Getting Rid of Trend Micro completely

Question

I am going through the event logs trying to find things that are causing Vista to crash all the time and take forever to boot.

When I first got the computer, I uninstalled Trend Micro that came with the computer. But now I notice an event message that reads:

"The Trend Micro Personal Firewall service depends the following service: tmcfw. This service might not be installed."

Obviously, there is something else I have to do to get rid of this software. I used a registry cleaner but that didn't find any trend micro entries.

Anyone know ahat I have to get rid of so the system doesn't waste time trying to load an uninstalled product? Thanks!

Inspiron 1501, Vista Home Premium

mwfanelli3 · Answer

Lo and behold, the Security window shows that Trend Micro's Firewall is running. There is no way to shut it off. Zone Alarm, my prefered product, is running as well. Defender is shut off.

There is no sign of Trend Micro in the Programs/Uninstall window. There is no folder in Program Files.

There is no way to use PCCTools as there are no actual Trend Micro folders or files around!

The msconfig app shows nothing from Trend Micro running. That was the gist of the error message: it was looking for a service that wasn't there.

I have no idea what version it was. It came preloaded by Dell when I bought this machine the first week in March of this year.

I really hope I won't have to reinstall Vista to get rid of Trend Micro! That would kill my schedule horribly.

mombodog · Answer

1. Go to Control Panel > Security and be sure the Windows Firewall is activated, when trend uninstalled it may have left it turned off.   2. http://esupport.trendmicro.com/support/viewxml.do?ContentID=EN-1033129#P86_2140   3. Check Programs and Features again, be sure all Trend products are uninstalled.   4. Use msconfig and check the 'Services' Tab and disable any Trend services that show up in there.   http://netsquirrel.com/msconfig/msconfig_vista.html  this shows the Startup Tab, just go to the 'Services' Tab   What version of Trend was it?

viewmontny · Answer

Look on the startup tab in msconfig and delete any entries related to Trendmicro. Also, if you find any, make note of the file location they reference and delete that from your hard drive if needed.

mwfanelli3 · Answer

I did that already. There were no Trend Micro things anywhere. I also manually did a search through the registry and found nothing.

This is annoying! I hate applications that insist on hanging around. I wish Dell would stop installing this garbage in the first place.

viewmontny · Answer

Something doesn't sound right. When you checked the services, did you hide all the microsft services to see what was left? I have Vista home edtion and I too had removed Trendmicro. The uninstaller left a few bits behind, but I manage to delete them.   Check the event log again to see if it shows any additional information for this service.  Also check in the \Program files\common files folder and \user\ \application data or local settings\application data.   If your files are set to hidden, you will need to check 'show files and folders' in tools\folder options\view to unhide them.

mwfanelli3 · Answer

There just isn't anything there. I went through the process list and can account for everything there (after looking a few up).

I don't think Trend Micro is running, I just don't want the system to waste time trying to start it up. Oh yeah, there is nothing in the startup lists nor in the startup folders related to trend micro.

viewmontny · Answer

It must be somewhere, give this a try. Its called autoruns v9.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx

If you can't find it with that, I don't know what else to try.

Message Edited by viewmontny on 12-19-2007 11:46 AM

mombodog · Answer

It is an installed 'Service' and may not even show up in Windows services list, you may have to search the registry for it, and it may not have a trend name associated with it, some sotwares install their service as an obuscated entry in the registry, making it difficult to identify.   Here is where all the Windows 'Services are located in the registry, be very carful what you edit in here.   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services

Windows General

Getting Rid of Trend Micro completely

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