Windows® Sysinternals Administrator’s Reference

Chapter 5. Autoruns

A question I often hear is, “Why is all this stuff running on my computer?” That’s often followed with, “How do I get rid of it?” The Microsoft Windows operating system is a highly extensible platform. Not only can programmers write applications that users can choose to run, those programmers can “add value” by having their software run automatically without troubling the user to start it, by adding visible or nonvisible features to Windows Explorer and Internet Explorer or by supplying device drivers that can interact with custom hardware or change the way existing hardware works. Sometimes the “value” to the user is doubtful at best; sometimes the value is for someone else entirely and the software acts to the detriment of ...