Autostart programmes

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I seem to have 53 programme starting automatically when I launch XP Home. How
can I find out which have to run, and which can be stopped?
 
In
David C said:
I seem to have 53 programme starting automatically when I launch
XP
Home. How can I find out which have to run, and which can be
stopped?
Click to expand...

On each program you don't want to start automatically, check its
Options to see if it has the choice not to start. Many can easily
and best be stopped that way. If that doesn't work, run MSCONFIG
from the Start | Run line, and on the Startup tab, uncheck the
programs you don't want to start automatically.

However, if I were you, I wouldn't do this just for the purpose
of running the minimum number of programs. Despite what many
people tell you, you should be concerned, not with how many of
these programs you run, but which. Some of them can hurt
performance severely, but others have no effect on performance.

Don't just stop programs from running willy-nilly. What you
should do is determine what each program is, what its value is to
you, and what the cost in performance is of its running all the
time. You can get more information about these with at
http://castlecops.com/StartupList.html. If you can't find it
there, try google searches and ask about specifics here.

Once you have that information, you can make an intelligent
informed decision about what you want to keep and what you want
to get rid of.
 
Thank you very much for this, which I appreciate, and which has helped. The
problem for me, though, is twofold: first, that I do not recognise many of
the elements there (I just don't know enough about it); and secondly that
neither CastleCops nor BlackViper have them all. Example this Autostart
entry:

C:\WINDOWS\system32\expolerdata.exe %srun%

No trace of expolerdata as a search string on either of those two sites, and
none either on Microsoft.com ... and yes, I have got the spelling right! Any
advice gratefully received!

Many thanks,

David C
 
David C said:
Thank you very much for this, which I appreciate, and which has helped.
The
problem for me, though, is twofold: first, that I do not recognise many of
the elements there (I just don't know enough about it); and secondly that
neither CastleCops nor BlackViper have them all. Example this Autostart
entry:

C:\WINDOWS\system32\expolerdata.exe %srun%

No trace of expolerdata as a search string on either of those two sites,
and
none either on Microsoft.com ... and yes, I have got the spelling right!
Any
advice gratefully received!
Click to expand...

http://www.spyany.com/files/expoler_exe.html
 
In
David C said:
Thank you very much for this, which I appreciate, and which has
helped.
Click to expand...


You're welcome. Glad to help.

The problem for me, though, is twofold: first, that I do not
recognise many of the elements there (I just don't know enough
about
it); and secondly that neither CastleCops nor BlackViper have
them
all. Example this Autostart entry:

C:\WINDOWS\system32\expolerdata.exe %srun%

No trace of expolerdata as a search string on either of those
two
sites, and none either on Microsoft.com ...
Click to expand...


I can't find a reference to exactly that file name, but if I go
to Symantec's Virus search site http://www.symantec.com/search/
and search on expoler, it finds a couple of things.

So I suspect that you're infected. Do you run an antivirus
program, and update its virus definitions regularly? Do you run a
firewall? Do you run several anti-spyware programs, such as
Adaware, Spyware Blaster, and Spybot Search and Destroy?
 
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