Chapter 9. Software Troubles

What You’ll Learn

In this chapter, I’ll show you:

• How to update or roll back a driver

• How to reverse a software installation gone wrong

• How to manually uninstall a program

• How to remove or fix buggy software

• How to roll back your system to the way it was before something went wrong

• How to fix your email program

• How to wrangle Internet Explorer 7 into submission

Bad Software! Sit. Stay.

Dealing with software makes me think of dogs in a dog park. All these programs are running around in a system, generally quite peacefully and cooperatively. But sometimes a rogue application comes along, like a basset hound with attitude, and upsets the whole balance of the system, driving it into a growling, furry fury.

Remove the barking offender, and you can return the situation back to normal, though sometimes that can be difficult. And if he’s gobbled through last night’s nacho bowl, mind the grass.

Like a nacho-gobbling hound, software can leave some nasty disruptive code that fouls the system when it is uninstalled. So let’s look at a few situations where software on a system can be a bad dog:

• The operating system—Microsoft is notorious for shipping incomplete and buggy operating systems. Vista is no exception. Although Microsoft claims it’s the most tested operating system ever, the reality is there is a lot of new programming code inside it. So until Microsoft ships the first service pack for Vista (expect it by the end of 2007), Vista is going to be temperamental at times, especially for those that push the operating system hard.

• Applications—Microsoft is not the only culprit. Third-party applications from both big and small software vendors can have all kinds of bugs built into them. Companies are actively reworking their programs to make them Vista compatible, primarily to be compatible with the new security system. If you are trying to install a program on Vista that was previously installed on a Windows XP computer (or older), you could encounter some problems, as follows:

• The installer might crap out.

• The program or Vista might throw up all kinds of error messages during installation (see Figure 9.1).

Figure 9.1. Some programs won’t install nicely on Vista, such as this Adobe Flash plug-in.

• It might not work as advertised or as expected.

• Drivers—If your problem appears to be hardware-related—that is, if a piece of hardware attached to or part of the system doesn’t work the way it is supposed to—chances are, the problem is software-related. Hardware rarely works intermittently and then dies softly. It usually makes like Bruce Willis and dies hard. So when your system starts to behave erratically, it’s a good idea to go looking for a software cause first before jumping to conclusions.

The device might need a firmware or a driver update, or sometimes it just needs more resources from the system, such as memory or hard drive space.

System Restore: Easy, Quick Fix

If anything goes wrong on your system, your first line of defense is to use System Restore, a feature first introduced in Windows Me.

System Restore (see Figure 9.2) was the silver lining in Windows Me and a feature that fundamentally changed the Windows troubleshooting world.

Figure 9.2. Use System Restore to roll your computer back in time to the state it was in before something nasty happened.

Simply put, System Restore is a computer time machine. With a simple click, it can transition your system back into a state that it was at during a previous point in time. What’s nice is it reverts all system files, the Registry, and drivers back to the way they were on a specific day. And here’s the kicker—it will uninstall any new software, including applications that have gone Howard Dean on you.

System Restore will remove any new viruses or spyware (they are software too), and it will roll back drivers. It doesn’t touch your personal data, however. So, if you have received new email or created a new Word document or dumped new pictures from your digital camera, these data files remain untouched.

It would be kind of like restoring your house to the way it was before your new furniture (applications) was delivered and before the painters came through (Registry settings), although your freshly bought groceries (your personal data) in the fridge wouldn’t disappear.

So this solution is for you if you want your system to be like it was yesterday or last week or last month, before a set of problems started to manifest. Here’s how to use that technique:

1. Be sure you are logged in as an administrator.

2. Click the Windows button and type restore in the Search box.

3. A shortcut to System Restore appears in the Start menu. Click it to open the utility.

4. A UAC screen appears. Click Continue.

5. The System Restore utility will suggest a recommended restore point, but you can also choose other restore points available on the system.

6. If you choose the recommended restore point, click the Next button. You will be prompted to close any open programs and to save files you might have open. The computer will restart after you click the Finish button and will initiate the system restore.

7. If you select Choose a Different Restore Point, click the Next button and a list of available restore points for the previous five days shows up (see Figure 9.3).

Figure 9.3. You can bypass the recommended restore point and browse historical restore points from the previous five days or older.

8. Choose the one you want and then click Next, and you will be prompted to close any open programs and to save any files you might have open.

9. When you click the Finish button, the system restore routine is initiated, and the computer reboots.

10. After rebooting, your operating system is restored to the way it was at the time of the restore point without the problematic software that caused the problem in the first place.

Shadow Copy: New File Recovery Feature

One of the new features in Vista is kind of like a mini time machine for single files. You can revert any file to the way it was in the past using a previously saved version, which is preserved by Vista (and uses technology from the System Restore feature).

This is handy if you accidentally overwrite a file’s data with new data. Perhaps you were updating numbers in a spreadsheet, and you imported and saved data from a previous month by mistake, overwriting the data that was there.

Or maybe you were writing a report and the cat jumped up on the keyboard and somehow deleted a huge section of the file.

In either of these cases, you could revert to a version from yesterday or last week to recover a previous version of the file.

This would have been really useful when I was in college. There were a few times when I accidentally blew away essays and wished I could roll back the clock and get the data back.

1. To restore a shadow copy, right-click on any file you have created and choose Restore Previous Versions (see Figure 9.4).

Figure 9.4. Restore your files to a previously saved version by right-clicking on it and choosing Restore Previous Versions.

2. You’ll see a list of all the saved versions of the file.

3. Choose a version of the file you want to recover and click the Restore button (see Figure 9.5).

Figure 9.5. Choose a previous version of a file using the Shadow Copy feature and click to restore it.

4. The file will be restored to the way it was in that version.

Application Repair 101: Patch or Upgrade?

I once worked on a computer for an attractive woman who I had been attempting to, shall we say, romance. At stake was her ability to burn audio CDs. I was battling with an old version of Nero Express, and after doing driver and hardware checks and running Windows updates, it became clear that the ancient version of Nero was causing some issues.

I had three choices here:

1. Look for a software update from Nero.

2. Buy a newer version of the program—that is, upgrade it.

3. Distract her on a date at an Indian restaurant and make her think of other things, such as onion bhajis with mint raita.

I started with option #1, but the application was so old that that updates were long ago rolled into a new version.

Needless to say, option #2 was the way to go, though I combined it with option #3. We didn’t order any bhajis in the end, but the Chicken Tikka Masala was very nice. I got a kiss at the end of the date. (I can see my TV appearance now: “Geek romance tips with Andy Walker: Next on Oprah!”)

Before we’re done with this, here are a couple of thoughts on those software fixes and upgrades.

Software Fixes

Note the version number of the software product (learn more about software versions in Chapter 2, “Basic Vista Troubleshooting”) and see whether an incremental upgrade (sometimes called a patch or a bug fix) is available for the software. Often a software publisher will issue bug fixes in a patch or incremental upgrade available for free on its website that upgrades, say, version 5.0 to 5.1 or, in some cases, 5.0 to 5.01, if the patch is small.

Automatic Updates

Some programs have built-in menu items you can click to check for updates. The command pulls in fixes from the maker’s website and installs them for you.

These commands are usually found in the program’s Help menu. To use them, simply click the Check for Upgrade feature and let the program update itself (see Figure 9.6).

Figure 9.6. Check to see whether your software can update itself. Sometimes you’ll find update options in the Help menu, such as this one in Camtasia Studio 4.

Your program might also have an auto-update option that you can turn on. Be careful with this option, as the program might put an applet in your startup routine and System Tray, and these, as I have mentioned before in this book, hog memory.

Version Updates

Full version updates will require you to pay either an upgrade price to go from version 5.0 to 6.0 or full freight if your software is really old, going from, say, 5.0 to version 7.0. Investigate this on your software maker’s site and see whether a Vista-compatible version is available.

That said, a significant jump from an old software version forward to a newer release can sometimes hurt system performance. New applications are written for the current generation of computer hardware, so upgrading to a new version may result in slower performance because the application is written for faster systems with more memory.

Undo a Bad Software Install: The Simple Way

Vista has been a bit quirky with some older programs, which battle with Vista during the installation process because they were not written to cope with Vista’s new security features. Even if a program does successfully install, it may not work as you’d hope. Older applications can bung your Vista system like a four-year-old with access to a toilet paper mega pack.

When this happens, the uninstaller probably won’t work, and you’ll have to manually remove the application. That can be terrible news on a Saturday morning because it can mean hours of battling with your system (instead of something fun, like shopping for chocolate-filled snacks).

Before we roll through that onerous process, try the Last Known Good Configuration approach or a Safe mode uninstallation. I talk about these techniques next.

If they don’t work, I’ll show you how to do a manual software uninstall. Lucky you.

Last Known Good Configuration

One of the handy features of Windows Vista that was passed on from Windows XP is the Last Known Good Configuration fix.

It’s a startup option that uses the last set of system settings that started up Windows without a hitch. Each time Vista is shut down, it saves system settings to the Registry. This process is really handy if new software damages Windows or if a new driver (sometimes the driver for your video card can cause big problems) hangs the system on startup.

Here’s how to invoke the LKGC:

1. Shut down your computer and then power it back on.

2. When you see the lights on your keyboard flash, start tapping the F8 key repeatedly: Tap tap tap tap tap tap. Then you’ll see the Advanced Boot Menu Options screen.

3. Repeat the F8 trick until you get into the Advanced Boot Menu Options screen.

4. Once there, use the up/down arrow keys to highlight the entry entitled Last Known Good Configuration (Advanced) (see Figure 9.7) and press Enter.

Figure 9.7. Use the Last Known Good Configuration to restore Windows to working order when a software install goes bad.

This will get you back into the system so that you can uninstall the offending program or driver that created the problems.

Safe Mode: Water Wings for Windows

If Vista is still not loading or functioning properly, Safe mode is the next step. It’s a diagnostic mode that lets Windows load in a raw state with only a bare a minimum of applications and drivers.

Here’s how to use it:

1. Shut down your computer and power it back on.

2. After you see the lights on your keyboard flash, start pressing the F8 key repeatedly until you see the Advanced Boot Menu Options screen.

3. Use the cursor keys to navigate to Safe mode and press Enter. After some processing, Vista loads in Safe mode.

4. Log in with an administrator account or the account you created when you first installed Vista or when you set up your computer.

5. When the desktop comes up, it appears in a low resolution mode in which the icons and graphics are plain and chunky.

When you’re in Safe mode (see Figure 9.8), you can attempt to repair or uninstall the problematic program that triggered the trouble. There are two ways to get to the uninstall wizard, as follows:

Quick method:

1. Click the Windows button, type appwiz.cpl in the Search box, and press Enter.

2. This launches the Uninstall or Change a Program window.

Click method:

1. Click the Windows button, Control Panel, Programs, Programs and Features.

2. The Uninstall or Change a Program window opens.

Figure 9.8. Safe mode is a diagnostic state you can put Vista into so that you can troubleshoot.

In the Uninstall or Change a Program window, follow these steps:

1. Locate in the list the program that is causing you grief and click it to highlight it.

2. Right-click to uninstall, change, or repair—one or more of these options may be available.

3. Your first choice should be to uninstall the program.

4. Let the uninstaller go through its paces and then restart your computer and boot normally back into Vista.

With the application removed, it should now be easy to boot into Vista normally.

Undo a Bad Software Install: The Hard Way

If you are reading this, you’re either really bored and need an excuse to not cut grandpa’s toenails, or your computer could also be in really deep doo-doo, as my Mom would say. If the latter is true, I’m going to make this as simple as possible for you, but be prepared to geek out a bit. We have to do a bit of Vista surgery.

We have to go through a fairly involved series of steps to wipe out all data tendrils that a third-party program puts into the system. But like eating a chunky frog sundae, let’s take it one difficult spoonful at a time.

Here’s a summary of where we’re going:

1. Figure out where all the program’s parts are using the Windows Registry.

2. Locate application files and folders and delete them.

3. Find and remove any hidden application data in the C:Users folder.

4. Remove Startup items using the System Configuration utility (also called msconfig) and disable related system services and startup items.

5. Finally, clean up the Windows Registry.

All set? Great, let’s get to it. For this example, I’m going to remove Mozilla Firefox manually from the system. Why? Early on, Firefox did not play nice with Vista. In the release version, it does. But at the time, it was a good candidate for removal and was a piece of software that touched most of the system during its installation.

Before You Get Started

Before surgeons perform any kind of operation, they immobilize the patient (well, the good ones do). It’s not good practice to remove an appendix while the patient is eating a ham sandwich; likewise with your system. Make sure it is doing nothing else when you do a manual software removal.

Close the application you are going to remove. And close all programs that may be running on the system. You want the system to be running idle.

Set a Restore Point

The System Restore utility can be used to reset the system back to the way it was before this procedure if something goes wrong, so before proceeding, set a restore point. This gives the system a reference point to revert to if something goes wrong. (Don’t you wish you could set a relationship restore point before trying to tell your betrothed that those pants aren’t working for him/her?)

1. Be sure you are logged in as an administrator.

2. Click the Windows button.

3. Type System Restore and click it when it appears in the Start menu.

4. Click Continue on the UAC warning dialog.

5. When the System Restore Wizard pops open, click the Open System Protection link.

6. Ensure that the C: drive has a check mark next to it on the System Protection tab and then click the Create button at the bottom of the dialog box (see Figure 9.9).

Figure 9.9. Create a restore point in the System Protection tab of System Properties.

7. Name the restore point something memorable when the Create a Restore Point dialog box opens. Something like “Before I Removed Firefox Manually” will work. Then click Create. Vista examines the system and creates a restore point.

Clean Out the Registry: Phase 1

Next let’s snorkel into the Windows Registry and cut out all the references to the program we want to manually remove from the system.

Here’s how, using the hidden Windows applet called regedit or Registry Editor:

1. Log in to Vista as an administrator.

2. Click the Start button, type regedit, and press Enter.

3. Click Continue on the UAC dialog. The Registry Editor window opens.

4. Click Edit, Find. In the Find window, check the boxes next to Keys, Values, and Data (see Figure 9.10). In the Find What box, type firefox.

Figure 9.10. Use the Find function to search for Registry keys in the Registry Editor.

5. Click the Find Next button, and the first entry in the Registry that uses the word firefox is located in the Registry.

6. When you encounter the first item, inspect it to make sure it’s relevant. This is a judgment call that is tough to teach. With Firefox, I wiped out all Registry entries that used the keyword (see Figure 9.11), but use common sense. And if in doubt, don’t delete it, or be prepared to do a System Restore afterward if you remove something that causes problems.

Figure 9.11. This Registry key is just a reference to a URL and is unrelated to the application that is being manually deleted.

7. Tap the F3 key to jump from one entry to the next, deleting them as you go. This unlinks Firefox from the system. This is sort of like packing your personal belongings before you move out of a house. You take all your furniture and personal effects out of service, but everything is still in your home in boxes—they’re just not usable.

8. When you’re done, close out regedit and restart the system, and check to ensure that the system doesn’t cough or behave oddly.

Find Files and Folders, Then Nuke ‘em

Next, we’ll need to locate all the files and folders associated with Firefox. The best way to do this is to use Vista’s Search tool:

1. Click the Windows button, and then on the right side of the Start menu about halfway down, click Search.

2. When the Search window opens, click Advanced Search in the top-right corner.

3. When advanced search features appear, locate the Location pull-down, and choose Local Disk (C:) (see Figure 9.13), or whichever hard disk you use as your boot drive.

Figure 9.13. Use Vista’s advanced Search to locate the applications files you want to delete.

4. Across the top, click Other to exclude Email, Pictures, Documents, and Music.

5. Also be sure to check the Include Non-indexed, Hidden, and System Files box.

6. Way in the top-right corner, type firefox in the Search box with the “x” in it. This locates all the files on the system with the word firefox in them. Primarily, you’re looking for the file folders that contain the program files.

7. To select all the files and folders, hold down the Ctrl key and click each item you want to delete so they are multiselected. After the items are highlighted, release Ctrl and press the Delete key to send them to the Recycle Bin.

Remove Startup and Services Settings

As I mentioned in Chapter 3, “Startup and Shutdown Issues,” Vista has a tool called System Configuration (or msconfig) that gives you the capability to manage what is loaded into memory when Windows starts up (see Figure 9.14).

Figure 9.14. Use the System Configuration utility to eliminate any startup applets or services related to your application.

You’ll have to use msconfig to clear out any unwanted startup items related to the program you are removing:

1. Click the Windows button, type msconfig, and press Enter.

2. A UAC warning screen appears; click Continue.

3. The System Configuration utility launches.

4. The two tabs we are interested in are Services and Startup. Click on the Services tab and scroll down, looking for any entries called firefox.

5. You won’t find any because Firefox doesn’t create any services when it is installed. However, if you’re reading this, I am sure you’re following along to remove another application. So, see whether it has any services listed. If there is, uncheck it and click Apply; then click OK.

6. You might be prompted to restart the computer. Don’t do this yet—first click the Startup tab (see Figure 9.15).

Figure 9.15. Check the Startup tab and uncheck any items related to the application you are annihilating.

7. If a program launches when Vista starts, this is where it is triggered from. In the case of Firefox, there aren’t any items here. But check to see whether the program you are removing (or a related helper applet) is listed here. If so, uncheck it.

Next up, we have to check what services are running in memory. So don’t restart yet.

1. To see whether any related services are running, launch the Task Manager by simultaneously pressing the Ctrl, Alt, and Del keys.

2. A utility screen appears with a list of tasks. Click on Start Task Manager (see Figure 9.16).

Figure 9.16. Check your computer’s memory to see whether any related services are running using the Task Manager.

3. The screen switches back to your desktop, and the Task Manager dialog box appears.

4. Click on the Services tab and look for any entries related to the software you are uninstalling (in my example, it would be Firefox). There should be no entries because you have already removed most of the program, but if any survived, kill them off by right-clicking and choosing Stop Service.

Finally, you will want to restart your computer.

Clean Out Your Registry: The Clean Up

The next and final phase (you’re almost there) is to delete any remaining Registry entries that you couldn’t kill off before. You can’t delete Registry entries if they have associated processes running live in memory.

So this time, we’re going to clean any residual Registry entries by sweeping the Registry in Safe mode. Safe mode loads only the bare essentials into memory to run Vista, so it’s a good place to do precision Registry housecleaning.

So, let’s get that done:

1. Restart your system and enter Safe mode once again.

2. Launch the Registry Editor by clicking the Windows button. Type regedit and then press the Enter button.

3. Click Continue on the UAC warning, if it appears.

4. Click Edit, Find (or press Ctrl+F) to open the Find window.

5. In the Find window, make sure the Keys, Values, and Data boxes are checked.

6. In the Find What box, type the search term that you have been using to locate Registry keys related to the application you are removing. (I would type firefox here.)

7. Click the Find Next button, which shows the first entry associated with your keyword in the Registry.

8. When it finds the first entry, hit the Delete key (or right-click on the highlighted entry and click Delete).

9. Click Yes on the Confirm Value Delete dialog box to approve the action.

10. Tap the F3 key to find the next entry. Repeat this until all entries are deleted.

11. At this point your computer should be free of all remaining unwanted Registry entries.

Finally, restart your computer normally and check to see that the system is free of the deleted application and that it is working normally and without any further complications. If so, congratulations! You’re one step closer to being an elite Vista geek.

Drivers: Update or Roll ‘em Back

Drivers are pieces of software that help Windows communicate with a hardware device. All components (such as sound adapters, chipsets, or hard drives) and peripherals (mouse devices, printers, or webcams) require drivers to work effectively with an operating system.

You can think of the drivers as translators. If you went into a Polish restaurant and ordered pierogies in Warsaw, you wouldn’t get very far if the owner didn’t speak English. However, if you hired my champion cleaning lady Barbara (who speaks English and Polish, and makes my kitchen sparkle), she would make sure that you made the right choice about the pierogies, that you knew how much to pay, and that you could also convey your enthusiasm for the deliciousness of the meal and order extra sour cream.

That translator role Barbara would play in your pierogi acquisition is analogous to how a driver works between Windows and a device such as a printer or graphics card. When a device malfunctions or doesn’t work at all or is not recognized by Windows Vista (and other Windows versions), the problem usually stems from the driver.

So, the first step in any diagnosis is to go into your Device Manager to see what’s up. Here’s how to do that:

1. Log in as an administrator.

2. Click the Windows button and type Device Manager. When Device Manager appears in the Start menu, click it to launch the applet.

3. Click Continue in the UAC warning, and the Device Manager window launches (see Figure 9.17).

Figure 9.17. The Device Manager lists all the components and peripherals attached to your system.

Get Jiggy with the Device Manager

Your Device Manager contains all the physical devices connected to your system that use drivers. So, let’s get familiar with it. On a healthy system, you’ll see a list of all the device types with plus (+) marks next to them in the Device Manager. Click the plus mark, and the category opens up and displays the specific devices on your system that fit that category.

On a system with problems, you will see devices listed with a yellow triangle and exclamation mark in it (see Figure 9.18). This shows that the device has a problem.

Figure 9.18. This system’s Device Manager shows a problem with a multimedia audio controller. It’s actually a Creative X-Fi sound card that has a buggy driver.

The next step here is to determine what kind of device is malfunctioning and why it’s malfunctioning. The best-case scenario is when Windows is definitive about the device. If it lists a specific device with a specific brand and model number, all you have to do is right-click and choose Properties to get more information.

On the General tab, you’ll see a box labeled Device Status. This typically gives you a good idea as to what’s going on with the malfunctioning device (see Figure 9.19).

Figure 9.19. On the General tab, you’ll see Vista’s diagnosis for the malfunctioning device. Typically, it is a missing or incorrect driver.

Usually the message says that the device driver is missing. That’s handy because the remedy is simple: Go get a new driver and reinstall it.

Now a caveat here: I almost always circumvent the Vista driver repair routine (by clicking the Reinstall Driver button below the error message) because nine times out of ten, it doesn’t work. I’ll show you how to do it in a more reliable way in the section “How to Update a Driver,” later in this chapter.

However, here’s what happens if you click the Reinstall Driver button below the error box. You get a wizard dialog that suggests that you do one of the following:

• Search automatically for an updated driver.

• Browse the computer for a driver.

If you send Vista off to automatically search for a driver, it will connect to the Internet and go to the Windows Update routine to see whether there is a driver online that is appropriate and more current than what’s on your system now.

If it finds one, it’ll download it and attempt to update the system with it. That’s in a utopian world (where snacks are free and you never suffer coffee breath when you are kissing your supermodel girlfriend).

Sometimes, though, Vista has no clue what device it is dealing with (see Figure 9.20) and might have classified it as an unknown or “Other Device.”

Figure 9.20. Sometimes Vista has no clue what the device is, so you have to do a bit of detective work.

Now you have your work cut out for you.

There are five solutions:

• Investigate it—Chances are, you know what the malfunctioning device is because it’s not working. So, your job now is to locate the device brand, make, and model by physically inspecting the device and digging out the manual or box.

• Unplug USB devices—Often, the mystery device is a badly configured USB device. So, unplug all devices connected to your USB ports one at a time until the troublesome hardware listing disappears from the Device Manager.

• Update the chipset—It could be possible that the malfunctioning device is a difficult-to-identify chip or appliance inside the system case or attached to the motherboard. If this is the case, the best course of action is to go to the website of the computer maker and see whether there is a chipset update. This is a collection of drivers for all the various computer parts on the system that include the microprocessor and various motherboard bits.

• Delete it—A handy trick that often solves a device malfunction involves a quick tap of the Delete key. In the Device Manager, simply select the malfunctioning device and delete it. This pops open a Confirm Device Uninstall? box. Click OK, and the device’s entry is removed from the Device Manager. Then reboot your system. On bootup, Vista detects the device as a newly installed device and looks through its own driver stores to see whether there is a driver to match. If there is, it installs the driver and repairs the problem.

• Delete it and the associated driver—When you go to delete a device in Device Manager, when you get the Confirm Device Uninstall box, a check box might appear with a Delete the Driver Software for This Device warning. Check it, and when you delete the device, it removes any affiliated driver, which may help clear the way by removing a corrupt or malfunctioning driver. If you do this, you’ll have to install a new driver manually if Vista can’t locate one for you when you reboot.

How to Update a Driver

When it comes to updating or installing a driver, I usually skip all the automatic driver detection mechanisms inside Vista and go looking for a driver myself.

This takes a bit of patience and detective work, but it pays off with results. Here’s how:

1. Determine the make, model, and brand of the malfunctioning component. This is the hardest part because consumer-readable part numbers are not always printed on a device, although some of the more user-serviceable components such as PCI cards, graphics and sound adapters, and external components usually have stickers or inscriptions on them someplace that give you a clue as to what they are. Sometimes this information is actually listed in the entry about the device in the Device Manager.

2. Next, look up the manufacturer of your computer on the Internet, or if you bought the component separately from a retail store, go to the device maker’s website. Look for support, downloads, or even a link to drivers. Clever companies such as Lexmark link to them on their home page (see Figure 9.21).

Figure 9.21. Clever companies link to their drivers from their home page. In this case, access to drivers is linked on the navigation bar on Lexmark.com.

3. Locate the driver for Windows Vista if it is listed. If not, you might want to see whether a Windows XP driver is available instead. Although not ideal, XP drivers are sometimes an acceptable substitute if Vista drivers are not available.

4. Download the driver software package to your desktop or to a folder that you can locate later.

Driver Downloaded! Now Comes the Hard Work

After the file is downloaded, you may proceed a couple of ways depending on the file type (see the preceding sidebar for a demystification of this). If the driver comes with a setup file, double-click it to start an auto-install of the driver. Often, helper applications (such as printer applets or video adapter control panels) also install in this process. When it is finished, you may be prompted for a reboot. Even if you aren’t prompted, reboot anyway to refresh the system.

If the driver doesn’t have an installation routine, just extract it to a folder because there’s a bit more work to be done. Here’s how to proceed in that case:

1. Remember where you extracted the driver files to. I usually extract them to a folder in Documents or to a folder I create on the Desktop called “Drivers.”

2. Next, click the Windows button, type Device Manager, and click it to open it when it appears in the Windows menu.

3. Locate the device in the equipment list that needs a new or updated driver, right-click on it, and choose Update Driver Software (see Figure 9.22).

Figure 9.22. You can initiate a driver update from the context menu in Device Manager.

4. In the dialog box that pops open, select Browse My Computer for Driver Software. On the next screen, use the Browse button to locate the folder where you downloaded the driver files and check the Include Subfolders check box; then click Next.

5. At this point, Vista looks in the folder you have selected to locate the available drivers and either chooses the best one and auto-installs it, or queries you about which one you want to use. If no drivers appear in the folder, you might have to locate a different driver or ensure that you are pointing at the correct folder.

In Case of Emergency: Roll Back the Driver

Sometimes drivers have bugs, too, so if a buggy new driver becomes available, it can cause havoc when installed. If this happens, you might want to roll back to an older driver:

1. Go back into your Device Manager and right-click the device with a misbehaving driver.

2. Choose Properties; then select the Driver tab.

3. Next, look for the Roll Back Driver button (see Figure 9.23). If a previous generation of driver is available, you can click the button and the system will dump the existing driver and reinstall the older version.

Figure 9.23. If a driver doesn’t work properly, you can always go back to a previous version by rolling it back.

This should be a temporary fix, because you’ll want to come back later and install a newer driver when the device maker issues yet another new driver to replace the buggy version that caused the problem in the first place.

Windows Update: Mother of All Bug Fixers

The biggest software bug fixer you have at your disposal is Windows Update, the built-in utility that downloads Windows updates.

By default, Vista checks for updates once a day. You can find out about how it is set up for your computer as follows:

1. Click the Windows button and then type windows update.

2. Click Windows Update when it appears in the Start menu.

3. In the Windows Update window, click Change Settings on the left margin.

4. The schedule that Vista follows for updates can be customized here.

Although most of Microsoft’s fixes that come through Windows Update are useful, and sometimes even necessary, occasionally a fix causes more problems than it solves.

Some geeks opt to turn off the automatic download and update feature in Windows Update and set it to Check for Updates But Let Me Choose Whether to Download and Install Them (see Figure 9.24). If you’re not a bona fide, beanie-wearing geek and know exactly what you’re doing, I recommend that you leave the automatic download and update feature enabled in case you miss a really critical update. It could mean the difference between owning a protected system resilient to the latest digital nasty or coming home to Internet roadkill.

Figure 9.24. You can set Windows Update to check for updates but let you choose whether to download and install them.

Undo Windows Update Hot Fixes

If Windows Update has slurped down a fix that has given your system an ice headache, you can remove it.

Here’s how:

1. Click the Windows button, type Programs and Features in the Search box, and click it when it appears in the Start menu.

2. On the left margin, click Installed Updates.

3. Click once on the update you want to remove.

4. An Uninstall button appears; click it, and you are prompted to confirm (see Figure 9.25).

Figure 9.25. If a Windows update causes problems on your system, you can uninstall it.

5. Click Yes, and a UAC screen appears if you are logged on as the administrator. If not, you are prompted for an administrator password to continue.

6. Restart your computer.

At this point, I have to flap my arms around a bit to get your attention, because you still have one more chore to do. If you don’t do this next step, the next time Windows Update runs, it will install the fix you just removed.

The update will reinstall itself if you have Automatic Updates enabled and turned on for Windows Update. So, here’s how to stop the update from coming back:

1. Go back to Windows Update and click the Check for Updates button on the left margin. Vista calls home to Microsoft to get a list of updates.

2. Now click on the View Available Updates and look for the update you just removed in the list.

3. Right-click on it and choose Hide Update. You’ll see a UAC screen, so confirm the action, and you’re done.

Troubleshooting a Software Installation

Vista has a whole new security system in place to thwart malware (viruses and spyware and their odious brethren) from installing quietly in the background. Any system modification including software installation requires elevated permissions on the system. By that, I mean you have to be logged in as an administrator even for basic system changes.

So, here are some steps to take in any software installation, but specifically for software that was designed for an older version of Windows that predates Vista.

1. Log in as an administrator.

2. If the application is being installed from the Web, download the installation file to your desktop or another place you can browse to quickly.

3. If the installation file is on an installation CD or DVD, browse to the installation file on the disk.

4. Next, right-click on the installation file and choose Run As Administrator (see Figure 9.26). This is true even if you are logged in as an administrator. This tells the system to elevate the rights around the installation of the file and can reduce errors as the installer application copies files to your system’s hard disk.

Figure 9.26. Right-click on an application’s installer and choose Run as Administrator to give some older applications enough of a nudge to install on Vista.

This installation technique should allow you to install a vast majority of legacy applications on Vista. Some will still crap out, but it should give you some oomph to get a few of your older pre-Vista applications to install on Vista.

Installation Successful! But, It Doesn’t Work

Sometimes you can successfully install an application and you’ll be all proud of yourself, and then when you go to run the program, it coughs and splutters and can’t talk properly to Vista. Some features such as printing may not work, or you may have a hard time saving data generated by your grumpy old application. The rule of thumb here is that the older the application, the less likely it is going to be compatible with Vista. Heck, you wouldn’t install an old 8-track stereo in your shiny new Audi TT. Well, maybe you would, but you have to think that you’re asking for trouble. So it is with Vista.

Microsoft has anticipated this, however (perhaps because some of its developers still have extensive 8-track collections in their Audi TTs), and has built a compatibility mode into Vista so that you can run older applications on Vista.

You can tell Vista to communicate with the program in one of six modes. Vista pretends to be any of the following operating systems when it interacts with the old-timer:

• Windows XP (SP2)

• Windows Server 2003 (Service Pack 1)

• Windows 2000

• Windows NT 4.0 (Service Pack 5)

• Windows 98 / Windows Me

• Windows 95

That said, the compatibility mode is not consistent. Some software just won’t install or will throw up so many objections and errors when it does a run that it’ll drive you to shovel the walk or mow the lawn (as seasonally and climatically applicable) as a means to escape the skull-gnawing aggravation that it causes.

In a bit, I’ll show you how to run your application in compatibility mode. First, however, you’ll need to “unhide” known file extensions in the Folder Options View tab, so you can look at a file and see its file extension and know whether it’s an executable file with an .exe file extension.

1. To do this, click the Windows button and type Folder Options; then click the View tab.

2. In the Advanced settings box, scroll to Hidden Files and Folders and select Show Hidden Files and Folders (see Figure 9.27).

Figure 9.27. To reveal hidden system files, use the option in the Advanced Settings box to show them.

3. Click Apply and then OK.

Revealing this information will help you discern whether your program launches from an .exe file. Now you’re ready to work with compatibility mode.

Program Compatibility Wizard

Vista comes with a Program Compatibility Wizard (see Figure 9.28) that lets you analyze the programs on your system and define what compatibility mode settings it should work in.

Figure 9.28. Use the Program Compatibility Wizard to tweak programs into running like they did on older Windows platforms.

To use the wizard:

1. Log in as an administrator.

2. Click the Windows button.

3. Type Run in the Search box and click Run when it appears.

4. In the open box, type this nasty piece of work: mshta.exe res://acprgwiz.dll/compatmode.hta.

Set Compatibility Manually

If you’d like to set a program’s compatibility mode manually, here’s how:

1. Log in as an administrator.

2. Right-click on the program’s shortcut or preferably browse to the executable file that starts the program.

3. Right-click on the shortcut or executable file and choose Properties.

4. Click the Compatibility tab.

5. Check the Run This Program in Compatibility Mode For box and then choose the operating system the application was designed for (see Figure 9.29).

Figure 9.29. Right-click on a program and click the Compatibility tab to fine-tune how it launches.

6. There are more settings you can check. If they are applicable to the application, enable them. See the next section.

Clever Compatibility Settings

When setting the compatibility mode for an application, you can enable several settings. Here’s a rundown:

• Run in 256 colors—Some older programs don’t know what to do with all the colors available in modern machines, so this setting gives an application a limited set to work with.

• Run in 640×480 screen resolution—Run the application in a lower resolution. In this case, it executes in a small window. This is also handy for legacy games.

• Disable visual themes—If you have problems with Vista menus or buttons inside the old application, use this mode to correct it.

• Disable desktop composition—This turns off the Aero effects, including window transparency and the other yummy graphical effects introduced in Vista.

• Disable display scaling on DPI settings—This turns off application resizing if large fonts are in use and mess with the way it looks.

Helpful Hints: Problem Reports and Solutions

Microsoft has introduced a new troubleshooting feature that is sometimes useful for figuring out problems with software or drivers on your system. It’s called Problem Reports and Solutions. After an application crash, or even a blue screen, the system will attempt to connect to Microsoft and report the incident using the Internet. If it is a known issue, Microsoft will list a problem report and a suggested solution.

To check this list:

1. Click the Windows button and type problem in the Search box.

2. When Problem Reports and Solutions appears in the Start menu, click it to start it up (see Figure 9.30).

Figure 9.30. You can use the Problem Reports and Solutions tool to find out whether Microsoft has figured out fixes for issues that have disrupted your system.

3. You see fixes you can install under Solutions (see Figure 9.31).

Figure 9.31. Microsoft might offer a solution to a problem you reported that can fix it.

4. Under that, check Information About Other Problems. This is a list of issues that have further information. Click each one to see a status of the issue. Sometimes there are hints on how you can remedy them.

5. On the left, click Check For New Solutions to discover more solutions if available.

6. Unreported problems can be submitted by clicking See Problems to Check.

White Window of Death

You’ve heard of the blue screen of the death. It’s the error screen you see when Windows crashes hard and then reboots.

Vista introduces a new crash type that I call the white window of death (WWD). When a program or application freezes, Vista responds by making the window inactive and whiting it out with a sheen of opaque fog (see Figure 9.32). It looks like San Francisco in July. But it’s not bad weather in your computer—Vista is just trying to wrangle a misbehaving program.

Figure 9.32. The white window of death means that your application has crashed.

The sequence that follows is a variation on the following:

1. The application freezes and whites out.

2. You see a dialog box where Vista reports the problem to Microsoft via the Internet.

3. Vista either offers a solution or offers to shut down the application.

4. In the case of a Vista component like IE7, it will attempt to restart it.

5. Sometimes, Vista will give you the option to shut it down or wait for it to respond.

What You Can Do

Sometimes a little patience and a click on the Wait for This Program to Respond option can bring the program back from the brink. Sometimes you have to suck it up, kill off the program, and restart it.

Other ways to remedy a WWD are the following:

• Look for an update or patch for the application from the program’s publisher.

• Upgrade to a Vista version of the program.

• Run the program in Windows compatibility mode, which I mentioned earlier in the chapter. Set compatibility mode to the version of the operating system the application was designed for.

• Live with the occasional crash.

Fix Your Email

One of the big crises that can go wrong with a specific application is a broken email program. When my email application is not working, I kind of freak out, because if there is one thing I rely on in my life, it’s my email. So, if you fail to be able to access your email, let me take you through the steps on how to check your settings and repair your email client.

I’m going to show you how in Windows Mail (formerly Outlook Express) because it comes standard on Vista; however, the repair concepts are fairly similar on most email programs, so whether you use Outlook, Windows Mail, Eudora, or even Mozilla’s Thunderbird, the fixes are pretty much the same.

What follows assumes you receive email through a POP3 email account and send it out through an SMTP server. This setup is standard with most Internet service providers.

So, let’s get on with fixing your email. I’ve divided the troubleshooting routines into two sections, as follows:

• I can’t receive email.

• I can’t send email.

I Can’t Receive Email

Let’s troubleshoot your POP3 mail account. You may use Outlook, Outlook Express (renamed Windows Mail in Vista), Mozilla’s Thunderbird, Eudora, or any other email program for this, but for simplicity’s sake, I’m going to use Windows Mail (see Figure 9.33) to walk you through this.

Figure 9.33. Windows Mail is the email program that ships with Vista. It’s a new version of Outlook Express, but renamed.

First, be sure that you gather your email settings from your Internet service provider (or if separate, the company that provides your email service). They should have provided you with a sheet of information when you signed up. Without this, you’ll have trouble fixing the problem.

You’ll need the following information:

• Address of the incoming email server

• Address of the outbound email server

• Email account username

• Email account password

• Authentication settings required for the outbound email server

With that info in hand, let’s get into the fun part: fixing email.

Let’s first review some common reasons why Windows Mail may not be receiving email:

• Your incoming email server address is wrong.

• Your email username or password is incorrect.

• Your incoming email server is not reachable (that is, it’s broken).

• Your computer is not connected to the Internet.

• Your email inbox on the server is full.

These are the most common issues you’ll encounter when your email is all bunged up. So, let’s go through the settings to make sure everything is set up as it is supposed to be. This will correct the preceding issues and restore your email to good working order.

1. Open Windows Mail. You can find it in the Start menu, or if not, simply type Mail on the Start menu search bar and click Windows Mail when it appears in the menu.

2. Click the Tools menu, then Accounts.

3. Click on the mail account you are having trouble with to select it and click the Properties button.

4. There are five tabs in the Properties window: General, Servers, Connection, Security, and Advanced. These tabs are almost identical to the ones featured in Outlook Express 6.0. The fields and options have been carried over into Windows Mail. Let’s look at these one by one.

General Tab: Generally, This Isn’t a Problem

Let’s start with the General tab (see Figure 9.34). It contains information about your email account. These settings should not impact your ability to send and receive messages; however, be sure that the Email Address and Reply Address are correct as these are embedded in your outbound emails so that a reply is correctly addressed by the person who receives from you.

Figure 9.34. The General tab contains basic information about your email account.

Servers Tab: Post Offices for Your Email

Next let’s check the Servers tab (see Figure 9.35). This is where the addresses of your email servers are. There are two critical servers. One is for incoming email. This is the sending server, and it is called a POP3. The other is called an SMTP server, and it’s the outbound server (more on this in the section on p. 286, “I Can’t Send Email”).

Figure 9.35. The Servers tab is where the addresses of your mail servers are kept in Windows Mail.

It’s here that you will need the address of the server that handles your inbound email.

I use a service for my Cyberwalker.com mail called Everyone.net, so my POP3 server is pop.everyone.net. Yours may be pop3.your-isp.com or mail.your-isp.com or a variation on that.

The most common problem with broken email is a bad username or password combination. So, check that in the Servers tab as well and compare it to the info provided by your ISP. And retype your password just to be sure.

Your password will be case sensitive, so make sure your CAPS lock is not on and that you type the password accurately. You will also see an option that says Log On Using Secure Password Authentication. Leave this unchecked unless your ISP asks you to explicitly turn it on.

Also check Remember Password so you don’t have to type it each time Windows Mail checks for new correspondence.

You’ll also see a field here in which to enter your SMTP or outbound server. I’ll talk about that in the next section.

For now, make sure that all these settings are correct. If they are, you should be able to receive email. Test it and see.

Connection Tab: Is the Internet On?

If you can browse the Web with your web browser, you shouldn’t have to worry too much about this tab.

If you want to set up an alternative connection for email to use, perhaps a dial-up account, check the Always Connect to This Account Using option and then use the Add button to create a new connection.

If you suspect your Internet connection is the source of your email problems, be sure to troubleshoot it using Chapter 10, “Internet Disconnect,” on p. 299.

Security Tab: For Advanced Users

Secure email for Windows Mail isn’t inside the scope of this book. It’s a pretty advanced topic, so I won’t go into it here. Most users won’t have to worry about it. However, if you don’t use secure email, but there’s information in the Certificate fields of this tab, remove anything in them.

Advanced Tab: Where the Fun Stuff Is Kept

The Advanced tab is a useful, but dangerous, place in Windows Mail. Here’s a few of the options explained, so that you can check that nothing is out of the ordinary.

Ports

The area where you may suffer problems here is the Server Port Numbers. These are numerical electronic doorways in and out of your computer and the server at your ISP on the Internet (see Figure 9.36).

Figure 9.36. You adjust your inbound and outbound network ports for email in the Advanced tab.

The default port for Outgoing mail is port 25. For incoming mail, it’s 110. Typically the defaults are fine. However, in some cases, your ISP may offer alternative ports to communicate on—most commonly for SMTP or outbound servers. (Check the next section for more information on this.)

SSL

If your email provider gives you the option to communicate with its server using a secure connection, you may be instructed to turn on This Server Requires a Secure Connection (SSL). These should be unchecked unless you have been told to check them by your ISP.

Server Timeouts

The Server Timeouts connection is used to adjust how long to wait for a response from an email server until the attempt to communicate is abandoned. The default setting should be one minute, or more if your email client occasionally fails to connect to your email server. Making this setting longer essentially makes Windows Mail more patient before giving up communication.

Delivery

Your options in the Delivery area should be set based on personal preference. However, a misstep here can cause problems.

When Leave a Copy of Messages on Server is checked, Windows Mail grabs only a copy of the new emails and leaves the original emails on the incoming email server. If this option isn’t checked, Windows Mail grabs a copy of the email from the incoming server and puts it in your inbox in Windows Mail and then deletes the original on the incoming server.

It’s useful to leave a copy on the server if you have two or more computers that fetch copies of your email.

Be sure if you use this feature, that you activate Remove from Server After X Day(s) because otherwise, your email on the server will build up and eventually exceed the server’s allocated space for your account. If this happens, the ISP will suspend your email service.

I Can’t Send Email

Chances are your biggest email woes will come when you try to send email. Sometimes Windows Mail will refuse to send email, and it will just sit in your outbox.

There are a few reasons why this might happen:

• Your outbound email server is offline.

• Your outbound email server address is incorrect.

• Your outbound email server requires authentication or you have to check inbound email first to trigger the outbound mail server.

• Your ISP won’t let you send email through a third-party SMTP server.

• The attachment on your email is many megabytes in size and you lose the connection or the server times out before it can be sent.

Are You Online?

First things first, check to see whether you have a good Internet connection. If you can receive mail and surf the Web with your web browser, you know this isn’t an issue.

If your connection is intermittent because it’s wireless or unreliable, consider switching to a wired or more reliable connection (if possible) to eliminate a bad connection as the source of your problems.

Is Your Outbound Server Address Correct?

Check to make sure your SMTP server address is correct. Your ISP can provide this server address. Mine starts with SMTP, as in smtp.everyone.net (see Figure 9.37); however, yours may be a variation on that. Your SMTP server could be mail.your-isp.com or smtpX.your-isp.com, where X is a number or another word.

Figure 9.37. Check to make sure your SMTP server address is correct.

Check Server Authentication

In a bid to avoid misuse of their servers by spammers, some ISPs require that you log in to their outbound server before sending email. If this is the case, be sure that Windows Mail is set up to do that. Here’s how:

1. Go back into your Email Account by clicking Tools, Accounts, and then selecting your email account and clicking Properties.

2. Click the Servers tab, and then under Outgoing Mail Settings, check My Server Requires Authentication and click the Settings button.

3. In the dialog box that opens, you have two choices, and the first is Use the Same Settings As My Incoming Mail Server. If your email provider requires you to authenticate your outbound server, this is the most likely setting (see Figure 9.38).

Figure 9.38. If your sent email is stalled in your outbox, your outbound email server might require authentication.

4. If you are using an SMTP server affiliated with a different company than the company from which you get your inbound email (rare, but possible), or your email provider asks you to use a different username and password, you’ll need to choose Log On Using and specify a different username and password affiliated with that server.

Is Your Attachment Too Big?

Hey, I’m not being dirty here. I am talking about file attachments. If you thought otherwise, you’re a dirty monkey.

So let’s get back on track here. If you are sending an outbound email, and it is stuck in your Windows Mail outbox, it could be jammed because of the file attachment. Large attachments can cause havoc with SMTP servers. Often they will time out before an email can be sent, especially if you have a slow Internet connection.

I don’t recommend that you send attachments bigger than about 5MB, and even something that large can cause problems on a slow connection (see Figure 9.39). Plus, the recipient will hate you for clogging her inbox. You don’t want to annoy grandma the day she is baking pies.

Figure 9.39. Don’t be a weenie and send big honking email attachments or your friends will hate you.

Also, consider this: If you send a too-large attachment to a person with an account on a corporate server, the server might trash the whole email and attachment or clog the account. So, try not to send that YouTube video of your uncle falling out of a canoe to your Wall Street pal, because it might clog his inbox and result in him missing a million dollar email from Donald Trump. Yep, your attachments could destroy someone’s career.

Instead, use a service like YouSendIt.com to transfer big files.

Modify Your SMTP Port Number?

If your outbound email stays in your outbox and won’t budge, it could be because you use an email provider that is not the same as your Internet service provider. ISPs don’t like you using an SMTP server other than their own.

There are two remedies for this. One is to use your ISP’s SMTP server as your outbound email server (and authenticate as necessary) or change the default port for outbound email.

Most ISPs expect you to use port 25 for your SMTP server, and so they block any activity on that port unless you’re using their SMTP server. You can get around this, however, by using a different port. Some email providers let you communicate with their SMTP servers on an alternate port.

For example, my email provider, Everyone.net, lets me set up my email client to communicate on port 2525 (see Figure 9.40). To use this workaround, find out what your email provider’s alternate SMTP port is; then go back into your email account in Windows Mail (this also works for other email clients) and click the Advanced tab.

Figure 9.40. Use an alternate SMTP port number if your ISP blocks third-party SMTP servers.

Under the Server Port Numbers area, change the outgoing mail (SMTP) port number to the alternate offered by your email provider. Don’t forget to restart your email client and re-create any emails stuck in your outbox. You should now be able to send email freely.

Other Email-Blocking Culprits

If none of this worked, you might consider that your email program is not the problem. Third-party security applications, including antivirus scanners and antispyware scanners, can sometimes block email activity. Software firewalls can also cause grief.

If you use any of these applications, consider removing them (temporarily) to see whether they are the source of the problem. If you have set up two computers to check the email account, be sure they aren’t checking at the same time. One will cause the other to error out (see Figure 9.41).

Figure 9.41. If two computers check the same email account at the same time, one of them will produce this error.

Also, a double firewall can be problematic. If you are using a third-party software firewall (perhaps inside a security suite from Norton or McAfee), be sure to turn off the built-in Windows Firewall. They might conflict.

Here’s how:

1. Log in as an administrator.

2. Click the Window menu and type firewall; then click Windows Firewall when it appears in the menu.

3. Click Change Settings.

4. Click your way through the UAC challenge.

5. In the firewall settings, select Off (Not Recommended) to turn off the Windows Firewall and click OK (see Figure 9.42).

Figure 9.42. If you use a third-party firewall, you don’t need the Windows Firewall, so switch it off.

6. A restart of your system and Windows Mail might be necessary.

If you have trouble with a stalled email in your outbox, be sure to re-create it in a new email and delete the original from the outbox.

Stuck emails often will stay stuck. So, it is better to remove the email from the outbox and make a new duplicate; then make email client changes and modifications to your security software (including firewalls), and then send the new email.

Fix Your Browser

My psychic powers are pretty potent when it comes to your computer, and I know the following things about you:

1. You’ve seen naked people on your computer (even if it wasn’t on purpose).
2. There are toast crumbs in your keyboard.
3. You use your web browser every time you turn on your computer.

See, I told you I was psychic.

My psychic powers also help me see into the future. Let me demonstrate. Put your fingers on the following sentence and hold them there while you read on:

PUT FINGERS HERE.

Let’s see. Yes, I know that your future contains some frustration. It’s probably related to Internet Explorer 7. The web browser might make you say some very bad words, even if you are a nun.

Hasn’t happened just yet? Just wait!

Vista comes with a new web browser version called Internet Explorer 7 (see Figure 9.43). It has had a significant overhaul since IE6, which was Microsoft’s last browser designed for Windows XP.

Figure 9.43. Windows Vista comes with a new web browser called Internet Explorer 7.

Microsoft’s web browsers have been a source of a lot of grief for Windows users, especially in XP. If your system has ever been infected by spyware or a virus, it likely came from one of two places: your email account or your web browser.

So, to address this, Microsoft built both Windows Mail (which I discussed in the previous section) and Internet Explorer 7 with security in mind.

New security features bring new problems. So let’s look at some of the issues you might face when using IE7.

I Can’t Download Add-ins

Some web pages will try to download extra pieces of software through your web browser. They might include mini-games, applets to enhance web pages’ functionality, or even a little chat application.

This software is delivered through a mechanism called ActiveX that was well exploited by malware developers to install viruses, spyware, and Trojans on Windows XP (and earlier) systems.

In Vista and IE7, Microsoft has gone to great lengths to limit invisible downloads. It used to be that if you encountered a web page that had ActiveX, the add-in could be installed automatically. Not anymore.

A new feature called Protected mode has been added to IE7. When enabled, it demotes the privileges of the browser below that of the user who is logged in. The thinking is that a web browser, which is a fast lane to the content on the Internet, should not have all the rights and privileges of a user who is logged in as an administrator.

So, a web page has to work really hard to install add-ins on your system, without alerting you first. This is a good thing. However, when you encounter an add-in, you’ll have to submit to a series of steps and alerts in Vista to allow its installation. Sometimes no matter what you do, an add-in installation will fail.

To remedy this, take the following steps to turn off Protected mode:

1. In Internet Explorer 7, click the Tools menu.

2. Choose Internet Options.

3. Click the Security tab and look for the Enable Protected Mode check box at the bottom of the dialog box (see Figure 9.44).

Figure 9.44. If you run into problems installing IE add-ins, turn off IE7’s Protected mode.

4. Uncheck it and click OK.

5. Make a note of what web page you are on and close IE.

6. Start IE again. At the bottom sill of the new IE window, you will see Protected Mode: Off.

Now attempt to return to the page when the add-in tried to install and attempt the download again. This time it should install properly.

After you are finished installing the add-in, be sure to turn on Protected mode again.

I Can’t Install Add-ins

Even if you can download an add-in by turning off Protected mode, sometimes it won’t install properly because of Vista’s security issues. To fix this, be sure to download it to your desktop first. Choose the Save option instead of the Run option when prompted. This will place the add-in as an installation file on your system.

Locate the item on your desktop, right-click on it, and choose Run As Administrator to install it without any further security hiccups.