Replies

Not intrending to hijack this thread, but ruirib mentioned consent.exe, and I have been suspicious of that file recently. I have had very high HD activity that slowed my computer down, and when I checked Task Manager, I could see consent.exe at the top of the list for a brief time. When I enabled “show all users”, I could see consent.exe showing through the dialog box (“Do you want to let this program change settings…) and the user column for it was blank. If I said no to the dialog box, consent.exe was not present in the Task Manager once the dialog box closed

Should I make this a separate post, and if so, in what forum topic? Sorry – hope this wasnt too rude – grasping at straws

Thanks, Gary

Thanks Peter S and Rick. Checking for McAfee shrapnel is a good idea, and that is a different URL for the Norton Removal Tool than the one I had. I’m saving this stuff.

Gary

My results are rather anticlimactic – MaAffee appeared to uninstall cleanly, loaded Zone Alarm from the CD, Malwarebytes from the internet, and was having enough success to try uninstalling Norton Online Backup from Windows Programs and features, as suggested by mrjimphelps. This also appeared to be a clean uninstall. I did this prior to getting CLiNT’s post about processes in Task Manager, which sounded like a good idea. I checked Task Manager later but didnt find anything that I could associate with any of the preloads. After that uninstalled most of the other junk that was preloaded, and seem to be in good shape. Is there anything I need to check to see if there are any old software parts laying around? Thanks to Zig, CLiNT, and mrjimphelps. Keeping the Norton and REVO uninstallers in mind for the future, but dont plan to be intentionally loading anything Norton in the near future.

Thanks, Gary

Zig and CLiNT – Thanks for the suggestions. I tried the Norton uninstaller from majorgeeks last night, but downloaded to another computer, copied to a CD, and from that to the new computer, instead of downloading directly to the desktop of the new computer as instructed, since I am not yet virus-protected or patched so did not want to connect to the internet. Apparently that doesnt work, as I got a message that the file (only 254 KB) was corrupted. I was hoping to uninstall Norton Online Backup and McAffee and install Zone Alarm before connecting to the internet. Also, the latest patch on the computer when I got it was from March 2012, so I’ve got a lot of patching to do, too. I patch my other computers manually, using Susan Bradley’s recommendations, but am not looking forward to 10 months worth of manual patching.

My plan now is to try to uninstall McAffee, install Zone Alarm from a CD, patch, then connect to internet, try Norton uninstaller and check into REVO. Both Norton and McAffee are already in the start menu, so does that mean that they are already activated? I guess so, since control panel says that the firewall is being managed by McAffee.

Does my plan sound reasonable?

Thanks for any suggestions, Gary

Additional question: Can McAffee be easily and cleanly installed by using Windows7?

Uh…no, it can’t or no, it doesn’t mean that. Sorry if that sounds a little dense.

Gary

Different topic in the same column: Further down in the column, Susan warns us that we should be sure that Office 2010 is up to date before installing Windows 8 over Win7. Does this mean that Office 2007 can’t be used with Win8?

Thanks, Gary

Maybe a dead issue now, but FWIW, I can paste directly to email or go through Word without saving. Win7 WLM 2009

Susan Bradley said to go ahead with NET1 and 2 for Win XP and 3 and 4 for Win7. I have a NET3.5 SP1 (KB2657424)offered for one of my XP machines. This came out in MS11-100. Should this be held or installed? Thanks for any help.
Gary

MarciaG – I had several of those that I couldnt figure out, but they turned out to be things that didnt apply (e.g., “Cannot print on Canon printers…”, etc.) and I didnt make good enough notes when I passed them over without hiding them. Not implying that is your case, but it is difficult to find an efficient way to keep track of all this stuff. I have a big spreadsheet of all the MS11-nnn, kb# in the Patch Watch column, kb# that was actually correct for my machines, etc., and it still slips through the cracks.

My question:

What about the IE8 compatibility view for Win7 x64 (2598845) and three updates for MS Office 2007 and Excel 2007 (2596651, 2596789, 2596596 all December 2011)? Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Gary

I have no .net files listed in the installed programs and updates list on my one-year-old x64 Win7 machine. I dont recall installing any, as I had heard earlier that they could be problematic. However, this month I was offered three x64 NET 3.5.1 updates (2518869, 2539635, and 2572077). My WinXP laptop, however, has several net1, net2, net3 and net3.5 files in the program list.

Questions:
1) Does the absence of NET files in the lists mean that I dont have any installed on the Win7 machine, or do I have to use the verification program to find out? The offered updates seem to imply that there are already NET 3.5.1 files installed, or do I misunderstand?

2) If I dont have any installed on the Win7 computer, do I need net files or will new software install or request the net files if needed. I use IE8, but dont have Silverlight installed.

3) I assume that I should go ahead and install .NET updates on the XP machine, based on Susan Bradley’s Patch Watch and her post above.

Thanks for any help,
Gary

Wow. Nonsense in my previous post. That should say 2552343 > 2532531. Sorry – looked at too many similar numbers in the last few days .

Anyway – when I installed 2552343 and searched for updates again, neither 2532531 nor 2566220 were offered, whereas 2532531 was offered previously. Does this seem strange or expected?

Thanks,
Gary

JMac001 – in the version of the patch table that I see, it says install for 2552343. Maybe that’s a recent change, but I printed my version on 7/19/11. Checked again just now to be sure. Guess I’ll go ahead and try 2532342 > 2532531.

All: To avoid any possible confusion, KB2532531 referred to by bethel95 in an earlier post, got typo’d to KB2532521 for a few posts.

Thanks, Gary

In view of Bob’s comment #10 above, it seems likely that KB2552343 might have to be installed prior to KB532531 to avoid the latter being offered repeatedly. I’m going to try that right after lunch, so will check back and report my results.

Thanks to all for all the info

Gary

KB2524375 – regarding the fraudulent digital certificates and possible spoofing: I was not able to find a recommendation on this patch, which I was offered. Is this a new one, or did I just miss it in previous newsletters? It looks new, as the advisory was published March 23 and revised April 19, 2011. Any recommendations?

Thanks,
Gary

MS Release Bulletin: Also http://www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/bulletins/201104.aspx is handy