Substitute for Secunia PSI?

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Secunia still works on the laptop and my wife’s PC – both Win8.1.1 Pro, but for the last three weeks has failed on my Win 8.1.1 Basic with UEFI.

When I open Secunia it says “Last scan 29.05.2014, the programmes may be out of date, please scan”. When I try to do so, it shows ‘preparing to scan’ then nothing happens. It has been removed and reinstalled 4 or 5 times now, but always the same result, despite constantly increasing the length of time before giving up, culminating last night when I left it running all night.

It is clearly not going to run on my machine, so I hope to find a similar service elsewhere.
TIA

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George,

I’m running Windows 8.1.1 with Secunia PSI 3.0.0.3019 on my Dell XPS 8700 w/UEFI & Secure Boot and it works just fine. Are you running the program as Administrator? HTH :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Thanks RG,

I’m running Secunia 3.0.0.9016, but so is my wife, and she has no problems with it.

It’s possible to run as administrator by using the Secunia icon in Start/Programs rather than the task bar, PSI opens and after a pause of c 30 seconds the message about outdated software appears, I click scan now and it just shows preparing to scan as before. I have no idea whether it’s running as administrator, or whether UAC and the outdated software message have superseded that. But it does not scan.

I found a FAQ section on the website, but my settings match their requirements, so I am still looking for an app to carry out the same function as PSI.
George

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George,

Actually, I have prevented PSI from running at startup using SysInternals Autoruns. I have a Scheduled Task (no schedule just run on demand) that runs PSI as Administrator. I then call this task from a shortcut as follows:
[noparse]C:WindowsSystem32schtasks.exe /run /TN “Secunia PSI as Admin”[/noparse]

Scheduled Task Setup:
37236-PSI1
37237-PSI2
37238-PSI3
HTH :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Thanks for the assistance RG – or should it be Bruce? –but it hasn’t solved the problem, despite the learning curve in setting it up.

I have never used Task Scheduller, but Google led me to a Windows page, with instructions on how to do it in Win 7. Following the directions allowed me to set it up as per your screen prints. I didn’t have a clue as to how to set up the shortcut, but it was possible to start PSI from Task Scheduller itself. However, the result was the same as before – the usual warning about possible outdated software, the recommendation to scan and then just preparing to scan, until I closed after some 40 minutes.

Perhaps I should mention that for a couple of weeks now I have been getting periodic pop-ups asking me to check my internet connection, combined with a very slow connection at times during the day – by slow I mean at least 90 seconds to connect to a site. Getting the latest Test Match score involves logging on to the Daily Telegraph, selecting Sport, then Cricket, and finally Test Match, all of which takes 6 mins or more. I think this is probably due to the ISP, espec. as it is impossible to speak to anyone there without waiting for 15 – 20 mins.

As nobody has suggested a replacement for PSI I will have to make a note of any updates it comes up with on my wife’s PC and apply them manually to mine, until such time as Secunia brings out a new version. It’s unfortunate that I have far more programmes on my PC than my wife has on hers.

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George,

Are you connecting via Wire or Wi-Fi? You may need to reset your TCP/IP stack or do some other network diagnostics to find the problem. HTH :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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RG,
Many thanks for that. It looks as though you may have solved one problem that was really inconveniencing me, whilst the other remains unresolved.

I was desperately trying to post #5 before 10 pm, when my AV commences the daily scan and I watch the BBC news, but the Lounge didn’t want to accept it. Returning to the PC an hour or so later, after the news and my supper, I checked to see whether my posting had been accepted, and after a long wait to get through discovered that not only had it been accepted, but you had replied.

The Fixit in your link claimed to have solved the problem, but it hadn’t. I next turned to my ISP’s Assist app, which has often remedied problems with my wife’s WiFi connection, but it is not compatible with Win 8. I then ran the Fixit again, and this time it worked. Whereas the internet had been painfully slow immediately prior to the second Fixit attempt, it was back to normal speed, and is the same today.

However, it was fine yesterday morning, so I shouldn’t get too excited, but have high hopes that the issue is settled. I have bookmarked your reply for future reference.

Unfortunately, the issue with Secunia persists – I just hope that the next version will fix it. In reply to your question, it’s an Ethernet connection to the router, then normal phone line.
George

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This may sound a bit out of left field, but I had a problem with Secunia displaying the graphics in the dashboard.

I found that there was a connection between the security settings of Internet Explorer (Internet Options) and Secunia. When I put Secunia.com into the Trusted Sites category under the security tab, the graphics would display correctly. I suspect there was some specific setting in the Internet category that was causing the problem.

Recently, I again had a Secunia display problem on my Win 7 SP1 system. When I upgraded from IE 9 to IE 11 the problem went away.

So, George, you might check to see if the Internet Options settings on both your computers are the same. If you have not made too many settings adjustments, you could just try resetting to defaults to see if the problem clears up.

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@ JC Zorkoff. I don’t use IE, but comparing the internet settings for Firefox on my PC and my wife’s – a tedious process when they are not in the same room – they seem to be identical.

FF doesn’t have a Trusted Sites list, nor, as far as I could see, default settings for the browser. However, https://*secunia.com was one of the two Trusted Sites listed in IE, so presumably I put it there sometime.

But thanks for the suggestion.

@RG. Internet connections have been back to normal all day, so we can assume that the Fixit has sorted out the problem. Thanks again.
George

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George,

One other thing you can try is to load MozBackup on both of your machines.
Take a backup of your Wife’s FF settings then restore them to your computer (you might want to uncheck the bookmarks & history options). This will insure that your settings are the same and may or may not fix your problem with FF. You might also want to take a backup of your FF settings before applying your wife’s to your machine JIC! HTH :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Made the backups with Mozbackup, but something seems to be wrong on both PCs.

There are only two files in the folder with today’s date, one to uninstall and the other a system dll with a warning about changing it. The rest seem irrelevant to me, or ask what app to open with, and I have no idea.

I will not be available again until tomorrow, so a reply is not urgent.

George

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George, I also do not use IE as my browser. The connection I was talking about was between the Internet Options (also accessible from Control Panel) and the Secunia program. There are some options which affect the functioning of Secunia. I found the hint a few years ago on the Secunia Forum and it corrected my problem.

I put the secunia.com site into the trusted category because I relaxed most of the restrictive options of that category.

PS I have both http://*.secunia.com and https://*.secunia,com as trusted sites (my only trusted sites).

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I had a look at Control Panel/Internet Options and changed the default home page from Dell to the one I use in FF, but when trying to enter http://*.secunia.com as a trusted site was informed only https sites accepted. https://*.secunia.com was already there, as previously stated.

Have now given up on Secunia with this PC, will just rely on noting anything it finds outdated on my wife’s desktop and the laptop. In regard to programmes not on the other machines, will just have to hope they will inform me when updates are available.

Thanks for the reply.

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Hi,

Why not try Belarc Advisor ?

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File Hippo has it’s own downloadable file updater … which is the basis of that module in Glary Utilities …. filehippo.com/updatechecker

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Have you tried installing/running an earlier version of Secunia [just Google ‘old version Secunia’] if you think it is, or might be, a program jinx?

I use to use Secunia until I tried the freebie Driver Booster [http://www.iobit.com/driver-booster.php%5D which essentially does all that Secunia did. The free version takes much more time to run than the paid version but …..it’s free & works fine. ;>}

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Have you tried installing/running an earlier version of Secunia [just Google ‘old version Secunia’] if you think it is, or might be, a program jinx?

I use to use Secunia until I tried the freebie Driver Booster [http://www.iobit.com/driver-booster.php%5D which essentially does all that Secunia did. The free version takes much more time to run than the paid version but …..it’s free & works fine. ;>}

I had a look at this, but apparently it only updates drivers, which are usually best left alone unless one has problems with a specific application. It does not appear to me to compare with Secunia PSI, but thanks for the suggestion.

You will see from earlier posts I have now installed Secunia v 2, but it still doesn’t scan.

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Maybe Milouz Market from http://market.milouz.com could be used instead of PSI.

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I found a good replacement for Secunia ver.3.
Since I bought a completely new system W7 Prof 64-bit and using Secunia ver 3, I soon found problems with Secunia in that it hung on loading. It initially worked fine, scanning at startup each day, but after a couple of weeks it started hanging whilst loading. I could not get as far as the Dashboard. Eventually I uninstalled it, binned it, and downloaded a substitute that I had previously used for years without problems – Secunia ver. 2.0.0.4003. Now configured, up and running, no further problems. I concluded that Secunia v.3 may have had some issues with 64-bit systems.

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I found a good replacement for Secunia ver.3.
Since I bought a completely new system W7 Prof 64-bit and using Secunia ver 3, I soon found problems with Secunia in that it hung on loading. It initially worked fine, scanning at startup each day, but after a couple of weeks it started hanging whilst loading. I could not get as far as the Dashboard. Eventually I uninstalled it, binned it, and downloaded a substitute that I had previously used for years without problems – Secunia ver. 2.0.0.4003. Now configured, up and running, no further problems. I concluded that Secunia v.3 may have had some issues with 64-bit systems.

Thanks to Google I found Secunia v2, which is not offered on the secunia site. However, it no longer works, maybe because my PC is 64 bit. Three attempts to scan have each aborted after 12 seconds.

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You can download past iterations of PSI here:
http://secunia.com/products/consumer/PSI/sys_req/
I switched back to version 2.0.0.4003 shortly after updating to version 3 which I disliked.
It still works perfectly on my Win 7 64-bit but have not tried in Win 8.1.

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Maybe Milouz Market from http://market.milouz.com could be used instead of PSI.

Thanks for the suggestion. I’m using it as a temporary measure, although not very impressed.

Listing dozens of programmes which are not installed on my PC is just an irritating time waster, but it only lists 16 that I do have, compared with 70 + with Secunia, when it used to work. Of the 6 programmes listed as OOD, two I updated manually, but the other 4 all said they were already up to date, despite Milouz quoting a higher version number than I have installed.

Is it possible that VLC, Last Pass, Auslogics and VirtualBox use different version numbers for 32 and 64 bit, and Milouz is looking for 64 bit versions that being the bittiness of the PC, whereas these apps may be 32 bit?

PS. I discovered Milouz downloading something called NVDA, presumably malware, and certainly not something I asked for. Managed to stop it, will uninstall Milouz in the morning and try File Hippo, although I believe that is a dodgy site.

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Thanks for the suggestion. I’m using it as a temporary measure, although not very impressed.

Listing dozens of programmes which are not installed on my PC is just an irritating time waster, but it only lists 16 that I do have, compared with 70 + with Secunia, when it used to work. Of the 6 programmes listed as OOD, two I updated manually, but the other 4 all said they were already up to date, despite Milouz quoting a higher version number than I have installed.

Is it possible that VLC, Last Pass, Auslogics and VirtualBox use different version numbers for 32 and 64 bit, and Milouz is looking for 64 bit versions that being the bittiness of the PC, whereas these apps may be 32 bit?

PS. I discovered Milouz downloading something called NVDA, presumably malware, and certainly not something I asked for. Managed to stop it, will uninstall Milouz in the morning and try File Hippo, although I believe that is a dodgy site.

Hi,

I am the developer of Milouz Market and I am sorry to read that you encounter some issues with it. I will respond to each point below:

-Our database contains the top 200 freeware, and we add new ones very regularly. We also take suggestion from users very seriously, so if you want to propose some, don’t hesitate.
-A new version has been release yesterday with the possibility to filter only the software installed on your computer.

About the version, it is possible that the 32bits one is not the same than the 64bits one. For example VLC is currently available in 2.1.3 in 32bits but 2.1.4 in 64bits. So if your computer is 64bits, Milouz Market will update software to the 64bits version. I will add to the TODO list an option to keep the 32bits version.

About NVDA, it is not a malware, it is an other software in our database for blind people. I think, what happens is that because the blinking of the display, you may click on the wrong line.

An other thing is : Milouz Market has been made at first for my own use (I am administrator system) to help employees to install software without any crapware, so if Milouz Market added some other malware, it won’t be very logical.

To finish, thank for your remarks, it will help me to improve the software

Regard,

Milouz

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Hi,

I am the developer of Milouz Market and I am sorry to read that you encounter some issues with it. I will respond to each point below:

-A new version has been release yesterday with the possibility to filter only the software installed on your computer.Milouz

Thanks for the info. I may reinstall it, if the details in #26 do not solve the Secunia problem. Especially if, as your reply seems to suggest, it would update VLC from 32 to 64 bit. I am somewhat surprised that it installed the 32 bit version on a 64 bit system if it is available in both forms.

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I am using Secunia 2.0.0.3001 on Win 7 Pro x64 SP1 and Win 8.1 Pro x64 with Update (i.e. 8.1.1) both with IE 11 and it works without problems.

I also dislike Secunia version 3 and switched back to version 2.

Georgelee, you did not notice to uncheck “Require server verification (https: ) for all sites in this zone” under the site list for trusted sites. That allows the http://*.secunia.com to be entered.

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Georgelee, you did not notice to uncheck “Require server verification (https: ) for all sites in this zone” under the site list for trusted sites. That allows the http://*.secunia.com to be entered.

I admit that I missed that, http://*.secunia.com is now listed in Trusted Sites, but the only difference seems to be that scans now abort after 7 seconds instead of 11 or 12 previously. There is clearly something else blocking Secunia, as versions 2 and 3 now fail on this PC, but being unlikely to find it, an alternative solution is required.

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I have been using Secunia PSI almost from the time it was first developed. I have v.2 installed on an old XP desktop and on a WIN 7 Ult x64 laptop; they both work fine. However, when I bought my WIN 8 laptop, I installed v.3. It often hangs when loading, just as described in the original post, but there appears to be no pattern to its misbehavior; sometimes it loads and sometimes it doesn’t.

Actually, I prefer v.2 to v.3, also. Sooner or later I just might switch the WIN 8.1 laptop back to v.2. It provides more information and seems much less prone to hang than the newer version.

I recommend the original poster work with v.2 to resolve his issues.

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You could try File Hippo Update Checker – http://filehippo.com/updatechecker

Personally, I tired of Secunia’s false positives long ago and I stopped using any update checkers other than Microsoft and the built in checkers for software like Java, Flash, and Malwarebytes.

Jerry

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I looked through the Secunia forum and found a reference to the required settings for Control Panel -> Internet Options at http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/personal/faq#s1

This is a good part of it’s contents:

===================================
To function correctly the Secunia PSI needs to be able to connect to Secunia’s servers. If you experience any issues where the Secunia PSI cannot complete scanning or where the interface will not load and show you the detected programs, then please do the following.

* Open the control panel.
* Open Internet Options > Security tab. In Windows7/Vista you may need to click Network and Internet to access the Internet Options.
* Select the Internet zone and click Custom Level.
* In Security Settings, go to the Scripting > Active Scripting option.
* Make sure that Active Scripting is enabled (rather than Disabled or Prompted).
* Click OK then Yes.
* Back in the Security tab, select the Trusted Sites zone and click Sites.
* Type in the following and click Add to add it to the Trusted Sites list: https://*.secunia.com.
* Click Close then OK.
* Run the Secunia PSI again to view the scan results.

Please note that some Internet Security Suites (Kaspersky Internet Security is currently an example) have their own settings for trusted sites. In case you are using such a program, you need to allow “https://*.secunia.com” as a trusted site in this program as well as in Internet Explorer. If you experience any difficulty doing this, please contact the vendor of the program.

If you are still having problems with the Secunia PSI, the services on which the Secunia PSI depends may have been disabled. To verify that they are running, type “Administrative tools” in the start menu search bar or open Administrative tools from the Control Panel.

Now click the Services tool and verify that the “Secunia PSI Agent” is listed and has its “Startup type” set to “Automatic”.
===============================================

Also, in the Secunia forums, searching for “Internet Options” or “Internet Explorer” will show that several users have had problems with Secunia hanging during startup, scans or program updates.

It is clear that Secunia is closely tied to Internet Explorer, whether it is the default browser or not.

I hope this helps Georgelee get his Secunia PSI working.

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I now have this problem, on a 64-bit windows 7 system with wifi (only) internet access. Secunia is already listed as a trusted site.

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Avast Free AV has a software updater, though it does try to slip in some PUPs depending on the software being updated.

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