PC Decrapifier

PC Decrapifier requires no installation…just double-click the exe file to get things started.

The first screen introduces you to the program and gives you the opportunity to check for a new release. Click “Next” when ready…

The second screen has the EULA.

The third screen provides a warning to be careful regarding software that you may have purchased and installed yourself. You definitely do not want to accidentally remove the good stuff.

This screen asks which type of computer you are running. Choose the appropriate response…for our example we went ahead and checked “Yes”.

You will have the opportunity to create a “Restore Point” before going any further with the removal process. It is recommended that you do so before going to the next step.

You will be notified as soon as the “Restore Point” has been created…it may take a few moments depending on your individual setup. Now you are ready to check for “garbage software”. Click “Next”…

Our Windows 7 install came up clean but that is not the end of things yet. At this point you will have the opportunity to remove other software that is not in PC Decrapifier’s list yet or was added after you got your computer. Click “Next” to see what is found.

As you can see PC Decrapifier shows a list of the other software on your computer. Here you can see non-OEM installs of Google Toolbar and Musicmatch Jukebox have been selected. It is a good opportunity to remove unwanted software that is cluttering up your hard-drive. Select the particular items that you would like to have removed and click “Next”.

You will be provided with a final opportunity to cancel the removal if you are uncertain about any of your selections.

Then all that you have to do is enjoy watching that unwanted software being removed for you… You may be occasionally prompted to confirm removal of non-OEM software in uninstall windows…

All done…

In the final window you will have an opportunity to provide feedback to the software author if desired, otherwise click “Finish” to close PC Decrapifier.

While many viruses and other types of malware are designed simply to cause chaos, more and more malware is used by organized crime to steal credit card numbers and other sensitive data.

Did Your Antivirus Say a Virus Was Detected?

If you saw a message pop up that says a virus was detected, that’s a good thing. Your antivirus noticed a virus and likely removed it without prompting you.

This sort of message doesn’t mean that you ever had a virus running on your computer. You could have downloaded a file that contained a virus and your antivirus removed the file before it could ever cause a problem. Or, a malicious file on an infected web page could have been noticed and dealt with before it caused any problems.

In other words, a “virus detected” message that occurs during normal use of your computer doesn’t mean your computer was ever infected or that the virus ever did anything. if you see a message like this, you’re likely visiting an infected web page or downloading a harmful file. Try to avoid doing that in the future, but don’t worry too much.

You can also go into your antivirus program and check its quarantine or its virus detection logs to view more information about the virus and what action was taken.

If You’re Not Running an Antivirus

If you’re not running an antivirus and your computer has become slow and unreliable, it’s possible that you have a virus. This can also occur if you’re running an antivirus with out-of-date virus definitions.

If you don’t have an antivirus installed, you should try to install one immediately. There are a variety of free antivirus products you can download, including Microsoft Security Essentials. The antivirus should ideally be able to clean up the viruses and fix your problems after you install it. If the antivirus can’t fix the infections on your system, read the section below on dealing with more troublesome infections.

If You Think Your Antivirus Isn’t Catching A Virus

If you already have an antivirus program installed but you think you may have viruses it isn’t detecting, you can get a second opinion from another antivirus product.

A variety of antivirus providers make one-time scanning tools available – for example, the ESET Online Scanner. These programs will download to your computer and do a quick scan without a long installation process. You can’t have multiple antivirus products installed at the same time, so this allows you to scan with another antivirus without going through the hassle of uninstalling your current antivirus.

If the scanner alerts you to a problem, you’ll want to remove the viruses with the scanning tool. If you had a virus, your current antivirus may not be up to the job. You may want to uninstall it and install another antivirus product after the process is complete.

Dealing With More Problematic Infections

Some viruses and other types of malware dig their hooks deep into your system, making them difficult to remove – especially by antivirus products you install later, after the virus has infected your system and had time to run wild, possibly downloading additional types of malware.

Booting into Safe Mode can help. In Safe Mode, Windows won’t load third-party software (including the virus), so you’ll be able to run your antivirus program without the virus interfering in the background. To boot into Safe Mode, restart your computer, press the F8 key while the computer is booting up, select the Safe Mode option in the boot options menu, and press the Enter key. Run the antivirus program in Safe Mode and restart after you’re done cleaning up. (If you don’t see the boot options menu, restart your computer and try again – you may not have pressed the F8 key at the correct time.) If you need Internet access in Safe Mode, select Safe Mode with Networking in the boot options menu instead.

If running the antivirus in Safe Mode doesn’t work, you can try booting from an antivirus rescue CD. When you boot into the rescue CD, the antivirus gets a clean environment to work in. It can scan your hard drive while the virus lies dormant, making it easier to clean infections that make themselves hard to remove. We’ll cover using the BitDefender, Avira, and Kaspersky rescue discs to remove viruses from computers at a later date.

The “nuclear option” if nothing can remove the viruses properly – or if the malware so damaged your system that Windows still isn’t working properly after you’ve removed the viruses – is reverting your computer to its factory state. Many computers come with restore partitions that you can access by pressing a certain key during the boot process (consult your computer’s manual for the exact key). You may also have a Windows installer disc you can use to reinstall Windows. Note that this will delete the files and programs on your computer, so be sure your important data is backed up before you reinstall Windows from scratch.

There are many possible causes for these hellish episodes, and it’s important to be educated on the why and hows of PC crashes to prevent them in the future. After all, the next crash could be your PC’s last. Following is a rundown of seven common causes and solutions.

Hardware conflicts

Many blue screens are a result of hardware and installation conflicts. All of your system’s components consume IRQs (interrupt request channels) when installed, and every device requires its own channel to function properly. When two devices share the same channel and are used simultaneously, a crash can occur.

Thumb through your Device Manager, and look for any devices marked with a yellow exclamation point. These are the ones with issues, and can usually be fixed with a driver update. Just search your device manufacturer’s website for the latest driver software, or, in a pinch, reinstall the offending hardware itself.

Bad RAM

Bad memory is to blame for many blue screens and failed boots. Fortunately, however, your RAM modules are some of the easiest components to check and replace.

First, use the software utility Memtest86+ to ensure your RAM is the problem. If errors arise, you next need to determine exactly which memory stick is to blame. To do this, remove all the sticks from your systemsave one inserted in the primary memory slot. If the system boots fine, and no errors are detected in Memtest86+, continue testing in the same fashionone stick at a time, inserted in the primary slotuntil the system fails to boot, or Memtest86+ indicates problems.

Eventually, you’ll nail down exactly which memory module is causing trouble, and then you can replace it with a fresh, clean stick (just make it’s fully compatible with your motherboard and other sticks of RAM).

Heat is thy enemy

Computers get hot. We know this from the loud fans bolted inside our desktops, and the alarming burning sensation we feel on our legs after using a laptop for too long. Everything inside a PC generates heat, and heat can cause components to become unstable and crash your PC. Indeed, computers are designed to crash as a last-ditch effort to protect their own internal components from permanent heat damage.

If you suspect your PC isn’t effectively dispersing enough heat, first check to make sure all your fans are spinning properly. If one isn’t moving, or appears to be spinning abnormally slow, check its connections to make sure it’s properly powered. If all appears fine, but the fan still isn’t doing its job, it’s best to replace it.

Next make sure that all of your PC’s vents, grates and filters are unhindered by dust, pet hair and other gross materials that prevent proper airflow. These areas are hotbeds (pun intended) for heat buildup. If you find any problem areas (see the disgusting example below), use a can of compressed air to clear the airways.

The troubleshooting process of seemingly inexplicable failures can be one of the most stressful parts of the job. Unplanned downtime of a mission-critical system can invite the harshest scrutiny from coworkers and management in even the smallest of organizations, and it only gets worse as the size of the enterprise grows and the stakes get higher. That additional pressure often leads even the best engineers to make very dumb mistakes, further compounding the problem and prolonging the downtime.

Staying cool under pressure isn’t easy no matter how many times you’ve been tossed into the fire, but there are five easy rules you can add to your emergency troubleshooting processes to get to a resolution faster, conclusively prove the cause of the outage, and avoid making things worse.

1. Do no harm

When presented with a seemingly incomprehensible problem, a natural first instinct is to dive into the problem headlong and start making a raft of changes to try a quick fix. Although this often works, and works quickly, it is just as likely to make things fabulously worse. Troubleshooting measures like rebooting an unstable system or trying automated database or file system repairs may well fix the problem and return the system to production, but they also might give up your best chance of recovering data, destroy any hope of determining the root cause, and substantially prolong the outage as a result.

Instead, the best first step in an unexplained outage is one that feels the least natural: Take a step back and carefully consider how you will undo everything you’re about to try in an attempt to fix the system. That might mean making configuration backups, taking virtual machine or SAN snapshots, making copies of log files that might be lost or overwritten, and copying potentially corrupted data to an unaffected system. Doing this as a first step feels wrong because it takes up valuable time when stress levels are at their highest and because it doesn’t directly do anything to solve the problem. But it does accomplish two very important goals.

First, if your troubleshooting does end up making things worse — such as if that server you decide to reboot simply won’t come back up at all — you’ll be that much more prepared to get current data stood up on a new system.

Second, if your first round of emergency button-mashing does somehow solve the problem, you’ll have the data you need to reconstruct the problem so that you can try to figure out the cause later. The only thing worse than not being able to figure out how to fix a problem is fixing it without knowing how or why your fix worked — not only will you not be able to explain the event to the masses hovering outside your cube, but you also won’t be able to offer any real guarantee that it won’t happen again.

2. Take notes
The next thing you want to be sure to do is to make a fairly detailed log of what you observed and what troubleshooting steps you tried — including the time wherever you can. As in the first step, this step seems as if it would sap valuable minutes in an already time-starved situation, but in fact it can save a substantial amount of time in the long run.

First, it prevents you from going in circles and trying the same things over and over — which happens frequently when stress levels are high. Second, if you have to involve the vendor, you’ll have a comprehensive list of what you’ve already done so that the support folks don’t have you do it all over again. Third, if you find yourself pawing through error logs, you’ll be able to line up the time stamps of when you tried various fixes to the time stamps in the logs. Without that, you’ll often be forced to retry the troubleshooting steps so that you can isolate the log entries they generate — costing you more time in the end.

3. Research carefully
If you’re back is really up against the wall, you’ll inevitably find yourself grasping at straws when researching the problem (in other words, Googling). Unless you have an incredibly specific error on your hands, chances are you’ll find several people posting that they’ve experienced a problem similar to the one you’re stuck in.

The most important thing to do here is be very critical when you review those apparently close fits. In many cases, you’ll discover that, although the symptom is the same, the circumstances are entirely different. I’ve seen massive amounts of time wasted in chasing the implementation of a fix for a completely unrelated problem — a situation that could have been avoided by more careful review of the problem description.

4. Share what you know
If you’re working as part of a team attacking the same problem or are staving off an angry mob of users, you’ll quickly find that communication is very important — both to keep users informed of what you’re doing (and that you are, in fact, doing something) and to keep team members from stepping on each others’ toes in the melee.

In a large team, a good first step is to designate someone that you’ll keep up to date with what you’re doing; that person can then communicate with the affected user community and keep all team members apprised of what the others are doing.

5. Be prepared
Although there’s really no way to truly prepare yourself for unforeseen problems, there are many steps you can take right now that will save you tons of time should the unexpected happens tomorrow.

For example, if you find yourself troubleshooting networking problems, have a laptop configured with a protocol analyzer, such as Wireshark, plugged into a port on your core switch. If you ever need it to troubleshoot a network problem, you’ll be 15 to 20 minutes closer to getting it rolling rather than scrambling to get it set up in the heat of the moment. Having centralized network monitoring and logging tools in place will make it far easier to correlate different application and network events and to narrow down an inexplicable problem to its root cause.

Putting it all together
Troubleshooting in a high-stress environment is both the least fun (in the moment) and most rewarding (afterward) experience in IT. That surge of panic and adrenaline is unlike just about anything else when working in the relative physical safety of a cubicle or data center. However, that stress will also lead you to make stupid mistakes if you don’t resist the urge to jump in with both feet and force yourself to approach the problem methodically.

Now you know how to be methodical while the adrenaline is pumping.

Maybe you’ve installed Apple’s iOS 6, the newest operating system for iPhones, iPad, and iPod touch, but do you know about all the tricks that are inside and how to use them?

Apple’s latest mobile operating system, iOS 6, may have sparked a fury of Internet hate for the new Maps app, and I certainly won’t wag my finger at anyone who misses Google’s engine behind the Maps app, but plenty more goodies are tucked away in iOS 6 that you shouldn’t miss.

Here are ten of the best features and how to use them.

1. Swipe up to reply to incoming calls with a text message. Maybe you heard that when a call comes in, you can now reply with a text message instead of just declining the call. But these options don’t appear automatically. You have to swipe up from the bottom of the screen to reveal them.

2. Customize your text replies to declined calls. The feature that lets you turn down phone calls but reply with text message allows you to use a canned message for added convenience. A few options appear when you swipe up, as mentioned in the first tip. To change what they pre-written texts say, go to

Settings > Phone > Reply with Message.

You can now customize your one-touch replies.

3. Learn how to work the Do Not Disturb option. A new feature called Do Not Disturb appears in the settings, but it’s nothing more than an on/off switch. Where can you set the hours for quiet time, or make it so that calls from emergency contacts come through? Oddly, these choices fall under the Notifications area. Go to

Settings > Notifications > Do Not Disturb.

The Scheduled button lets you define the hours when you don’t want to be disturbed. The Allow Calls From button just below it launches a new screen where you can exclude people from your do-not-disturb list.

4. Attach photos and videos to email in the Mail app. Formerly, using the mail app was occasionally a pain. You’d compose a message, remember that you wanted to send the recipient a photo, too, and realized you couldn’t actually attach anything to the draft. Now you can. In an email draft, press a hold anywhere in the body. In landscape mode (holding the phone horizontally), list of options will appear, including one to insert a photo or video. If you’re in portrait or vertical mode, just press the arrow button that appears until you see the right choice.

5. Read in full-screen mode. News articles, blogs, and other text-heavy pages, when viewed on an iPhone especially, cause squinting and more pinching, zooming, panning than most people feel comfortable doing. When Safari detects a text-heavy page in iOS 6, it supplies a button called Reader at the top right of the URL bar, which reformats the page in a full-screen and easier-to-read layout. You’ll also notice a “share out” or “send to” button (curved arrow) in Safari with a lot of great option beneath it also worth exploring. They’re mostly not new to iOS 6, but they do appear in a newly designed interface.

6. Pass your iPad or iPhone to friends without worrying they’ll get nosy. I admit that I’ve hesitated in the past before passing my mobile devices around to friends to let them look at photos or something that made me giggle on Facebook. The larger the group of friends, the more suspicious I am that someone might take liberties with my device when I’m not looking. The same is true, I’m sure, for parents who let their kids play with their iPhone or iPad. Guided Access, new to iOS 6, lets you lock down your device so that only the app you open can be used, and no other functionality works until you enter a unique four-digit passcode. It’s a little tricky to find and set up.

First, go to

Settings > General > Accessibility > Guided Access.

Toggle the switch to on and set a passcode. When you want to use Guided Access, just open the app of choice, and triple tap the home button. Be sure to hit the start button at the top right. But wait, there’s more (see the next tip).

7. Disable buttons in apps (in Guided Access). When you enable Guided Access in an app—which locks users from going into any other app or areas of the phone—you can also disable parts of the screen. For example, if you turn on Guided Access in the Photos app, you can also use your finger to circle parts of the screen you want to disable, such as the top row of buttons so that one can look through your other albums. Just be sure to hit the Start button in the top right corner before handing over your device!

8. Share Photo Stream. Apple’s syncing service, iCloud, handles images with speed and good responsiveness. But it was never easy to share your pictures until iOS 6 came along. To share your Photo Stream images, go to the Camera app and press Photo Stream. Then hit the plus button in the upper left, which will open a screen where you can fill information about how to share your Photo Stream, whether with a select few individuals, or by making it public on your iCloud account.

9. Learn what the new Privacy button means (and use it). A new Privacy button under Settings comes with little explanation. Tap it, and you might not know what information it’s even telling you because there are no instructions or explainers. Here’s what it does: Privacy shows you apps that can talk to other apps, and whether they are. For example, my Twitter app talks to my Flipboard app. I enabled that integration, and I’m okay with it. But if I didn’t remember allowing it, or wanted to shut it off, I can do so in the Privacy area with one quick motion. This feature gives you very good ability to quick ability to turn off any app-to-app sharing that you don’t want and you might have forgotten existed. So if you don’t want Facebook to know where you are, check the Location Services section of your Privacy buttons, and you can flip the switch off lickety-split.

10. Customize native Facebook alerts. A big new feature in iOS 6 was the direct folding in of Facebook functionality, meaning you can share to Facebook a picture from your Camera app or a link from Safari without ever opening the Facebook app itself. It works similar to the baked-in Twitter functionality that was new to iOS 5. What many users may overlook, however, is the ability to customize your Facebook chat and message alerts, separate from the Facebook app as well. They’re found under

Settings > Facebook > Settings.

Of course, you can also add Facebook alerts to your Notification Center, but that feature isn’t new (it’s under Settings > Notifications, and then scroll down until you find Facebook in your list of apps).

This guide won’t walk you through identifying a failing component and repairing it by hand. It’s focused on the easy stuff – although it’s easy, people pay hundreds of dollars to have it done for them.

Remove Viruses and Malware

Many people still wrestle with infected Windows PCs. If your computer is infected and isn’t working properly, you don’t have to pay someone else to fix it. The Geek Squad doesn’t have any magic tools – they use many of the standard antivirus tools you can use yourself.

For instructions on removing viruses – and preventing them from coming back – read: What To Do If You Get a Virus on Your Computer

For a really deep infection, a good repair place may dig through your autostart entries and registry by hand and manually remove malware that isn’t being caught by tools. However, this can be time-consuming – and if the computer is already so infected, there’s no guarantee all the malware will be removed. In cases like this, they’ll often just reinstall Windows. You can do that yourself, too.

Reinstall the Operating System

Some people think that computers become slower over time and eventually need to be replaced – it’s sad, but true. Other people may take the computer to a repair place when it starts slowing down. When dealing with a computer that’s become bogged down by startup programs and toolbars, a simple Windows reinstall is often the fastest, easiest solution.

This can also help if you’re experiencing other problems with your computer, such as file corruption or weird errors. While it’s often possible to troubleshoot these things by replacing corrupted files and bad drivers, it’s usually faster to just reset Windows back to its factory state.

Most new computers come with factory restore partitions, which you can access by pressing the correct key during the boot process (check your computer’s manual). You may also have CDs or DVDs you can restore your computer from. If you installed Windows yourself, you can use the Windows installation disc. On Windows 8, use the Refresh or Reset feature to easily reinstall Windows.

Be sure to back up your important files before doing this. Some places may back up your important files for you, while some may ask you to back them up ahead of time – that’s because they’ll just be reinstalling Windows for you.

Remove Included Bloatware

If you’ve just purchased a new computer – or reset your old computer back to its factory default state – you’ll often find it packed full of useless software. Computer manufacturers are paid to include these programs, which slow your computer down (particularly during the startup process) and clutter your system tray.

Best Buy’s Geek Squad will charge you to remove this bloatware. Even Microsoft is getting in on the action – if you bring a Windows PC to a Microsoft store, they’ll remove the bloatware for $99.

Don’t fall for it: You don’t have to pay a dime to remove these preinstalled programs. There are three ways you can go about doing this:

• Use a program like PC Decrapifier. It will automatically scan your computer for bloatware and automatically uninstall it.
• Open the Uninstall a program control panel and manually uninstall each piece of bloatware, one-by-one. If you do this on a new computer, be sure not to uninstall any hardware drivers. Everything else should be fair game.
• Reinstall Windows. Many geeks like performing a fresh install of Windows on their new computers to start from a clean state. You’ll often have to download and install hardware drivers from your computer manufacturer’s website after the reinstall.

Build Your Own Computer

If you’re in the market for a new desktop computer (you can’t really build your own laptop), you don’t have to buy a prebuilt computer. It’s surprisingly easy to build your own computer from components you can order online. This is generally cheaper than building a new computer – you can get better hardware and choose exactly the hardware you want.

For step-by-step instructions for everything from choosing components to assembling your new machine, check out our guides:

• Building a New Computer – Part 1: Choosing Hardware
• Building a New Computer – Part 2: Putting it Together
• Building a New Computer – Part 3: Setting it Up
• Building a New Computer – Part 4: Installing Windows and Loading Drivers
• Building a New Computer – Part 5: Tweaking Your New Computer

Upgrade Your RAM or Hard Drive

Some computer upgrades are particularly simple. Adding new RAM to your computer is a very simple process – as long as you buy the right RAM for your computer, installing it is will be easy (even in many laptops.) You can also upgrade your hard drive (or add a new hard drive) to increase the storage space you have available. This is a bit more complicated, as you’ll have to reinstall Windows or move your existing operating system over if you’re replacing the original hard drive, but it’s not too hard.

We have guides that will walk you through performing these simple upgrades:

• Hardware Upgrade: How To Install New RAM
• Hardware Upgrade: How To Install A New Hard Drive, Pt 1
• Hardware Upgrade: How To Install A New Hard Drive, Pt 2, Troubleshooting

RMA Your Computer

If you bought a laptop or pre-assembled desktop computer, you don’t need to take it to a repair place if it breaks. If it’s still under warranty, you can contact the manufacturer to RMA the computer and have them repair it. RMA stands for “return merchandise authorization” – you’ll need to tell the manufacturer’s service department your problem and receive an RMA number before mailing it to their service center.

If you built your own computer from scratch, it can get a bit more complicated here – you’ll need to pin down which component is defective and RMA that component alone.

For information on RMA’ing your hardware if it breaks, consult your computer’s warranty documentation. You can also visit your computer manufacturer’s support website online.

Recover Deleted Files

If you’ve accidentally deleted an important file, you’ll be happy to know that it may be possible to recover it. This is because deleted files aren’t actually erased immediately.

If you need in-depth forensic data recovery of critical business documents, you might want to contact a professional for that. This is an expensive service, so unless it’s extremely important data, you may as well just try doing it yourself.

Read More:

• HTG Explains: Why Deleted Files Can Be Recovered and How You Can Prevent It
• How to Recover that Photo, Picture or File You Deleted Accidentally

These are all things you can do on your own fairly easily if you can follow instructions. We haven’t touched on the more complicated stuff here, but a lot of what people pay computer repair places to do is simple. This is the computer equivalent of changing your own windshield wiper fluid.

Social engineering, in the security realm, is defined as the art of gaining access to buildings, systems or data by exploiting human psychology, rather than by breaking in or using technical hacking techniques, according to csoonline.com. It is by this form of fraud that many different types rogue software are able to get computer users to willingly install their software on their computers.

One common type of rogue software that uses social engineering to gain access to your computer is fake anti-virus program. Surprisingly, a 2010 study by Google found that 50% of all malware download through internet advertising came from these fake anti-virus programs. As you can see, this is no small issue but the problems it causes can be easily avoided. As the old adage goes, an ounce of prevention in this case is definitely worth a pound of cure.

To understand just how these fake anti-virus programs work, a comparison to the mythic Trojan War is actually quite fitting. As the story goes, the Greeks were involved in a lengthy war against the city of Troy. As a peace offering, the Greeks constructed a giant wooden horse and gave it the Trojans. Unbeknownst to them were the 30 elite soldiers hidden inside. Once the horse was taken inside the men escaped and opened the city gate, allowing the Greeks inside the city wall to finally conquer the city of Troy.

Fake anti-virus programs work in a similar fashion. Like in the image above, one will stumble upon a message saying that their computer is infected and that if you click the provided link, they will remove the problem. It would seem great to have that software come in to save the day but just like the soldiers hiding inside the horse, their only object is to deceive and destroy.

Once a user chooses to install the program, the software then hijacks the system. Having had control given them over the computer by the user, the software then will display unwanted ads pressuring the user into buying the software. Often they will also install viruses, key-loggers, spyware and other types of malicious software. These programs can be very difficult to remove.

Here at Stability Networks we see this problem often but many times it could have easily been avoided. By following the steps below, you can make sure that these rogue security programs do not comprise the stability and security of your computer.

• Use a firewall

This helps prevent unauthorized connection from being made to your computer. The firewall should always be left on.

• Make sure your system is up-to-date

This prevents malicious software from using software exploits to gain access to your computer. Always update your computer to ensure those vulnerabilities do not exist.

• Use caution when clicking links

If any link looks suspicious, don’t click it! Even if the suspicious link is from a trusted source, contact them about link before you click it.

• Use a standard user account rather than an administrator account

This will prevent malicious software from making changes to operating system-level files. When you have an administrator account, any file can make can make changes to system-critical files without your permission.

• Familiarize yourself with common phishing schemes

This is help you know what to look out when these programs are trying to deceive you. Many easily identifiable characteristics will help you know if something is a fraud.

• Use a popular anti-virus and anti-malware software solution

This will help remove malicious software it is does make it to your computer. Software like AVG Anti-Virus and Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware Pro both provide real-time monitoring of your system. Always keep them updated.

This error occurs when Firefox is closed but is still running in the background. Firefox is either in the process of closing or is frozen and hasn’t quit properly. In rare situations, there may be a problem with your profile.

Wait a Few Seconds

If you’ve just closed all your Firefox windows and quickly tried to open a new one, you may see this message. This is because Firefox is still running in the background, doing housekeeping tasks and saving your data before quitting completely. If you wait a few seconds and try launching Firefox again, you may find that it opens properly.

End Firefox.exe in the Task Manager

If waiting a few seconds didn’t help, then Firefox has failed to quit properly. While all Firefox windows may be closed, Firefox itself is still running in the background. It may be frozen and using no system resources or it may be chewing up your available CPU time.

Luckily, ending Firefox in the Task Manager is simple. First, open the Task Manager by pressing Ctrl+Shift+Escape. You can also right-click your taskbar and select Task Manager.

Firefox won’t appear in the list of running applications because this list only shows applications with open windows. No problem – just click the Processes tab.

(On Windows 8, you should find Firefox under Background processes. You can also click the Details tab to see a full list of processes.)

Type the letter f and you should instantly jump to the firefox.exe process. You can also click the Image Name header to sort the process list alphabetically and locate firefox.exe.

Once you’ve located firefox.exe, select it and click the End Process button.

This is what the message means when it asks you to “close the existing Firefox process.”

Confirm the operation and Firefox will be unceremoniously quit. You can now restart Firefox.

Restart Your Computer

Restarting your computer is the nuclear option and, quite frankly, isn’t a very good idea. If you encounter this error, you can always fix it without restarting your computer.

The “restart your computer” suggestion is for less-experienced users that may not want to deal with the Task Manager – restarting your computer works because it ends all the processes on your computer, including firefox.exe.

Remove the Profile Lock

If you’ve tried everything above – including rebooting your computer – and you still see this message, it’s possible that your Firefox profile is still “locked.” Firefox is designed to ensure that only one copy of Firefox is using a profile at a single time. To ensure this, it places special lock files in the profile directory. In rare cases, Firefox could have left behind the lock file when it crashed or quit abnormally.

You can delete these lock files yourself. Ensure Firefox is not running (not even in the task manager) before you do this or you could potentially corrupt your profile.

First, you’ll need to open your Firefox profile folder. To do so on Windows, press Windows Key+R, copy-paste the following line into the box, and press Enter:

%appdata%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles

Double-click the profile folder ending in .default. The profile has a random prefix name on each computer, but it always ends in .default.

Locate the parent.lock file and delete it. Firefox should now launch properly.

If you’re using Mac OS X, you’ll need to delete the .parentlock file in your profile directory instead. Linux users will need to delete the .parentlock and lock files.

85: the percent of email sent that is spam. 8600: the number of new malicious websites created each day. 1500: the price some organizations charge to send out 32 million spam emails. 1,300,000,000: the number of attempts to infect someone’s computer a year.

The numbers are staggering and the threat is real: cybercriminals are working hard to take control of your computer and compromise its security. The numbers are increasing but so are the solutions available to combat these problems.

Prevention and cure are the focus of these solutions. Things such as firewalls and anti-viruses are designed to constantly monitor a system or network malicious activity and stop it from causing any problem. These programs also provide a cure to remove the problem if it somehow makes it on to your system.

In this piece, we will look at four different security solutions, what they do and what they protect against. Whether it is a business looking to secure a critical network infrastructure or an individual looking to keep their workstation running well, following these guidelines will ensure that your computer can endure the constant attacks of cyber criminals around the world.

OpenDNS:

When you go to a website, a DNS server helps direct traffic to the correct place. Normally your internet server provider does this but OpenDNS replaces it, allowing you more control. As an organization dedicated to DNS services, they focus a lot on security. It can prevent users from accidentally accessing bad websites and downloading malicious files. It also prevents any software that might have made it on to the computer from communicating with the outside world and thus often preventing its spread.  OpenDNS also improves employee productivity.  OpenDNS can be configured to allow or disallow access to specific web sites (e.g. prevent access to social media sites like Facebook or MySpace).

Here is an example of a threat that OpenDNS protects against:

Botnets

• A botnet is a type of malware that allows a command and control server to take control of a computer, effectively rendering it a “zombie” system. Once a computer is taken over by a botnet, it might be used unsuspectingly to attack other computers or distribute spam emails.

Anti-virus and anti-malware:

This security solution is one of the most important. Software like AVG Anti-Virus and Malwarebyte’s Anti-Malware Pro both provide real-time monitoring to help prevent malicious software from infecting a computer. Extensive virus definitions help these programs to remove any malicious software if it did get on the computer. The following are types of threats that anti-virus and anti-malware software protects against:

Computer viruses

• A computer virus is defined as piece of software that is designed to infect a computer and then spread to another computer. The virus will often overload system resources making a computer difficult to use.

Rogue security software

• Rogue security software will pose as legitimate anti-virus software stating that the computer is infected and that only they can remove the problem. They are, if fact, the problem that needs removed because if it is installed, it will reduce the functionality of your computer and often display unsolicited advertisements.

Firewall:

A firewall is the first line of defense in securing a network. Like a moat around a castle, a firewall keeps unauthorized connections from getting into an internal network. Placed before an internal network, a firewall uses a predefined set of rules to keep bad traffic out and allow legitimate traffic to pass through, keeping the network safe.

Here is an example of a threat that a firewall protects against:

IP spoofing

• IP spoofing is the creation of internet packets with forged address for the intent of concealing the identity of the sender. When data packets are sent across the internet, it contains, among other things, the address of the source and the address of the destination. Hackers use IP spoofing to fool a network into believing that the malicious data they are sending is from a trusted source.

Email Security Software

Email security software helps protect your email inbox from spam and malware. Email security software is set up to work in line with a company’s email vendor to filter emails before they get to the users inbox. Email is a common way for malware to spread and email security software helps stop that.

Here is an example of a type of threat that email security software protects against:

Phishing scams

• Phishing is described as a way to acquire personal information such as usernames, passwords and bank details by impersonating a trusted source. Used as a type of social engineering, phishing emails often look and feel of legitimate company communication but will ask a user to enter their credentials to prevent something bad from happening. Spelling errors are a common way to detect this of scam.

Webmail was first introduced with HoTMaiL in 1996. Back then, it was novel to have a personal email address you could keep for life – one that was totally independent from your business or internet service provider. Eight years later, Google introduced Gmail, which included 1 GB of storage and inbox search. And while Gmail and other webmail services like Hotmail have added some features since then, not much has fundamentally changed in webmail over the last 8 years – though yesterday’s frustrations about the small size of inboxes are now things of the past. At the same time, email is becoming less and less useful as inboxes become cluttered with newsletters and social updates, and people increasingly keep up their personal connections in social networks instead of their email address books. All of this has led many to hope for a better solution so you don’t have to settle for today’s webmail.

It’s Time for a Change

We think the time is right to reimagine email. So today, we’re introducing a preview of Outlook.com. We realized that we needed to take a bold step, break from the past and build you a brand new service from the ground up. You already know Outlook via the Outlook desktop application-for PCs and Macs-as the world’s most popular application for reading email, managing a calendar, and connecting to people. And you may have used the Outlook Web App connected to Exchange Server in your organization. Now, in addition to a desktop application and a service for businesses, we’re offering Outlook as a personal email service – Outlook.com.

Modern experience for modern browsers and devices. Email isn’t just about the browser anymore. In fact, email represents 20% of the time we spend on smartphones, and is used extensively on tablets as well as PCs. Outlook is designed cloud first, so all of your mail is always available wherever you are. Its fresh, clean user interface gets the clutter out of your way-the header has 60% fewer pixels and there are 30% more messages visible in your inbox that the webmail most people are used to. And there are no display ads or large search boxes that take up extra space. Outlook.com also uses Exchange ActiveSync, so it powers your mail, calendar and people experience on your smartphone, tablet, and the new Outlook 2013 Preview.

Connected to friends and co-workers, wherever they are. Over the last several years, social networks have become an incredibly popular place to share and communicate with friends and co-workers. At the same time, email use among people who use social networks actively has continued to increase. We saw an opportunity to make email better by using your connections on social networks to enrich your email experience. And so with the Outlook.com preview, we are giving you the first email service that is connected to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google, and soon, Skype, to bring relevant context and communications to your email.

In the Outlook.com inbox, your personal email comes alive with photos of your friends, recent status updates and Tweets that your friend has shared with you, the ability to chat and video call – all powered by an always up-to-date contact list that is connected to your social networks. And, of course, you are in control of your experience – what you share, the networks you connect to, and your personal information.

Smart and powerful. Today’s inbox is about more than just exchanging mail with the people you know -50% of the email in a typical inbox is newsletters and another 20% is social network updates. This is part of the reason our inboxes are overloaded and we often feel it’s a chore to “do email.” Outlook.com automatically sorts your messages from contacts, newsletters, shipping updates, and social updates, and with our Sweep features you can move, delete and set up powerful rules in a few, simple clicks so you can more quickly get to the email you really want.

People also use email to share photos and work together on documents. So we included free Office Web Apps — Word, PowerPoint, Excel and OneNote – which let you view and edit attachments without leaving your inbox. And Outlook.com comes with SkyDrive, so if you’re sending photos, documents, or just about any other file, you can now put them on SkyDrive and stop worrying about attachment limits.

Putting you in control. Email is private and confidential, and most folks we’ve talked to want to keep it that way. So we keep your personal email personal. We don’t scan your email content or attachments and sell this information to advertisers or any other company, and we don’t show ads in personal conversations. We let you decide whether to connect your account to social networks, and which ones you want to use – and you’re in control of who you friend or follow. And, if you’re a power user who wants to really fine tune your inbox, we let you create your own categories, folders, and rules to tailor Outlook.com to your preferences.

And of course Outlook.com comes with the features you’d expect from any email service. Building on our past work with Exchange and Hotmail, we provide an inbox with virtually unlimited storage, industry leading spam protection, and rock solid account protection powered by your Microsoft account. Outlook.com also works great with the Outlook desktop application, and as you’d expect from a personal email service, it’s free.

Get Started Today at Outlook.com

While today’s preview is just the start, Outlook.com is ready now to become your primary email service. We’re expecting millions of people to try it out. Starting today, you can get an @Outlook.com email address, and we’ve also made it easy to get started with your current email address if you want to.

• If you’re a Hotmail customer and want to upgrade to the Outlook.com preview, just click “Upgrade” in the options menu of Hotmail. Your email address, password, contacts, old email, and rules will remain unchanged, and you can send/receive email from your @hotmail.com or @msn.com or @live.com address. You’ll experience it all in the new Outlook.com preview user interface. You can also add an @Outlook.com email address to your account if you want.
• Using Gmail, Yahoo, or another email service? No problem – it’s easy to try the preview by going to http://www.outlook.com/. If you have a Microsoft account, just log in and get started. If you don’t, it’s easy to create a new account with an @Outlook.com email address. Then you can set up Gmail or your other email service to forward your mail to Outlook.com and import your contacts and messages by following these instructions . This will let you use both services for now, but we think that over time, most people will prefer Outlook.com.
• Don’t have an email address? Go to Outlook.com and create a new one and you’ll be up and running.

Once you’re using Outlook.com, you can also set it up on your phone (Windows Phone, iPhone, Android, Blackberry, or other phone), tablet (Windows 8, iPad, and Android), in the new Outlook 2013 Preview, or in other mail apps you might use. And because Outlook.com supports Exchange ActiveSync, you can set it up just like you would your Exchange or Hotmail account.  Have more questions? See our step-by- step guide to setting up Outlook.com on your phone.

Join the Preview and Join the Conversation

Today is the start of our preview, which represents an opportunity to learn together as we roll out and scale this new service. We know your email is important and you need a service that puts you in control, and we’re looking forward to your feedback. Once you’re using the service, just click Feedback in the Outlook.com Options menu and let us know what you think. If you have questions about this post, feel free to leave a comment here on our blog, or join us on Reddit later today where we’re hosting an “Ask me anything” at 11am PST. We have a lot more we’ll be sharing on this blog, and we look forward to continuing this conversation with you.

A lot has changed in the last eight years, and we think it’ time for a fresh look at email – modern, connected, smart, powerful, and in control. So try out the preview at Outlook.com. We think you’ll like what you see.