Windows 7 to Have Toned-Down User Account Control

According to the Microsoft blog "Engineering Windows 7," the next version of Windows will tone down and streamline the User Account Control that so many Vista users are frustrated with.

While many could provide a laundry list of reasons why they prefer to use Windows XP over Vista, one issue at the top of most PC users list is the User Account Control (UAC) that was introduced with the often-criticized OS. While some of it’s features can be turned off or disabled, the fact remains that many do not like the constant double-checking the OS does for things as simple as opening a program or installing a plugin.

Well, it seems as though Microsoft has gotten the message, and according to ZDNet, will work to fine tune UAC to be more effective and less invasive. “We’ve heard loud and clear that you are frustrated," said Ben Fathi, president for core OS development. "We still want to provide you control over what changes can happen to your system, but we want to provide you a better overall experience."

To do this, explains Fathi, Microsoft will broaden the control you have over UAC notifications, as well as provide additional and more relevant information in the UI. One complaint that seems to resonate with users across the board is the amount of duplicate messages one receives about a repeated action. To solve this, user will get “better and more obvious control over the (UAC) mechanism," said Fathi.

According to comments from members of the Windows team, Vista’s UAC has a significant role to play in making the latest OS the most secure version of Windows yet. Clearly the measures put into place are good ones, but now work must go into striking the balance of having strong security without making the user feel restricted from accomplishing normal tasks.

Windows 7 is promising a lot to consumers, ranging from super-speedy boot times to better-defined different versions of the OS. Microsoft may find even more fans if they follow through with a true UAC rework. Microsoft is in damage control mode. With yet another extension on Windows XP, set to keep the OS around until the summer of 2009, and early builds of Windows 7 going to those who attend Microsoft’s Professional Developers Conference in October and Windows Hardware Engineering Conference in November, as well as a rumored beta before Christmas, one thing is clear: Windows 7 is in full swing up in Redmond, and Microsoft desperately wants to make the disappointing present a forgettable past as soon as they possibly can.

Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam served as Tom's Hardware News Director during 2008-2014. He entered tech media in the late 90s and fondly remembers the days when an overclocked Celeron 300A and Voodoo2 SLI comprised a gaming rig with the ultimate street cred.
  • resonance451
    Ever since moving to Vista with SP1, I've had only one crash, and that was from an Apple program: iTunes. With XP, I had numerous crashes, slowdown issues, and driver problems. Don't believe the hype. And for the record, I actually like UAC, and it's not even half as bad as the propaganda suggests it is.

    The hype is meaningless, as is often the case. Vista is fine, and it works well for me. It's worked far better than XP ever did. Sorry. I didn't want to admit that I had believed the widespread myths about Vista, but at one point I really did. Now I'm of a different opinion, but I guess that's what happens when you actually know what you're talking about.
    Reply
  • smalltime0
    resonance451Ever since moving to Vista with SP1, I've had only one crash, and that was from an Apple program: iTunes. With XP, I had numerous crashes, slowdown issues, and driver problems. Don't believe the hype. And for the record, I actually like UAC, and it's not even half as bad as the propaganda suggests it is.The hype is meaningless, as is often the case. Vista is fine, and it works well for me. It's worked far better than XP ever did. Sorry. I didn't want to admit that I had believed the widespread myths about Vista, but at one point I really did. Now I'm of a different opinion, but I guess that's what happens when you actually know what you're talking about.+1
    Although I do get pissed sometimes with UAC... I believe microsoft updates are no security threat to my PC...
    Reply
  • resonance451
    More control over UAC would be nice. I don't think it's a pressing issue as much as people have made it out to be. I expected to be hit with a constant cancel/allow every 30 seconds. I keep a strict control of what processes I have running, with only my audio drivers for my RME FireFace 800 allowed on startup. I'm not going to waste such a powerful system to poor handling, so having complete control over it with my utilities and UAC is really a plus for me.
    Reply
  • Boslink
    UAC for new users is a good thing but for those that know how to use windows (simple user) can be a pain in the but.

    I disable UAC on my vista but i consider my self very advance user that really knows what should and what shouldn't do. Case in point is that for more than 4 years i had ZERO virus and/or mailware, trojan etc problems.

    This translate to ZERO problems with XP and Vista. And do not think that i'm not using torrent and not going to "underground" pages almost daily.

    What bother me with Vista is interface. I really have hard time accepting it. But again i have hard time accepting XP interface so i switch to classic start menu. Going to control panel, finding things that i need to manage my PC are also pain in the but in Vista.

    Yes i could spend some time and learn how to work on new OS but i just don't have time to waste. Last time i spent almost 1 hour trying to find out how to do some "simple" things that i regularly do on XP (was network related).

    And that's is the only reason why i still have dual boot and why i prefer XP over Vista.

    Still i can't say XP is better than Vista. They are both good and i actually like Vista but i'm much, much more comfortable using XP than Vista.

    And i think that's the main reason why people (that know how to use PC) don't like Vista.
    "XP is good, Vista is also good, they almost perform the same but for Vista i have to dedicate some time to learn it's secrets with no real benefit."
    Reply
  • Niva
    Boslink, I like how you say "underground pages"... UAC is only bothersome while installing new programs, and really at first when you're setting the system up. Once it's all configured I have no issues with it. I'd rather click an extra button when configuration is required than have it go off in the background w/o my knowledge.

    Now there are aspects of UAC I don't like in Vista, like a constant icon on the taskbar god forbid I haven't installed an antivirus program.

    My biggest peeve with windows is really against the users. Everyone runs as an admin while they do everything. If people would learn to install a user account and only log in as admin to install/update the system things would be so much better. Of course that would be like admitting unix/linux got it right for Microsoft.
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  • To be honest Vista isn't as bad as it's reputation is. If you have good fairly modern hardware with at least 2GB of RAM or more it should run somewhat okay. Vista's biggest weakness by far is it's more of a resource hog than XP Pro. BTW, XP Pro SHOULD be stable. I've never crashed it in years. At worst I've somehow killed the explorer.exe process requiring a reboot but it's been years since I've seen a real bluescreen or lockup. From what I've seen a lot of folks suffer from bad drivers, hardware, viruses or poor setup.
    Reply
  • Boslink
    NivaBoslink, I like how you say "underground pages"... UAC is only bothersome while installing new programs, and really at first when you're setting the system up. Once it's all configured I have no issues with it. I'd rather click an extra button when configuration is required than have it go off in the background w/o my knowledge.Now there are aspects of UAC I don't like in Vista, like a constant icon on the taskbar god forbid I haven't installed an antivirus program. My biggest peeve with windows is really against the users. Everyone runs as an admin while they do everything. If people would learn to install a user account and only log in as admin to install/update the system things would be so much better. Of course that would be like admitting unix/linux got it right for Microsoft.
    Saying users are guilty for not playing/acting how Microsoft wants (or any other company) is . . . . . . . . just wrong.

    True Microsoft tried to create system how to protect "users" but users almost always choose to go easy way. That's why Administrator accounts are always used. That's why Vista is "bad" OS in their eyes. Easy way is XP for them.

    So instead of forcing something on users microsoft should listen to them.

    After all OS is created for users
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  • hardwarekid9756
    resonance451Ever since moving to Vista with SP1, I've had only one crash, and that was from an Apple program: iTunes. With XP, I had numerous crashes, slowdown issues, and driver problems. Don't believe the hype. And for the record, I actually like UAC, and it's not even half as bad as the propaganda suggests it is.The hype is meaningless, as is often the case. Vista is fine, and it works well for me. It's worked far better than XP ever did. Sorry. I didn't want to admit that I had believed the widespread myths about Vista, but at one point I really did. Now I'm of a different opinion, but I guess that's what happens when you actually know what you're talking about.QTF

    I've been using Vista since Day1. My system was still fast. I had no issues with any games I played nor were my frames noticeably worsened. My Flask mpeg encoder worked out-of-the-box with comparable performance. It was vastly more stable and a lot more feature-rich and usable out-of-box than XP. I didn't need a million plug-ins or add-on programs to do what I wanted. It. Just. Worked. Vista gets a bad rap because the Technoratti pick the OS apart, when no real user (I work weekends at Geek SquaD, I get my fair share of "Vista Sucks," but just about everyone is pleasantly surprised that it really isn't that differen than XP and functions just about the same, save for a few differences).

    UAC is actually a pretty handy feature, IMO. I work in malware research (during the week), and it has saved my arse MORE than once when I forgot to re-enable the protection software and saved me from a re-image. At home, It's saved my butt more than once when I download Bittorrent files that just so happen to have a hidden surprise (A dialog saying "would you like to run 'purepwnage.avi.exe'" is a real life-saver).

    UAC could use some tweaking, but if you know how to deal with it (alt C after the grey window you're expecting,) it's a real god-send.
    Reply
  • Again another Vista bashing article,yay!! lol...
    No,serious.
    There's nothing more annoying than popups constantly trying to get your attention.
    Maybe,if MS is reading this,they can think of creating UAC or whateva, as a small notifier on the bottom.

    Popups that require people to click are from the devil, because they require the user's time.
    notifications that if left alone the system will do it's job are good.
    Occasionally you'll need to disable a program, you can still do that by clicking the notification area,on the bottom.

    It's almost as stupid as the Norton 360 backup program. Norton used to be so intelligent, now not only the interface but also the program itself sucks balls; like last time, I needed to take a backup of my documents.
    Instead of letting me select the folders to backup,the Norton Backup program forced me to search through my harddrives for .html, .txt, and .doc/.xml/... files or similar.
    How many clicks do you think it took me to only make the right files highlighted?
    Yes,over 2000,since my HD has many documents that are not mine but come with programs like winrar or other windows programs.
    They literally adopted the reverse psychology of 'deselecting' all non-to be backed up files. I mean I've never seen any program work as stupid as this one!

    Also,a lot of the actions taken in Vista speak for them self.
    If I want to move files from an external HD,I expect Windows to warn me,saying:'are you sure?', since it could be an accident.
    But after that,Vista gives a 'administrator-rights, yes or no' window.
    When you click there, another popup for moving the thumbnail file,a file windows created, which I didn't want in the first place, and it is hidden anyways,then why ask me about it?
    The fourth window finally appears probably when all files have been moved and now the dir needs to be deleted...
    I mean... We all know Vista UAC does NOT mean more safe OS, it just means a slower, more powerhungry, annoying OS that most users turn off anyways.

    So if windows 7 will have this UAC,then forget it. Even if it's improved over Vista, it'll still be slower than XP, use more resources, and be more annoying than XP.
    I want no more than 1 warning on deleting or moving of several files,and that's it! Same goes with working on an external drive.

    You see, many home users ARE the Administrator, and don't need Administrator rights for anything.
    I can imagine in large companies administrators allowing certain actions and disapproving others like for instance installing programs on companies PC's.

    And therefor there be a extra admin popup,but not for the home user...
    Reply
  • The problem I have with Vista is that it's a resource hog. I have a laptop that purchased right around the time when vista was set free into the world, and it runs like crap compared to an identical machine running XP. I think that they need to come up with a way to better scale back the OS for the lower end machines.
    Reply