Vista - Users

I have Vista Home Premium 64 bit.

I had the computer built by a local shop and they installed the OS. I am
the User named Walter and also the Adminstrator. Should I set things so
that I log in as a Standard User instead of as an Adminstrator? Is it worth
the effort?

Walter wrote:Best practice says you should run as a user. I'd create another account
and assign it to the Users group. You need to have at least 1
administrator account.

--

Regards,
Hank Arnold
Microsoft MVP
Windows Server - Directory Services

"Hank Arnold (MVP)" <rasilon@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:eocJd1yRIHA.1208@xxxxxxOkay, if I start logging in as a standard User than I will move all my data
files from the current Admin account to the new User account.

also, I can't imagine a situation on my home computer where I wouldn't want
to have all apps available to every user. So that means I should always be
in the Admin account when I install apps, right? If I am in a user account
when I install an app will it install for all users?

I have not yet turned off UAC, like I hear most people eventually do. Will
switching to this strategy of running as a standard user but installing apps
as an Admin allow me to turn of UAC without losing the advantages that UAC
provides. (not sure what that actually is.)

If you are installing while using a standard user account and the install
requires administrator, then a dialog box comes up where you can select an
administrator account to give you admin privileges for the install.

"Walter" <nospam@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:e$w8ZF3RIHA.2376@xxxxxx

"Walter" <nospam@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:e$w8ZF3RIHA.2376@xxxxxxYou can still install apps from a standard user account, you'll be prompted
by UAC for the admin password.

Unless the program installer itself offers to limit use to one user, all
users will always be able to run just about any program installed, with the
exception of programs that require admin privileges. When you attempt to
open a program that needs admin rights you'll again be prompted for the
admin password to allow it to run.

Turning off UAC is not recommended. This actually defeats much of the
security in Vista. Also, you will have to be logged on to your admin
account to install anything with UAC turned off, since the standard users
will not get a prompt for the admin password, only a message stating that
you have to be an admin to install the program.

UAC can seem very annoying when you're first installing all of your software
on a new machine, but UAC hardly ever pops up, even for a standard user,
once all your applications are installed and you've set up the computer to
your liking.

It's ironic to me that Unix, Linux and Mac users have lived with prompts to
elevate user privileges to "root" every time they need to make a system
change, or install software, with nary a complaint about it, but especially
Linux users (and Apple themselves) make fun of UAC in Vista . . . even
thought it's the same basic thing. Sure, on Linux once you've elevated you
don't see the prompt again for whatever the timeout is set for (thus giving
EVERYTHING that runs during that time full access to the system) and with
UAC even if it's 2 seconds after elevating one program you run another that
needs admin rights, you get another prompt, it's still the same basic thing.

Mic

Thanks for the answers about the user accounts. I also listened to an old
podcast called Security Now with Steve Gibson and Leo Leporte about UAC and
it does sound like a good idea so I will not turn it off.

But my real concern is this: Over the years I've downloaded a lot of free
applications and utilities for all types of things. I usually learn about
these apps from reviews, newsgroups and web searches and in the end I have
no idea who has written them. Some of them are open source, but it doesn't
do me much good because I'm not a programmer so I don't have the knowledge
to inspect the code, searching for anything nefarious. And most of the
stuff is not open source anyway.

So for example -- I download a free disk defrag application. When it starts
up I get a UAC message asking me if I want to let Vista run it. It
certainly doesn't seem like much sense to say No. So I say Yes. If that
disk defrag application is a disk application, but also a trojan or some
other app that wants to start running in the background logging keystrokes
or whatever, I've just compromised my computer.

So it seems to me that UAC is only really going to work for people who only
put applications on their computers that they know, with absolute certainty,
are safe. This may work for people that only load a limited set of popular
apps but might not be of much use for me. Am I missing something? (like I
say I still intend to run UAC anyway.)