On your personal PC, do you have administrator status?

[AmigaMan]

Originally posted by: mechBgon
I also have a separate Standard User account named malware research that I use for high-risk activities.

sure 😉 😉 give it up, that's your pr0n surfin account isn't it 😛

j/k, that's some good advice. I really need to get my wife's PC on a limited user account just for the fact that she's prone to installing the latest pretty screensaver or image editing program. Can't tell you how many time's I've uninstalled crap on her machine...

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: AmigaMan

Originally posted by: mechBgon
I also have a separate Standard User account named malware research that I use for high-risk activities.

sure 😉 😉 give it up, that's your pr0n surfin account isn't it 😛

Actually, that's exactly what it is. Here is the reason, 😉 normally with "Show Pictures" unchecked. There's some extremely twisted stuff goin' on out there :shocked:

j/k, that's some good advice. I really need to get my wife's PC on a limited user account just for the fact that she's prone to installing the latest pretty screensaver or image editing program. Can't tell you how many time's I've uninstalled crap on her machine...

Will she resent you taking away control? That's the one tricky part... it's hard to candy-coat the message "sorry honey, I don't trust your judgement."

 

[fierydemise]

I use 2 accounts, a standard and an admin. With UAC I can get by basically using just the standard but every now and then I'm doing something where the constant UAC prompts get a bit annoying or I need admin so I use that account but on a day to day basis for Vista I use a standard account.

 

[BladeVenom]

Yes, because so many games require administrative access. One of the worst game companies for this is Microsoft Game Studios.
Here's a short list.
Microsoft Flight Simulator X Deluxe
Microsoft Flight Simulator X Standard
Microsoft Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings
Microsoft Age of Empires II: The Conquerors Expansion
Microsoft Age of Empires II Gold Edition
Microsoft Age of Mythology
Microsoft Age of Mythology Gold
Microsoft Age of Mythology: The Titans
Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator 3: Battle for Europe
Microsoft Dungeon Siege
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2002 Standard Edition
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2002 Professional Edition
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004: Century of Flight
Microsoft Freelancer
Microsoft Halo: Combat Evolved for PC
Microsoft Impossible Creatures
Microsoft Links 2003
Microsoft Links 2003 Championship Edition
Microsoft MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries
Microsoft RalliSport Challenge PC
Microsoft Rise of Nations
Microsoft Train Simulator
Microsoft Zoo Tycoon
Microsoft Zoo Tycoon Complete Collection
Microsoft Zoo Tycoon: Dinosaur Digs 1.0
Microsoft Zoo Tycoon: Marine Mania

 

[MercenaryForHire]

Originally posted by: Muse
On your personal PC, do you have administrator status?

No, all my programs just magically install themselves. I don't know who has admin, but it's not me.

😛

- M4H

 

[nova2]

if you know what you're doing & you stay updated on vulns, its nice to run higher risk apps in a really restrictive limited account, email, browsers, IM, you should at least run those all the time in a limited account, except when updating them.
you may then not care so much about running everything else as admin on winxp.

all of that would be in vain if say you got owned by the (actual) new notepad++ vuln you didn't know about.
http://secunia.com/advisories/25245/

 

[natto fire]

Originally posted by: Hyperblaze
I run as a standard user but can easily sudo or su to root.

not recommended to run as root as common user however

ha, same here.

My Windows box, on the other hand, I just use admin all the time, but I was unaware you could run certain programs with different rights as in Linux. I might give it a try, but probably not.

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: BladeVenom
Yes, because so many games require administrative access. One of the worst game companies for this is Microsoft Game Studios.
Here's a short list.
Microsoft Flight Simulator X Deluxe
Microsoft Flight Simulator X Standard
Microsoft Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings
Microsoft Age of Empires II: The Conquerors Expansion
Microsoft Age of Empires II Gold Edition
Microsoft Age of Mythology
Microsoft Age of Mythology Gold
Microsoft Age of Mythology: The Titans
Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator 3: Battle for Europe
Microsoft Dungeon Siege
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2002 Standard Edition
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2002 Professional Edition
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004: Century of Flight
Microsoft Freelancer
Microsoft Halo: Combat Evolved for PC
Microsoft Impossible Creatures
Microsoft Links 2003
Microsoft Links 2003 Championship Edition
Microsoft MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries
Microsoft RalliSport Challenge PC
Microsoft Rise of Nations
Microsoft Train Simulator
Microsoft Zoo Tycoon
Microsoft Zoo Tycoon Complete Collection
Microsoft Zoo Tycoon: Dinosaur Digs 1.0
Microsoft Zoo Tycoon: Marine Mania

I can confirm that the Mechwarrior4 series don't cooperate with a non-Admin account on WinXP. But they do work with a non-Admin account on Windows Vista. 🙂 I also talked in person with the guy who heads MS Game Studios once, and he said they are making sure to address this, going forward. Cool guy. 😎

Anyway, one more way Vista > XP. I think it accomplishes this by means of its virtualization tricks. Sort of like the classic Star Trek episode Menagerie 😀