Any problems yet from having the UAC off?

Has anyone did something and wished they had the UAC on to prevent it?

Like install something by mistake, or what not?

I'm just curious as I plan to disable UAC.

 

Turned off, staying off, and no regrets.

 

UAC is more about giving you a chance to stop a malicious program from doing something bad before it does it. Its usefulness is when you've already got some evil code on your system trying to do something. I can't see anyone missing UAC. It's feasible that someone will get some virus infection that may have otherwise been prevented.

 

For anyone who has the knowledge to REALLY be an admistrator on their machine (like the three of you obviously) this is not a bad idea. But I worry that lots of "novices" are going to see this and think they can get by without it.

Gary

 

I have mine turned off although I don't recommend it. First off I am fairly knowledgeable about Vista and I am very careful about internet sites I visit. It can be a helpful tool to help protect people that are new to computers and Vista. Even then they should not get into the habbit of just clicking "OK" or "Allow" without fully reading the UAC window. To answer your original question, I have not had any instances of wishing I had UAC turned on.

Jim

 

I agree with you ScuderiaConchiglia. UAC really should be left on unless one is well-informed. Also, having a good firewall (i.e.: NOT WINDOWS FIREWALL) that notifies of outgoing connections and gives the opportunity to allow or block them is worthwhile, even for the well-informed.

 

I disagree. A novice can run Vista just fine with UAC turned off. There was this operating system a while ago, I believe it was called Windows XP, and everyone ran it without this UAC thing. Also, I've seen UAC confuse many more users than it actually helps. After the first few prompts, people get accustomed to the warning, and just click "OK" through it.

As long as you have AV/AS and a firewall running on your system, UAC is redundant and unnecessary.

 

Sorry, I forgot to mention I will be disabling it on my mother's PC. She just got a laptop and doesn't like the UAC popups too much. She is also the type of person to be mislead by the "download free screensaver" type of ads.

Is there a way to minimize it? Or maybe even setup a user that has limited privileges & have the UAC off? She doesn't really use much software and mostly does Web, E-mail, Music/Pic and very little Office use like Word.

 

sounds good to me

 

I guess I'll experiment on that then. I don't have experience in setting up limited privileges accounts. It is her laptop so I don't want to restrict her of anything. What about software Updates like for Itunes, etc: Would this restrict that?

Any tips?

 

LOL, While I usually recommend caution when setting up a PC for the very young or those who are older, your mother is likely younger than I am!

I would probably do several things in this situation:

• Leave UAC on
• Install Firefox and the AdBlock Plus add-on and the EasyList filter subscription
• Walk through the first time uses of the commonly used programs and do the initial UAC setup for them
• Hide Internet Explorer

Unless you want to replace it all .

 

The problem is that Vista does not come with AV, AS, or Firewall worth a ****.

 

First thing I did when I get my G1s was turn off UAC. Seriously, it was off within 5 minutes of the first time I pressed the power button.

 

The greatest OS in the world isn't capable of protecting itself from a computer illiterate user.

If your mother gets confused by those, I don't think there's anything you can do except steel yourself for the torrent of tech support to come.

... then again, I know some people who don't know the difference between the internet, email, and a web browser, and their computers are squeaky clean. They seem to work using a series of memorized catechisms to guide their clicks.

 

I'm also going to install the free version of LogMeIN (remote PC) and have it start up on boot in system tray. So I don't have to deal with going over there every time my moms has a problem. I can just fix it remotely.

UAC really bothers her so I'm just going take it off and set AntiVirus, Adaware and Spybot on a schedule. And set certain options on PC, etc: There's always system restore if something mildly serious happens.

Thanks guys.