This laptop is driving me crazy!!

[Alys Kinch]

I hate vista. thought i should get that out first.

 

hubby bought a brand-new laptop from a friend who bought it days before he lost his job. never even got the cable guy to hook up the internet... so i got stuck with vista which is something i told him i didn't want on the laptop. now, of course, i am fighting with it.

 

does anyone know why i am being told my add-ons are disabled by the internet information bar while the add-on manager says they are all enabled? i have downloaded all of the updates that were available for vista and the issue isn't fixed. i would really like to be able to run add-ons because i have homework that is online and two hours of dead time during which i have to sit at the college. *sigh*

[DPR]

 

Oh yeah, that one is easy. The reason it doesn't work is because it's...vista! If I could afford it, I would buy you a mac and laugh with you as you realized that all of your cares had just blown away in the wind.  Good luck with your add-ons, though. I spent about 12 hours trying to get my father's vista just to recognize his printer. I had to uninstall and reinstall four times and i still have no idea what it was that did not work.

[Cadsuane]

Can you just wipe it and install XP?

[ironcross]

up till i got my new pc i thought those mac pc commercials were just funny, now as a vista user i can honestly say, microsoft has ROLALY SCREWED UP!!!!  >:(    i hate vista. some of my old games run just fine,,, except that the color is all screwed up, oh and i love the "are you the one who wants to do this" things it pops up when i try to install something.

 

if it is possible i would follow caddys advice, wipe it and put XP back on it

[Shendare]

I'm getting used to Vista myself. I went out and bought it as soon as it became available, and upgraded my XP machine right away. Within two months, I had reformatted and gone back to XP. Way too many driver/software incompatibilities.

 

Now, Microsoft finally has the first Service Pack for Vista in Release Candidate phase, after Beta but before full official release. So, I went ahead and upgraded again, and I must say I've had zero problems with my games and programs with SP1 installed. Everything that I've tried so far runs great.

 

The security confirmation pop-up can be a little annoying when you're first having to re-install all your software and drivers, but after that, when things get quiet again, it's sort of good to know nothing's being done to your computer without your knowledge. No programs are allowed to do anything that affects any files or folders on your computer without that confirmation window popping up, aside from the files and settings in your own user area.

 

It's like having the security benefits of running a Limited/Restricted Account in XP/2000, but instead of having to log off your user account and log on as Administrator to install something, you just have to click "Allow" on the pop-up. A very good compromise, though it took a while to grow on me, since it was new and all.

 

As for your problem, Alys, there are a couple of things that might be causing the issue.

 

1) There are usually two shortcuts for Internet Explorer in Windows, a regular one "Internet Explorer" and a restricted one "Internet Explorer (No Add-Ons)". Double check to make sure you're not using the second one.

 

2) There may be a little confusion with newer Internet Explorer security features. I mostly use Firefox these days, so I'm not 100% familiar with them, but looking around the Security tab of IE's "Internet Properties" showed two things: a "Protected Mode" that prompts you whenever an add-on tries to install or load, and different settings for different "Internet Zones".

 

You might try turning off the "Protected Mode" checkbox and see if that fixes it. If not, you'll likely want to reset the security settings for each of the zones to the defaults. You'll got pop-ups the first time you try to do several things after that point, and usually you can click "Allow" or "Yes", then check "Don't ask me again" on the pop-up to save the setting.

 

See if any of that helps. Or, you can try Firefox, too! *laugh*

[Alys Kinch]

thanks, shen. as i said, i would just switch to firefox, but it's not supported by this site that i need.  the first thing i tried was switching to unprotected, turning off all internet security, then i checked all the add ons.

 

i can't downgrade because the two computers we have had xp preinstalled.

 

i will check the ie to see if it's the one you mentioned, but to my recollection, it's the only one i have seen...

[Alys Kinch]

and there's the problem right there... i never saw the parenthesis... thanks again, shen.

[Shendare]

Awesome! To get to the right room, you've got to go through the right door. *laugh*

[Alys Kinch]

*pokes* it helps if the door label is plainly readable... if you have to hover to find out there is more to it.... there's clearly a problem.

[Shendare]

Huh. I haven't seen the parenthetical portion actually hidden before.

 

Of course, I've never tried dragging the shortcut out of Accessories -> System Tools onto the desktop before. Maybe whoever created the shortcut didn't realize they were dragging that restricted one.