Whenever you install Microsoft Office, you may notice a startup item is added: the Office Startup Assistant. If you have ever wondered what this does, take a look at this Microsoft KB article: The Osa.exe file does the following:Initializes automation. Initializes some of the common fonts installed by Office. Handles certain commands (New Office Document, Open...

Up until Windows Vista, the native tool for managing startup program was ‘msconfig’. While there are more powerful utilities available, this is sufficient for most user’s needs. Windows Vista has done away with this tool and instead has replace it’s startup programs manager with a more powerful tool built into Windows Defender. Here is...

Most power users know about the ‘msconfig’ utility which ships with Windows and allows you to configure many of the system level parameters. One of the more well known functions it performs is the enabling and disabling of startup programs. For more advanced control of the startup programs and processes, take a look at a couple of freeware...

If you have browsed the PCMech Forums, you probably see the occasional HijackThis log uploaded to a post. Another program similar to this which you might want to take a look at is Runscanner. This freeware program is very similar to what HijackThis offers: RunScanner is a freeware windows system utility which scans your system for all running programs, autostart...

There are many tools out there which analyze and report on Windows start up applications, but what if you want to know a bit more information about these start up programs and whether or not you actually need them? If this is the case, check out Sysinfo.org which offers a searchable listing of start up processes. One thing to note regarding this list: This is...

Almost all of us have programs which we prefer to start automatically when we log into Windows. Common examples include email clients and monitoring utilities. However, having all these programs open immediately upon startup can significantly (depending on the number of programs) increase overall the startup process. To help remedy this situation, use...

As part of normal Windows system maintenance, one thing you should do is check your programs set to automatically start to make sure everything running is legit. Typically, most people just use the “msconfig” utility to accomplish this, but a much more comprehensive utility is Sysinternal’s AutoRuns tool. Rather than re-inventing an...