Annoying Adobe

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😡 Does anyone know how to put a stop not only to automatic Adobe downloads but to the annoying pop-up question asking if I want to updates.
I am using Win & home premium.

Thanks in advance.

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Adobe has 65 products. Which one?

If Flash Player, see Control Panel. But I recommend setting that to Allow instead of Notify, not Never (because you do want updates if you want to avoid hackers and viruses).

Bruce

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He’s probably referring to one or more of these:
Adobe Reader, Flash[whatever], Shockwave [not the Transformers one].
I have mine set to notify me of updates, I choose when to download & install.
He might have his set the same way.

"Take care of thy backups and thy restores shall take care of thee." Ben Franklin, revisted

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This is relating to Adobe reader – so do you have any idea how to fully disable future updates and pop-up’s?

I am on a limited download plan.

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@Robko – Have a look at this post.

Hope it helps…

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Thanks Rick, I’ll give it a go – I just hope it doesn’t involve fiddling with the registry. (I don’t have so much self-confidence).

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I have mine set to Notify and all updaters unchecked in msconfig and don’t even get the notifications and have to rely on someone in another forum posting about any updates.

I decided on the notify as opposed to auto as there was once a scare about Flash Player possibly being hijacked and if one of those updates had been auto, then there’s no telling what could have been installed.

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@Robko – No registry-editng required. 🙂

Go the the 4th post by LondonBoy2001 on 20-Sep-2011 02:28.

Hope this helps….

By the way – It’s always a good idea to let others know the version of the program you’re asking about, so answers can be tailored accurately. For example, in Acrobat Reader you should be able to use ‘Help > About’ to find out the version no. (Sorry but I can’t give more specific info ‘cos I don’t use Acrobat Reader.)

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Robko,

Or just ditch it for Foxit Reader or Nitro Reader. HTH :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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To be honest, that would be my preference too, i.e. Foxit Reader. 🙂

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Rick,

Does anyone know how to put a stop not only to automatic Adobe downloads but to the annoying pop-up question asking if I want to updates.

Are you saying Ditching Adobe won’t stop that behavior? 35623-ROTFLOL :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Hi RG,

I think you’re joshing (have I got that term right?).

I often wonder about whether to answer an OP’s question prescriptively (accurately but perhaps not too helpfully) or whether to advise a different route altogether.

You’re a Super Moderator and I think this is a great forum so I would value your advice in order to tailor future answers more helpfully.

However, this is off-topic so perhaps a new post or PM?

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G’day RG, I never even heard of these two alternatives you speak of; but will definitely give them a try – I just hope they are able to open my existing .PDF’s

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Robko,

G’day RG, I never even heard of these two alternatives you speak of; but will definitely give them a try – I just hope they are able to open my existing .PDF’s

I’ve never had a PDF that either of them couldn’t open. HTH :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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For recent versions, in Adobe Reader just go to Edit, Preferences, Updater (at the very bottom of the list) and choose:

Do not download or install updates automatically (v. 11.x.x) or Manually check for and install updates (v.10.x.x).

Help / Automatic updates | Acrobat, Reader

Bruce

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Thanks for your input Bruce and for addressing the specific/initial question.

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Thanks for your input Bruce and for addressing the specific/initial question.

Your specific question was answered, but I’d like to mention another alternative to Reader: PDF Xchange Viewer at http://www.tracker-software.com. A link to the viewer is on their home page. Their viewer is light on system resources and does a good job. Their reader previews functionality of their paid versions which leaves a watermark if you modify a PDF with it. But, if you’re only viewing/printing PDFs, I recommend giving it a shot!

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Open A A R, open “edit”, open “preferences”, open “updater”, change your Updater preferences to “Never”.

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Adobe Reader was installed by default on my new computer. I immediately Revo’d it out. Revo reported an installation size of a staggering — because it is just that: staggering — 185Mb. Gawd’s sakes: why??? I turfed out this hapless bloatware and replaced it with Tracker Software’s well-known freebie, PDF-Viewer. Size on disk: 52Mb. But it wasn’t just the size of the thing that I objected to, it’s the fact that Adobe Reader is installed on 1,000s of computers run by novices blissfully unaware of the harsh fact of life that the more ‘popular’ something is (in terms of number of users) the greater the likelihood of it being targeted by hackers. After all, why bother going to a lot of trouble to create malware and then direct it at the smallest possible audience? What you want to target is the largest audience . . . and the Adobe Reader audience, unwitting though it most often is, remains the largest pdf user group of ’em all. No wonder Adobe Reader is more or less constantly under attack. No wonder it is more and less constantly having to be updated. No wonder that you’re more likely to be a sitting duck than anything else if you’re using Adobe Reader when there are so many safer, better and considerably less bloated freeware alternatives out there.

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But it wasn’t just the size of the thing that I objected to, it’s the fact that Adobe Reader is installed on 1,000s of computers run by novices blissfully unaware of the harsh fact of life that the more ‘popular’ something is (in terms of number of users) the greater the likelihood of it being targeted by hackers. After all, why bother going to a lot of trouble to create malware and then direct it at the smallest possible audience? What you want to target is the largest audience . . . and the Adobe Reader audience, unwitting though it most often is, remains the largest pdf user group of ’em all. No wonder Adobe Reader is more or less constantly under attack. No wonder it is more and less constantly having to be updated.

On that basis, do you select the least popular software to use in every category? e.g., your browser is Opera?

Adobe Reader works fine for me, and it only gets automatically-installed updates four or five times each year.

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On that basis, d’you extrapolate to absurd degree the content of every post you read on every Internet forum? Wouldn’t surprise me.

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On that basis, d’you extrapolate to absurd degree the content of every post you read on every Internet forum? Wouldn’t surprise me.

No. Why does avoiding the most popular software for security reasons only apply to PDF readers?

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The solution has already been posted; get rid of Adobe Reader. Foxit is a better program, it’s free, seldom needs updating. In short it just works!

David

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As we Linux users have been discovering lately, security through obscurity only lasts until the hackers “discover” your software (or OS). I’m thinking what happened was that most of the low-hanging Windows and IE fruit got picked (and patched for the most part). All that’s left now is the less-used but long-neglected alternatives. If this analysis is correct, it’s only a matter of time before Adobe Reader alternatives get targeted by hackers. I wonder if the alternatives’ developers will be prepared?

-- rc primak

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As we Linux users have been discovering lately, security through obscurity only lasts until the hackers “discover” your software (or OS). I’m thinking what happened was that most of the low-hanging Windows and IE fruit got picked (and patched for the most part). All that’s left now is the less-used but long-neglected alternatives. If this analysis is correct, it’s only a matter of time before Adobe Reader alternatives get targeted by hackers. I wonder if the alternatives’ developers will be prepared?

At last a real-world Linux user!

I have tried Linux versions in the past (RedHat, Mandrake, Ubuntu, etc.) but was not impressed as there are several programs I need to use that simply do not work under Linux or the Linux equivalents are fairly deficient compared to their Windows counterparts.

Not surprising that Windows programs have been targeted so persistently by hackers in the past. We only need to look at Windoze market share to realise why that is.

Had some problems with Vista until SP2, and have had very few problems with Win7 (I waited until SP1 for Win7 was released before I upgraded, and really don’t see much difference between Vista SP2 and Win7 SP1).

It is not only Linux versions that are now being targeted by hackers, Mac users are now having to run AV/AS programs for the same reason – hackers now know that Windows systems have been hardened against their attacks, so they are now turning their attention to “soft” targets such as Linux and Mac systems.

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Foxit Reader will open your existing pdf files.

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😡 Does anyone know how to put a stop not only to automatic Adobe downloads but to the annoying pop-up question asking if I want to updates.
I am using Win & home premium.

Thanks in advance.

Be very care, there many fakes of Adobe Flash Player. If you got Malwarebytes run it, if not heres the down load link, run this 1 time a day. Download FREE VERSION.

https://www.malwarebytes.org/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFqh9g1Olx8

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Be very care, there many fakes of Adobe Flash Player.

But this thread is about Adobe Reader updates.

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I’d get rid of Adobe Reader for sure, Foxit does everything you’ll ever need with far less bloat.

David

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Adobe Flash Player and Adobe Reader can be problematic from time to time. I keep Flash Player current and working, ’cause many web sites depend on it being “resident.” I also moved from Adobe Reader to PDF X-change Viewer recently, the free version.

"Take care of thy backups and thy restores shall take care of thee." Ben Franklin, revisted

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