Contemplating New Internet Security
As much as Zone Alarm is my husbands Internet/Computer security system of choice… I’m about to rip my hair out.
I did their 18 step process to find out if I had a Cisco VPN, clean uninstall the program, reinstall the program (after convincing them I had a product key so they WOULD help me). No dice.
I still have the program looking like it’s installing but when it comes to giving me the User Interface so I can set all my preferences and, you know, run the program, it hangs up. I get the icon in my task bar saying “Protection is running, UI is initializing”. And that’s where it stays.
NOW, their tech supports want me to and I quote from the email:
Please clean your startup programs other than ZoneAlarm and see if you still have the same issues. 1.) Click Start 2.) Type Msconfig in the Search box 3.) Hit Enter 4.) Once in Msconfig, click the Startup Tab, and remove the checks from everything except Zlclient.exe. 5.) Click the Service Tab, place a check in "Hide All Microsoft Services." Now remove checks from everything other than TrueVector Internet Monitor 6.) Click OK 7.) Restart your computer and see if it works. 8.) If it works, go back into Msconfig and place checks back in five or so at a time and restart, so you can narrow down what is causing the conflict.
Yeah, I’m not sure I’m quite comfortable with cleaning everything out of the start menu and then rebuilding it. I can see way too many thing going wonky with the computer doing that. If my husband is okay doing that – then he’s welcome to it. But for me, I’m thinking it’s taken me four days to get my computer to proper functionality to potentially muck it up now.
Oh, and I’m really confident with all the “See if it works” and “IF it works” language in this process.
Right now I’m really thinking there has to be an easier way to protect myself online — and it may not be with this program.