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Hidden Programs at startup

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by mrbelle2001

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When I open Task Manager in w98SE immediately after I boot up I see numerous programs running that I did not activate and that are not in my start menu. How can I identily these programs and get rid of them I suspect much of it is spyware, but I want to be sure before I start deleting programs.

9 replies

by johngreer

Start --> Run --> MSCONFIG

Look in the StartUP tab and you'll see all things that start, and where they start from. You're prob seeing things in the Registry Run sections.

by ann777

Task Manager will have windows programs activated and they are needed.

The start --> Run --> MSconfig --> click on Selective Startup --> and then go to the last tab (Startup).

This will have the applications that are loaded into memory (as aTSR -- in other words they load faster when used when pre-loaded as they are from boot). All you really need in the Startup tab are the two programs that Windows requires in order to operate: systray and explore MUST remain checked. You can uncheck everything else, but be ready to go back there and checkmark some that have to run in order for the application to opeate correctly as well.

by ann777

Incidentally, you do not delete spyware from Task Manager.

What you need to do is go to Start --> Settings --> Control Panel --> Add/Remove Programs and Uninstall/Remove anything you do not recognize.

Then download and run Ad-Aware software and delete anything it finds. Reboot your computer (to make sure that the computer is running from the cleaned registry) and spyware should be gone.

Ad-Aware is available from :

http://www.lavasoft.de/support/download/

It is a free download.

by thechas

About 1 page of programs in task manager is 'normal' for Windows98.

Explorer is your Windows session
tray is the system tray
rundll32 and a power management setting are normal.

If you run a firewall, or an anti-virus program, they will show up also.

As a general rule, there will be at least 1 running program for each icon in the system tray.

As stated, you can use the startup tab of msconfig to see what is starting. The path to the program file will help identify what it is.

I agree with Anna, that running AdAware will help you get rid of software that some programs and web-sites install on your PC.

Chas

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