The Ultimate Troubleshooter (WXP-Home)

[basscarp]

I am looking at a program that will find and explain the programs that "run in the background" and "startup" own their own.... i.e. like aol instant messager, msdetect.exe etc... Does anyone have an opinion on the program titled (The Ultimate Trouble Shooter) I currently run/use (SpyBot, AdAware, Registry Mechanic & Norton System Utilities 03, My firewall is a router. I would also like to know of a good "trojan horse/worm" remover program.

For info on "The Ultimate Troubleshooter tool- go to http://www.answersthatwork.com/TUT_pages/TUT_more_info.htm

[The_Dude]

Have a look at Winpatrol http://www.winpatrol.com/ (http://)

[Kenneth Alcock]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr>

I am looking at a program that will find and explain the programs that "run in the background" and "startup" own their own...

<hr></blockquote>I think I've got just what you need /images/forums/icons/cool.gif. And, it's freeware to boot! /images/forums/icons/shocked.gif Here's an excerpt from the help file which explains it.
<font color=blue>
Autoruns
Copyright © 1996-2004 Mark Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell
Sysinternals - www.sysinternals.com

This utility, which has the most comprehensive knowledge of auto-starting locations of any startup monitor (A starting list of auto-run locations was obtained from David Solomon's "Windows Internals" seminar), shows you what programs are configured to run during system bootup or login, and shows you the entries in the order Windows processes them. These programs include ones in your startup folder, Run, RunOnce, and other Registry keys. A "Hide Signed Microsoft Entries" option helps you to zoom in on third-party auto-starting images that have been added to your system. </font color=blue>

Here's a link straight to the download page:
<a target="_blank" href=http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/autoruns.shtml>http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/autoruns.shtml</a>

[Booter]

I downloaded the trial version of The Ultimate Troubleshooter, and studied it for a while (quite a while ago).

While I found that the trial version was not fully featured, it did give me access to see what tasks were running on my PC, what services were running, I think the trial version gave me more hardware information than I had time to read, and as I recall it showed Startups initiated in the MSCONFIG Startups, Startup folder, and registry. That info alone was useful to me.

What it didn't show was their "findings, views, or recommendations" for the listed items.

I found it interesting enough to shell out the twenty dollars, and now have the full-fledged version, including access to updates as they come along and descriptions of the tasks, processes, services, and startups, and their recommendations on each.

For the money, you get a copy that, as I understand it, will run on one computer only in the full fledged form. I've not tried to transport it, but believe the trial version to be transportable.

I have found some features I really like, like being able to control whether or not startups (no matter where they are located) can be enabled or disabled from a single place. I have also found the instructions and information on controlling tasks and services useful at times.

I've also found some things I either don't much care for or can easily misuse. I recently tried their housekeeping bit, which deleted about 111 mb of stuff for me. I don't know whether this was the source of problems I found a few days later or not (I can be dangerous when I try), but I ended up doing a system restore to get back in form again yesterday.

I'd recommend you try the trial version first (it's free), and then decide whether you want to go further.

As with any tool you get, free or not, the ultimate responsibility for what happens is yours.

Bruce