Vista Tutorial - WLM Desktop and Google Desktop and Toolbar

I am running Windows Vista Premium and Office Standard 2003 with the Google
Desktop and Toolbar V4 preinstalled by Gateway. I would like to load Windows
Live Mail and other services but I am afraid that they will conflict with
Google. I am not that familiar with Vista yet so I would rather not
uninstall Google if I do not have too.

Has anyone had any problems with both toolbars and desktop searches loaded?
Would it be sufficient to hide Google Toolbar?

Hi, Nevada.

The word "desktop" may be confusing you - and that's quite understandable,
given the several ways Google and Microsoft have used the word. :>(

First, there is no "WLM Desktop" anymore, even though Microsoft has not yet
removed it from the name of this newsgroup (also known as a Discussion Group
or a Microsoft Community). The "desktop" part of the name was retired in a
renaming frenzy last May, while Windows Live Mail was still in beta.

Second, more naming confusion: Every copy of Vista comes with Windows Mail,
the rewrite of Outlook Express. OE will not run on Vista; WM will not run
on WinXP. But the new Windows Live Mail (final version released in November
2007) will run on both WinXP and Vista. When WLM is installed, it deletes
the shortcut for WM or OE, but it does not delete the older application; in
fact, WLM can run side by side with OE or WM. WLM is a part of the Windows
Live family. It does not come pre-installed or as a part of Vista, but must
be downloaded and installed by the user. If you did not install WLM on your
computer, then you probably are using WM and should visit the OTHER
newsgroup for WM users: microsoft.public.windows.vista.mail

Third, OE/WM/WLM are all mail and news reader applications, not search
applications, even though each has some limited search abilities. None of
them should interfere with Google in any way, so far as I know. And, unless
you stop it, Vista's Indexing service will also be running in the
background. I've never used Google's Gmail, but many users do use it with
OE/WM/WLM.

Fourth, if you have Office installed, you also have Outlook, which includes
another mail application (but not a news reader) along with its Calendar and
other functions. But this also should run alongside the other programs
without conflicts.

And, finally, my try to answer your questions: No, I've not heard of
problems with running multiple search applications, and yes, hiding the
Google Toolbar should be sufficient, and maybe not even necessary.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
rc@xxxxxx
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64)

"Nevada" <Nevada@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:A93B5E72-6409-4D57-8AE3-0479E0CBD13C@xxxxxx

To expand on RC's response below, if you are referring to the desktop search
that is available from Microsoft for XP, there is not a version for Vista as
far as I know as search features are built right in to Vista. Click on the
Start Orb (Button) and you will see an area where you can type in your
search. You might want to reconsider the need for having both Vista and
Google's search features enabled as I suspect each one is having to index
all your files and email thereby likely slowing down your machine when the
indexing occurs.

In terms of toolbars I have run both WL Toolbar and Google toolbar with no
problems other than what I perceived was a slow down in terms of how quickly
Internet Explorer loads. I get around this by turning one of the toolbars
off in View - > Toolbars in IE.

As RC explained, Windows Live Mail is a desktop email client and should not
affect your use of Google Toolbar or Windows Toolbar in any way that I have
seen. I don't think any of the other Windows Live accessories that are
included in the install of WLM will affect you either.

"R. C. White" <rc@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:BBFA8BC1-4E43-4B77-8611-07146DEB8749@xxxxxx