Tips & Tricks

Stop Mysterious XP Pop-ups

Last week I told you how to disable Windows Messenger, thinking it was the same as the Messenger being used to send pop-up advertising. Turns out that they are two different animals. Windows (a/k/a MSN) Messenger is used for Instant Messaging, while this Messenger is used in networks to transmit and send Alerter service messages between clients and servers.

Even though you'll never use it unless you are on a network, by default it is turned on, causing an open hole in your XP firewall for pop-up advertising to get through. Here's what to do if you want to stop Messenger...

Go to Control Panel / Administrative Tools / Services (or Start / Run and type in "services.msc"). This will bring up a long list of Windows services that ar running or available on your system.

Find "Messenger" and double click to open the Properties box. In the "Startup Type" field, change the setting to "Manual". You could choose "Disable", but if any services depend on Messenger they will fail to start, so you're better off playing it safe.

Click OK to save changes.

Thanks Uncle Bill for yet another useless program to shut off.

~ David

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