Internet Explorer and Vista

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Just got a good question from reader L: Great article you posted on January 12th about the ending of IE 8, 9, and 10.   A local radio station in my ar
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On the Vista front users should be aware that Adobe has discontinued support for Version X of the Adobe Reader. More recent versions of Reader are incompatible with Vista. As a result, Vista users should be aware that continued use of Reader X is now a security risk.

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At Least we are on the clear for a year or so.

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I’m kinda curious why no one recommends Pale Moon in these posts about IE. Apparently Vista will be supported by them for some time longer.

Regarding Adobe Reader, I recall we were all advised to dump it in favor of Foxit or (my choice) PDFExchange Viewer.

My second laptop is Vista, and when EOL happens, the wifi will be disconnected and I’ll keep using it air-gapped.

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Sumatra PDF is a light, fast, regularly updated and safe alternative to Adobe Reader. Don’t expect frills, just excellent PDF rendering and printing. I replaced Adobe with Sumatra on all my computers years ago and have never regretted it for a second.

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What free, good alternative to MSE is there? I am a Win 7 user plagued by svchost spiking and WU taking forever, and unfortunately, MSE uses WU to get its daily updates. I am pondering a switch so I can just turn off WU and run it when I want.

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Vista, IE9 is having problems displaying a few sites.
CHROME & FIREFOX are, OK.
Adobe Reader 11.0.14 appears 2b supported ?
It looks like next CHRISTMAS, it’s a new PC. If Win10 is up to scratch. Otherwise it might be a migrate to MAC ?
Regards AK

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I relied on Foxit for a long time. Then, it began using agressive and invasive tactics… reminiscent of Microsoft shenanigans. So I switched to PDF X-Change Viewer. Older-fashioned, but more respectful of the customer.

Incidentally, Foxit is Chinese, or at least has strong links with China. I don’t trust this very much.

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I wonder if Chromium will continue support. I did a quick search but couldn’t find anything. I did see Chromodo available which seems to still support XP!

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I don’t have any idea – but it’s a tantalizing possibility.

Firefox seems committed to keeping the old Windows fires burning.

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Both Avast and AVG are free alternatives to MSE which have consistently caught more malware in independent testing than MSE for a few years running. both compare favorably with many paid alternatives.

I don’t like the way Avast takes up system resources if you aren’t careful about its settings. AVG has been accuse of spying, but this appears to be no more personal than the standard Windows telemetry these days, and not as personal as Google’s products, including their Chrome Browser.

So it appears there are free alternatives as good as if not better than MSE for those versions of Windows which support MSE now. I don’t know about Vista, but it would not surprise me if AVG Free even supports Vista and has no plans to abandon that market any time soon. Someone can correct me if this is wrong.

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You can eliminate the contention between MSE getting updates and svchost spiking from WU/MU by stopping the Windows Update Service. MSE will be able to retrieve it’s updates even while the Windows Update Service is stopped. You can see the activity by using the task manager (show processes from all users) and when MSE has completed updating you can restart the Windows Update Service.

If you don’t want to use the Service GUI to control windows update you can easily do it from an elevated command prompt. To stop Windows Update enter “sc stop wuauserv” and to start it use “sc start wuauserv”.

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I’ve had a look at alternative browsers.
READ THE SMALL PRINT T&C’s.
Check the PRIVACY, for DNS REDIRECT, AUTHORISED ADVERTS. Free is very rarely FREE ?
Lots to choose from, pick YOUR WINNER.
Regards. AK

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