Windows 7: User account control - restrictions

I have just installed & 32ibt Home Premium on an old Vista machine that I could not rectify the mess it was in.

The problem is that my friends children accessed iTunes, free games, P2P stuff / sites. some unsavoury stuff from their friends phones etc and heaven knows what else and she is sick of it as this happened on her laptop and I had to factory default that one to make it operable.

I have looked through the tutorials and cannot find just exactly what I need to do to allow the owner full access to the machine yet allow the kids to use it but only for certain things such as education sites, Youtube and Word etc as she (and I) do not want to go through this again.

Could someone please point me in the right direction or is there no such thing like that that can be done?

Hello John,

About the only thing I can think of is to setup an administrator account for the mother, and make the kids use a standard user account. In addition, enable the built-in Adminsitrator account and create a password for it so that it cannot be used without knowing the password.

Afterwards, she could setup Parental Controls on their standard accounts. The hard part is to either setup the web filter to only allow specified sites, or only block specified sites.

If she wants to allow the kids to run anything that runs elevated by default, then she could use the tutorial below to create a shortcut that will allow them to without them having to know the password.

Elevated Program Shortcut - Create for Standard User

Hope this may help some.

Thanks Shawn ok I have made the admin hers and she just needs one for the remaining daughter who is doing tertiary studies. As you will know teenagers are a law unto themselves and although Mum gives them the third degree about what and where they go on the net unless it can be physically blocked they will eventually succumb and probably the odd friend or two - if you get my drift.


Now I did try Content in internet options and although Facebook and iTunes and anything Apple is marked as "never" I found that a Google search for those and a click on the link actuated the "never" block . BUT typing the address in the bar or clicking on a link to say Facebook in Wikipedia went straight to that site the
"never " didn't work.

I will try out your links and see what I can do as she cannot set this sort of thing up - just a usual and casual turn on and Ebay sort of a person and leaves this sort of thing up to the techs or me as she really can't afford that sort of money. (She is my cleaning lady and a friend at work too so happy to do it for a cheaper clean LOL!!) ) this is the second machine they have absolutely wrecked in this way the first( a laptop) I had to factory default but as I mentioned knowing how um - pedestrian Vista is I flipped in a spare 500GB Spinpoint and a 32bit 7 OS that were surplus to my own requirements and the machine is flying now. I just don't want these errrrr "young people" messing this one up for her.

Thanks for the tips.
John

You're welcome John. Good luck. I hope it goes well.

Ok Shawn I have set up the parental controls the only thing is I will have to teach mum how to set no go sites as the control always redirects me to Windows Live to enter sites. There seems to be no direct control from the control panel itself.

I just thought it could be done from control panel thats all - bit of pain but at least the machine will not be flooded with rubbish

The only problem I can see with this is that the daughter might just be cluey enough to sneak into the Live account and unblock the rubbish sites as I call them - no prizes for guessing which ones I mean LOL!! *Clue - begins with A

Yeah, the web filter part like in Vista was removed in Windows 7 to use Windows Live Family Safety instead.

Take a look at OpenDNS. It has 3 Parental Control programs. Two are free and the paid version ($20 a year) can give you a report on what sites are visited. I have not look into the details but it might be worth a little research.

OpenDNS - Parental Controls

Jim

Ok thanks Shawn and Phone man it isn't really that hard once you are use to it and I will have a look at that DNS stuff too

Anytime mate.