Windows Defender and McAfee Security Suite

[Tim]

I'm a Comcast Internet subscriber and am eligible for a complimentary
installation of McAfee's Security Suite. However, I've been unable to
complete the installation for the Suite after six months of trying. I've
done everything asked of me, but something apparently blocks finalizing the
installation. Even after three hours of on-phone consulting with both
Comcast and McAfee every trial ends with an empty dialogue box. The only
thing left to try is to uninstall Windows Defender, but it doesn't show up in
my list of "Programs and Features," even though it appears to be working when
enabled.
Just out of orneriness, I want to prove to myself that WD is the culprit
preventing me from installing McAfee. Can I do a manual uninstall? Where is
it located?
AND... has anyone else experienced this problem? (I am using Vista Home
premium on a new Gateway T-Series laptop without any other virus protection
ever installed.)
TIA

 

[Dave M]

Tim;
You can't uninstall Windows Defender from Vista, as it's part of the
Operating System. I doubt that this could be the source of your problem,
since the other million or so of Comcast's McAfee users would be posting a
few messages on this board with the same request. If you had a previous
installation of another Anti-Virus (say Norton's) you might need their
(Symantec's) complete removal tool in order to proceed.

 

[Bill Sanderson]

I agree with Dave.

You can't uninstall Windows Defender. You can turn it off--tools, options,
scroll all the way to the bottom, and choose do not use.

that should get you a complaint from the Security Center as verification
that you have succeeded.

Have you, by any chance, disabled UAC? I know of other cases of software
which will not install on Vista when UAC is turned off.

You might also try running Microsoft's WMIDIAG utility--just run it--don't
try to fix anything with it.

In general, I suspect you'll be more likely to resolve this by looking at
McAfee related resources--do they have a FAQ or KB, or info about Vista
related issues?

When the blank dialog box comes up, can you tell what's running, using
taskmgr? Whose dialog is it--any way to guess?