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Solutions: Virus scan takes too much time

 
Published June 17, 2012

My computer is running well and I have no apparent problems, but when Microsoft Security Essentials does a virus scan, it takes forever (over 50 hours). I also have Malwarebytes, and it also takes a long time. Neither scan shows any malicious material. Any thoughts?

That is definitely not a normal run time. Make sure you are current on Windows updates and that no competing antivirus is running, including the old Windows Defender. Check the system log in Event Viewer (Control Panel\System and Security\Administrative Tools) to make sure your hard drive is not logging integrity errors. Bring up the Security Essentials program, click the settings tab and then click the MAPS link on the left. Change your settings to "I don't want to join MAPS." The other two settings have been known to cause behavior such as what you described in a few PCs.

Can you recommend DVD software for easy editing? I use a free download called DVDVideoSoft, but lately it won't let me save after editing. My daughter plays basketball and I would like to edit the games that my husband films to post on YouTube. I am open to purchasing software if you could recommend an easy edit program.

There are certainly many DVD editors for purchase, but I would recommend first trying Microsoft Movie Maker. I use it for my own admittedly modest video editing needs. It's free and it is fairly straight-forward to create clips, paste clips together and add text and visual effects. You can download and learn more about it at windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-live/movie-maker-get-started.

My problem is that all of my digital pictures (which are about 2.5 MB) seem to be too large for the Microsoft Photo Editor to open. It used to be that the pictures also had a different kind of icon from what they have now, and that all I had to do was click on the icon and it would open up. Now, however, when I try to open it, I get the message that the image is too large and I have to go to Paint to get it to open, but then it doesn't have the same photo-editing capabilities. When I save it and then try to open it in Microsoft Photo Editor, I still get the message that it's too large.

I would forget about Microsoft Photo Editor. It is an older program and has limitations as you've found out. If you have Microsoft Office 2003 or later, it comes with Microsoft Picture Manager. It's easy to use and does a pretty good job. Other free photo-editing tools are Picasa ( picasa.google.com) and Microsoft Photo Gallery ( windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-live/photo-gallery-get-started). Once installed, you should be able to right-click on a picture, choose "Open with" and see these programs listed as a choice. When running it for the first time, you will most likely be prompted if you want to open these types of files with this program as a default. This will change their icons and allow you to just double-click the file in the future.

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Send questions to personaltech@tampabay.com or Personal Tech, P.O. Box 1121, St. Petersburg, FL 33731. Questions are answered only in this column.