Additional User Accounts, procnics9x trouble, Cidaemon, start-up woes, email addresses, routers, and unwanted popups...

Why are there additional user accounts on my Windows XP machine? Well, it depends. Several applications actually do create additional user accounts when set up. Unfortunately there are several worms and viruses that will also set up user accounts to make your machine accessible to hackers. Without knowing specifically what accounts have been created, it's impossible to say which is which.

My wireless card generates a "can't load procnics9x.dll error" - how do I fix it? This is apparently a configuration problem with certain LinkSys wireless cards on Windows 9x. Broadband Reports has a discussion thread on the topic that has a couple of solutions.

My virus scanner got rid of a virus, but now Windows complains it can't find it on start-up. How to I stop Windows from looking for it? The anti-virus program removed the program, but not the start-up entry. This prior article on what runs at startup can help you identify and remove the offending entry.

How do I change my MSN email address? To the best of my knowledge, you can't. The best approach is to open a new account under the new name, and close the old one.

How do you connect two routers? It depends entirely on what you're trying to accomplish. For most simple installations ... you don't.

Everytime I sign on to AOL I get three XXX windows - how do I make them stop? This is a classic case of spyware (even though it might not be spying). Run a spyware tool such as SpyBot or AdAware and they should clean it up.

A few minutes after I connect my network connection properties change, ad a stange phone number appears... This was actually a much longer question, but it boils down to an application attempting to hijack or change your internet connection or dialup icons, typically attempting to get you to call a high-cost toll number. The answer here is also to run a spyware tool such as SpyBot or AdAware and they should clean it up.

Cidaemon.exe is slowing my machine down, is there anyway I can shut it off? Certainly. Turn off the content indexing service: right-click on My Computer, select Manage, click on Services, right click on Indexing Service, select Properties, press Stop, change the Startup Type to Manual, and press OK.