Giving up on UAC

[Anderson2]

After 10 days with Windows 7, I finally just had to give up on UAC and turned it off to get some work done. It was not the notifications that bothered me. I did not mind the notifications. In fact I could see their value. It was all the legacy programs that could not work correctly because they could not fully access their folders to modify their settings or whatever they needed to do that finally did it. I tried all the tricks recommended, took ownership, gave myself full control, ran exe files as administrator, etc.; nothing worked. Many programs still would not work correctly. When I finally gave up and turned UAC off everything finally worked correctly and I finally could get to doing some real work instead of futzing around with the OS.

My question now is the following. Is running W 7 with UAC turned off, firewall on, AV up-to-date, and malware checked and behind a router any more risky than when I ran XP? If not, that is the way I will go - just as I ran XP and preceding OSs for years. As long as I need to run programs that were not designed to run W 7's way this seems to be the only practical solution.

 

[Frostmourne]

After 10 days with Windows 7, I finally just had to give up on UAC and turned it off to get some work done. It was not the notifications that bothered me. I did not mind the notifications. In fact I could see their value. It was all the legacy programs that could not work correctly because they could not fully access their folders to modify their settings or whatever they needed to do that finally did it. I tried all the tricks recommended, took ownership, gave myself full control, ran exe files as administrator, etc.; nothing worked. Many programs still would not work correctly. When I finally gave up and turned UAC off everything finally worked correctly and I finally could get to doing some real work instead of futzing around with the OS.

My question now is the following. Is running W 7 with UAC turned off, firewall on, AV up-to-date, and malware checked and behind a router any more risky than when I ran XP? If not, that is the way I will go - just as I ran XP and preceding OSs for years. As long as I need to run programs that were not designed to run W 7's way this seems to be the only practical solution.

UAC off, system is as as secure as XP is, which is very poor. Replace any apps that don't work with 7's security measures. They are old and insecure anyway.

 

[zigzag3143]

After 10 days with Windows 7, I finally just had to give up on UAC and turned it off to get some work done. It was not the notifications that bothered me. I did not mind the notifications. In fact I could see their value. It was all the legacy programs that could not work correctly because they could not fully access their folders to modify their settings or whatever they needed to do that finally did it. I tried all the tricks recommended, took ownership, gave myself full control, ran exe files as administrator, etc.; nothing worked. Many programs still would not work correctly. When I finally gave up and turned UAC off everything finally worked correctly and I finally could get to doing some real work instead of futzing around with the OS.

My question now is the following. Is running W 7 with UAC turned off, firewall on, AV up-to-date, and malware checked and behind a router any more risky than when I ran XP? If not, that is the way I will go - just as I ran XP and preceding OSs for years. As long as I need to run programs that were not designed to run W 7's way this seems to be the only practical solution.

Its actaully less risky even with uac off/. win7 still has DEP, has other things that XP did not. We all turn off uac.

Ken

 

[Frostmourne]

After 10 days with Windows 7, I finally just had to give up on UAC and turned it off to get some work done. It was not the notifications that bothered me. I did not mind the notifications. In fact I could see their value. It was all the legacy programs that could not work correctly because they could not fully access their folders to modify their settings or whatever they needed to do that finally did it. I tried all the tricks recommended, took ownership, gave myself full control, ran exe files as administrator, etc.; nothing worked. Many programs still would not work correctly. When I finally gave up and turned UAC off everything finally worked correctly and I finally could get to doing some real work instead of futzing around with the OS.

My question now is the following. Is running W 7 with UAC turned off, firewall on, AV up-to-date, and malware checked and behind a router any more risky than when I ran XP? If not, that is the way I will go - just as I ran XP and preceding OSs for years. As long as I need to run programs that were not designed to run W 7's way this seems to be the only practical solution.

Its actaully less risky even with uac off/. win7 still has DEP, has other things that XP did not. We all turn off uac.

Ken

And give malware the run of your system - no protection, no protected mode in IE8.

 

[pparks1]

We all turn off uac.
Ken

Speak for yourself. I have NEVER had a need to turn of UAC in either Vista or in Windows 7. I seriously don't understand that applications you guys are using and what you are trying to do which makes UAC such an absolute nuisance. I'm a systems admin at work and have been able to run everything to do my job without having to resort to disabling UAC.

With that said, to the original poster, with UAC disabled you are no worse off than you were with Windows XP. I however to agree with others who have suggested that you should probably look into replacing the software that you use that will not work period with UAC.

But understand that there are those among us....who are computer enthusiasts, and are well versed in IT and do this professionally for a living that have no issues with UAC whatsoever.

 

[m3gaman]

UAC was annoying in the early days of Vista but It's never bothered me in windows 7

 

[Anderson2]

After 10 days with Windows 7, I finally just had to give up on UAC and turned it off to get some work done. It was not the notifications that bothered me. I did not mind the notifications. In fact I could see their value. It was all the legacy programs that could not work correctly because they could not fully access their folders to modify their settings or whatever they needed to do that finally did it. I tried all the tricks recommended, took ownership, gave myself full control, ran exe files as administrator, etc.; nothing worked. Many programs still would not work correctly. When I finally gave up and turned UAC off everything finally worked correctly and I finally could get to doing some real work instead of futzing around with the OS.

My question now is the following. Is running W 7 with UAC turned off, firewall on, AV up-to-date, and malware checked and behind a router any more risky than when I ran XP? If not, that is the way I will go - just as I ran XP and preceding OSs for years. As long as I need to run programs that were not designed to run W 7's way this seems to be the only practical solution.

Its actaully less risky even with uac off/. win7 still has DEP, has other things that XP did not. We all turn off uac.

Ken

And give malware the run of your system - no protection, no protected mode in IE8.

Actually I don't use IE except for windows updates. So that is not a problem for me.

I hear you pparks1, but some apps I need still do not have updates that work correctly in W 7 and even though I am quite computer literate and have used them extensively since the Apple II days and the original PC I obviously do not have your level of expertise (nor the time to fight the OS). Besides replacing all my apps for the latest versions so they work better in W 7 is an expensive proposition.....

 

[Frostmourne]

Its actaully less risky even with uac off/. win7 still has DEP, has other things that XP did not. We all turn off uac.

Ken

And give malware the run of your system - no protection, no protected mode in IE8.

Actually I don't use IE except for windows updates. So that is not a problem for me.

Windows Updates are separate from IE8, the point is if malware gets through your browser and your security app - and it might - it will have full unobstructed access to your PC. UAC will not protect you.

 

[pparks1]

Windows Updates are separate from IE8, the point is if malware gets through your browser and your security app - and it might - it will have full unobstructed access to your PC. UAC will not protect you.

And either way, that's no worse that anything that existing with Windows XP.

 

[Anderson2]

UAC was annoying in the early days of Vista but It's never bothered me in windows 7

I am willing to live with annoying. It is getting apps I own to work correctly in W 7 that is my problem. I guess you are using the latest versions of programs written with W 7 in mind.

 

[pparks1]

What particular applications are you running which are causing all of these pop-ups?

 

[JMH]

After 10 days with Windows 7, I finally just had to give up on UAC and turned it off to get some work done. It was not the notifications that bothered me. I did not mind the notifications. In fact I could see their value. It was all the legacy programs that could not work correctly because they could not fully access their folders to modify their settings or whatever they needed to do that finally did it. I tried all the tricks recommended, took ownership, gave myself full control, ran exe files as administrator, etc.; nothing worked. Many programs still would not work correctly. When I finally gave up and turned UAC off everything finally worked correctly and I finally could get to doing some real work instead of futzing around with the OS.

My question now is the following. Is running W 7 with UAC turned off, firewall on, AV up-to-date, and malware checked and behind a router any more risky than when I ran XP? If not, that is the way I will go - just as I ran XP and preceding OSs for years. As long as I need to run programs that were not designed to run W 7's way this seems to be the only practical solution.

In answer to your specific question above the answer is possibly a tad less risky.
[FWIW - I leave my UAC on.]

 

[Anderson2]

What particular applications are you running which are causing all of these pop-ups?

There are several. One is PaintShopPro 9.1 which was written long before W 7 was created and is far superior to later editions. One solution someone just discovered that works for it required a registry edit is:

In Windows 7, double clicking on an image file that should open in PSP 9
will open the program with an error message but without the image on
most machines.
PSP 9 uses an old Windows system called DDE to pass the image to the
program. DDE is still part of Windows 7, but is prevented from working
by 7's tighter security.
One solution, though perhaps a risky one, is to disable UAC.

The other solution was posted by "bpark37" on the PSPUG forums
(PSPUG Message Board - PSPUG Message Board) -

"NEW SOLUTION! Tested on 2 PC's.

I have successfully applied this fix using Paint Shop Pro 9 (PSP 9) with
Windows 7 (win7) x64 on 2 different PCs.

(1) Open Regedit

(2) Go to the following string: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\Paint
Shop Pro 9.exe\shell\open\command

(3) Change the "Default" entry to
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Jasc Software Inc\Paint Shop Pro 9\Paint Shop
Pro 9.exe" "%1"

(4) Delete the following string (which is immediately below the string
you just edited):
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\Paint Shop Pro 9.exe\shell\open\ddexec

(5) Exit Regedit

(6) Open a picture file as you typically would from windows explorer and
it should open without error."

I've tested this on both 32 bit and 64 bit versions of Windows 7 and it
worked fine.

Another is TrueCrypt (latest version) which works but when I wish to dismount a file, I need to force the dismount which is not cool and worriesome.

I would like to use UAC for the added security but I can't be a debugging programmer just to get work done.

Jeff

 

[ickymay]

Another is TrueCrypt (latest version) which works but when I wish to dismount a file, I need to force the dismount which is not cool and worriesome.

I would like to use UAC for the added security but I can't be a debugging programmer just to get work done.

Jeff

I have UAC fully on and I don't have to force dismount on any true crypt volumes ?

 

[Anderson2]

You are correct. It has nothing to do with uac. Does the same with uac turned off.

I've turned uac back on but now need to figure out how to solve the truecrypt dismount problem. It has to be some setting that I need to change. I'm working in W7 64 bit. Are you 32 or 64 bit in case that makes a difference.

(Worked fine in xp which is why I thought it was the uac messing things up).

 

[bobkn]

After 10 days with Windows 7, I finally just had to give up on UAC and turned it off to get some work done. It was not the notifications that bothered me. I did not mind the notifications. In fact I could see their value. It was all the legacy programs that could not work correctly because they could not fully access their folders to modify their settings or whatever they needed to do that finally did it. I tried all the tricks recommended, took ownership, gave myself full control, ran exe files as administrator, etc.; nothing worked. Many programs still would not work correctly. When I finally gave up and turned UAC off everything finally worked correctly and I finally could get to doing some real work instead of futzing around with the OS.

My question now is the following. Is running W 7 with UAC turned off, firewall on, AV up-to-date, and malware checked and behind a router any more risky than when I ran XP? If not, that is the way I will go - just as I ran XP and preceding OSs for years. As long as I need to run programs that were not designed to run W 7's way this seems to be the only practical solution.

Some of the problems can be prevented by running the application's installer with admin privileges. I don't pretend to understand the effects on privileges of the installed software, but it may help.

I'm unsure how useful UAC is. People (me, at least) tend to click "accept" just to make the box go away, without paying much attention to what's happening. It's less annoying under Win7 than under Vista, but some have complained that it's also less secure. (That's at the default settings. The security can be increased, at the cost of getting as many UAC alerts as with Vista.)

 

[Anderson2]

Being new to W 7 I am giving uac the benefit of the doubt. I am guessing it's main value maybe if something asks to run that I did not initiate - which has not happened yet.

I think uac would be much friendlier and useful if one could give it a list of program files it should run without asking but that it would ask about *if* they changed in any way - the way many 3rd party firewalls work. This way you would get less notifications and therefore pay attention to them when they occur.

Seems pretty obvious to me. Modifying the file properties to "run as administrator" is a less secure way to do things because I am not sure if that permission persists if the file is modified by malware.

 

[Anderson2]

Using Process Explorer I discovered what process is keeping the file locked. I discovered that the drive that I mounted my file to remains still locked by "clmlSvc.exe" and preventing dismounting. I discovered "clmlSvc.exe" is owned by CyberLink MediaLibray Service. I believe that is the CD writing application pre-installed on this pc.

Armed with that knowledge what should I do? I do not want to have to manually stop "clmlSvc.exe" every time I want to unlock a TrueCrypt volume.

[Incidentally I tried to use "Unlocker.exe" to discover what was locking the file but it does not seem to work correctly in W 7. At least it does not appear on the right mouse click contents. Is there a trick to making it work in W 7?]

Thanks for any help.

 

[pparks1]

I think the only issue with defining a set of applications which can simply elevate is that now if these apps always elevate then they could do damage to your system without any notice to you.

For example, let's say that for some reason an update comes in for firefox which requires it to elevate. Well, if you see that happen and simply add firefox to the list of programs which can silently escalate to admin...then if a piece of malware later tries to do something which requires elevation it would happen without your knowledge since you gave firefox the ability to excalate without your knowledge.

It's a tough one since some apps always need admin rights, while others simply need it every now and again.

 

[pparks1]

Using Process Explorer I discovered what process is keeping the file locked. I discovered that the drive that I mounted my file to remains still locked by "clmlSvc.exe" and preventing dismounting. I discovered "clmlSvc.exe" is owned by CyberLink MediaLibray Service. I believe that is the CD writing application pre-installed on this pc.

Armed with that knowledge what should I do? I do not want to have to manually stop "clmlSvc.exe" every time I want to unlock a TrueCrypt volume.

You could uninstall that burning application if you aren't particularly attached to it and replace it with something else which doesn't cause this behavior. I tend to gravitate towards
1). ImgBurn (free)
2). CDBurnerXP (free and does work under Windows 7 despite it's poor name).