"The program don't support the project"

I have recently upgraded to Windows 10 on an eight year old laptop which previously was running Windows 7. Everything appears to have gone well and I am enjoying the new operating system. However, every time I boot up and get to the desktop a small box appears on the screen with the following wording "Warning. The program don't support the project" with an OK button and an X close button. Clicking on either of these closes the box and I simply carry on as normal. Has anyone else experienced this strange message? What concerns me is the bad grammar "don't support" and I am concerned it might be some sort of malware.

I attach a screenshot.

Hello there, Marrea. Welcome to the forum.

Personally I've never seen that. I suggest you run this: DISM - Repair Windows 10 Image - Windows 10 Forums

Then this: SFC Command - Run in Windows 10 - Windows 10 Forums

Please report how those go.

The use of improper grammar would concern me as well. Definitely not Microsoft's MO.

Rocky said:

The use of improper grammar would concern me as well. Definitely not Microsoft's MO.

Yes, and run a security scan as well, Marrea.

I agree, Looks like a virus, check all of your startup programs.

HippsieGypsie

Many thanks for your welcome to the forum. I ran DISM as you suggested and here are the results:

C:\WINDOWS\system32>Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth

Deployment Image Servicing and Management tool
Version: 10.0.10240.16384

Image Version: 10.0.10240.16384

[==========================100.0%==========================]
No component store corruption detected.
The operation completed successfully.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth

Deployment Image Servicing and Management tool
Version: 10.0.10240.16384

Image Version: 10.0.10240.16384

No component store corruption detected.
The operation completed successfully.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.10240]
(c) 2015 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>sfc /scannow

Beginning system scan. This process will take some time.

Beginning verification phase of system scan.
Verification 100% complete.

Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violations.

So nothing appears to be amiss there.

Following that I did a complete computer scan with AVG 2015 which found no threats.

Finally I ran Malwarebytes, which reported three PUPs in Registry Keys:

HKLM\SOFTWARE\TWEAKBIT\ATPopups
HKLM\SOFTWARE\TWEAKBIT\ATUpdaters
HKLM\SOFTWARE\TWEAKBIT\GoogleAnalyticsPackage

It successfully quarantined those.

Tweakbit was a program I installed to try and find a driver for my ATI Radeon X1600 card because, during the installation of Windows 10, Windows replaced this with MS’s own Basic Display Adapter. However, as it was unable to find a driver, I uninstalled Tweakbit, but it had obviously left some traces in the Registry as program uninstallations often do. I managed to fix the graphics driver problem by installing the Vista driver which I had on a CD which came with the laptop when I originally bought it. Much to my surprise it works in Windows 10!

XweAponX

The Startup tab in Task Manager lists the following:

Apple Push
AVG User Interface
CIR Application for Disti (the publisher is stated to be MTC, which I think may be short for Mitac, the makers of my laptop)
CLIStart.exe (I think this is something to do with ATI Catalyst Control Center)
Microsoft OneDrive
O&O DiskImage Tray
QuickTime Task
Realtek HD Audio Manager
ROC_roc_ssl_v12.exe (I think this is something to do with AVG)
Synaptics Pointing Device starter
Synaptics TouchPad Enhancements
VProtect Application (I think this is something to do with AVG)

Do any of those look like they might be causing a problem?

“The program don’t support the project” is still appearing on the Desktop each time I start the computer. I am now wondering whether I should perform a clean installation of Windows 10 to see if that will get rid of this annoyance (my present installation was via the “Upgrade this PC now” option). What do you think?

Hello, Marrea. I see you're making progress. Glad you caught those pups, although that doesn't seem to be the problem. Do you remember installing anything that may have added other programs/crapware without your knowledge?

Since you have AVG is Defender completely shut off? Just for grins, try disabling AVG and anything related reboot to see if that's it. Do not open a browser to go online until AVG is enabled again.

If that's not it, leave it (them) disabled, still do not open a browser to go online, disable everything but the Synaptics and reboot to see.

If that does it, turn them on one by one rebooting in between to see which one does show the warning.

Remember to turn AVG back on before opening a browser, which might take another reboot.

A fresh install may be in order. Surely better than upgrades.

@Marrea

You're welcome. :)

Good research there! It states it may be disguised as a virus and we don't if it's legitimate. If so, what program uses it. This is beyond my knowledge, so I can't answer your question as to whether or not to download and run the scan. However, I can point you to a member that may know. He is a security expert who works for a large corporation. Write a visitor message message to View Profile: azasadny - Windows 10 Forums linking this thread to him. I'm quite sure he'd be willing to help. Someone else may have an answer for you also.

if it still pops up, try adwcleaner. It works great at detecting things other malware scanners do not see.

Downloads - AdwCleaner - ToolsLib