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OpenOffice 3.0 Installation Issues

January 28, 2009 By

Subscriber and friend Ron Spruell wrote about a problem he had with the new OpenOffice 3.0. The problem occurred with one of the free antivirus programs, so this may be of particular interest to many readers:

OpenOffice 3.0 Problems: Terry — I tried Oo 3.O. I did not uninstall 2.4 first. Oo 3.O increased my CPU usage to 80% to 100%. My computer would barely run. I had to uninstall and go back to 2.4. Has anyone else had a similar experience? Would a clean install solve my problems. BTW, I love Oo. I find Writer much easier that MSWord. Calc has a few short comings. I use Impress for all presentations. I never did learn how to use Power Point. Ron Spruell

I wrote back to Ron to tell him that I had not heard or read about any problem before seeing his email. I asked if he used Process Explorer or Task Manager to see which application was bouncing to 100%.

Continue reading OpenOffice 3.0 Installation Issues

Filed Under: Anti-virus, Performance Tweaks, Software, Terry's Computer Tips, Windows XP

Malware Silently Alters Router Settings – Change Your Router Passwords

October 31, 2008 By

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Not your password for Windows — you may or may not change that, based on your personal preference (or if at work, based on the requirements of your employer’s network).

I’m talking about changing your passwords on your wireless routers and wired routers.

Whether you use a Linksys router, a DLink router, a Belkin route, or one of the many other brands of routers , whether you use wireless or regular Ethernet connnections with your router, change the password from the default password — now!

In my security articles on routers, I have long recommended that you change the router’s password. Sure, it can’t be accessed from the Internet side of the router, but if you manage to pick up some automated malware or a trojan that gives remote control of your computer to someone else, you may find your router subverted. It may run all of your requests through their system, so they can log and analyze your actions, passwords, etc.

Well, the automated malware that I’ve long predicted has now been found in the wild.

Continue reading Malware Silently Alters Router Settings – Change Your Router Passwords

Filed Under: Anti-spam, Anti-spyware, Anti-Trojan, Anti-virus, Networking, Patches, Security Fixes, Security Issues, Terry's Computer Tips, Vista, Windows XP

Sunbelt VIPRE Review | VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware Review

August 23, 2008 By

When I began my evaluation period of Sunbelt Software’s new VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware program, I was promptly shocked.

I had read several reviews about VIPRE and had read phrases like “high performance” and “low resources.” I had even read comments that where the writer said that VIPRE was virtually unnoticeable on their computer and that their computer suddenly had more speed that it had in a long time.

Naturally, I discounted those comments and claims, thinking that they were advertising exaggeration and hyperbole. They usually compare the computer’s performance to when it had been running one of the big-name suites, so that wasn’t too surprising any way.

I was shocked when I installed VIPRE on my notebook computer. I saw for myself that VIPRE didn’t interfere with my activities. My computer really was faster with VIPRE, even faster than the speedy combination of CounterSpy and NOD32.

Get more information on VIPRE

Continue reading my Sunbelt VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware Review

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Filed Under: Anti-adware, Anti-spyware, Anti-virus, Software, Terry's Computer Tips, Vista, Windows XP Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Adware Ties into Internet Explorer

March 28, 2008 By

This week, I received a query from a reader about a warning message he was receiving:

Hi Terry , I was wondering if perhaps you can help me , I have this very annoying adware that occurs EVERYTIME at startup …. not-a-virus:Adware.Win32.BHO.cr Now althugh this doesn’t appeato be causing any problem on my PC and I get delete it , it is still annoying to do this everytime . Is there anything you can suggest to REMOVE this adware from startup . Pls note : I am not computer savvy and my experience is limited , so I would need exact steps If you could help me , it would be greatly appreciated Regards

I’m not familiar with this particular message, but a little quick searching via Google showed that a number of people had posted similar questions on forums — and they all seemed to use

Continue reading Adware Ties into Internet Explorer

Filed Under: Anti-adware, Anti-spyware, Anti-Trojan, Anti-virus, Security, Security Fixes, System, Terry's Computer Tips, Vista, Windows XP

ie7-installation-turn-off-antivirus

April 25, 2007 By

To install, the IE team recommends temporarily disabling your anti-spyware, anti-adware and anti-virus applications.

One of my subscribers asked “My question is how do I do this ?”

Read more in Turning off Antivirus, etc. for IE7 Installation

Filed Under: Anti-virus, IE, Security Fixes, Terry's Computer Tips, Web browsing, Windows XP

Fighting Against Spyware & Malware

March 9, 2007 By

Spyware is software that enables a third-party to track where you go on the Internet. Usually this does not involves specific tracking cookies and companies that specialize in tracking your visits to advertiser sites.

Although this capability has given cookies a bad name, cookies are not inherently evil. They are used for many good purposes such as automatically logging you into a site like My Yahoo! or the New York Times. Most sites do not use cookies to spy on you.

Spyware, on the other hand, is almost always software that is actually installed on your computer — without your knowledge, usually, to monitor and report on what you do. It may be for the purpose of giving you specific advertising. More often, it is designed to steal personal information such as user IDs and passwords or credit card numbers.

Adware is software that generates ads, especially popup ads, to interfere with your computing and Internet surfing experience.

As most people use the term “adware,” and I agree with them, “adware” does not include software that displays unobtrusive ads with your conscious agreement (not buried deep in a license agreement or installed without your agreement) as a way to provide free software for you.

Examples of this latter “non-adware” case are Eudora (email) and Opera (web browser), both of which give you the option to purchase versions without advertising and have ad-sponsored versions available as free alternatives.

Malware is a more generic term to mean any program that is designed to abuse your computer system or trust. Spyware and Adware are in this category, as are Browser Hijackers, Trojans, Viruses and Worms.

Read more in Fighting Against Spyware & Malware

Filed Under: Anti-adware, Anti-spam, Anti-spyware, Anti-virus, Firewall, Security

Why I Love Firefox

November 10, 2006 By

Nice little blog entry by a Firefox “newbie” who switched from IE to Firefox for security reasons — after problems with I.E.

Why I Love Firefox — You know, I use Firefox, too. For pretty much the same reasons, too, but Ive been using it since version 0.7.

Filed Under: Anti-adware, Anti-virus, Security, Web browsing

Minor issues surface after IE 7 launch

October 20, 2006 By

Joris Evers of Tech Republic reports, has a good report on IE7′s first day in his article Minor issues surface after IE 7 launch.

Events for the initial day of IE7 included:

  • a reported security flaw (Microsoft said — that’s ok, it an Outlook Express bug that we might fix later, not an IE7 bug).web sites that did not work properly with IE7 (duh!),
  • a false positive that the MS download page was passing a virus (MS said the AVAST report of VBS:ZULU was false)
  • and crumpling of Microsoft’s download servers due to high demand.

None of those are big surprises, except that I’d think Microsoft would use Linux-based servers for large download sites <grin>.

Filed Under: Anti-virus, Communications, Operating System, Web browsing

Hidden File Extensions in Windows

October 12, 2006 By

One of Microsoft’s attempts at “user friendliness” is that recent versions of Windows are set to hide file extensions. What’s a file extension? As an example, it is the “.exe” that is at the end of a program’s name.

Unfortunately, Microsoft decided that we don’t really need to know what file extensions are. Even worse, they decided that Microsoft programs including Windows might not always consider the file extension, when deciding which program to use with a file.

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Huh? That was a lot of words. Let’s take it in shorter sentences.

A file extension is the ending of a file name.

For example, Microsoft Word’s file name is WINWORD.EXE. Word, by default, declares to Windows that it owns files with the extension “.doc”.

So, if you double-click on a file ending with .doc, Word will try to open it. Similarly, the Notepad program “notepad.exe” declares ownership of the .txt file extension.

[By the way, Windows is not case sensitive, so it views Notepad.exe and notepad.EXE and NoTePaD.EXe as the same thing.]

Finally, by default, you do not see file extensions — Windows hides them.

OK, so what’s the problem?

Find out in my article Hidden File Extensions in Windows

Filed Under: Anti-adware, Anti-spam, Anti-spyware, Anti-virus, Operating System

Anti-Virus Programs and Online Scanners

October 12, 2006 By

Viruses, worms and trojan horses still attack computers — they come in emails, they arrive completely unexpectedly in unpatched Windows hole, and they arrive via “drive-by downloads.” Anti-virus programs continue to battle viruses. They now attack worms, trojan horses and phishing attacks, too.

It is actually amazing in today’s world, but there are still people who don’t run an anti-virus program on their computer. I often run into people whose common complaint is that “the computer is running slowly.”

Most of the time, the computer has picked up some spyware or trojans that are causing the problems. However, sometimes, the problem is that the computer has multiple virus infections in addition to spyware, trojans and automatic downloaders.

Occasionally, the computer is up-to-date on its Windows Updates, Office Updates and Anti-Virus software. The virus might have gotten in before the anti-virus vendor got the signature in the updates. Other times, though, the computer isn’t running an anti-virus program.

I’ve also seen computers with old (e.g., 1998) versions of Norton Antivirus running all the time, but without current virus signatures — in other words, providing no real protection. Other times, the computer owner has the antivirus program, but it is not running.

Read more about Anti-Virus Programs and Online Scanners

Filed Under: Anti-virus