quickies: winmail.exe, sidebar.exe

had installed a new app, and went tripping through the processes/services to see what it was doing. notice that winmail.exe was loaded and running -- but i don't even use winmail (running Thunderdbird). checked startup, doesn't load there. and when i checked services it wasn't apparent where it's loading. ended the process. is this just part of Vista x64, and it will load (uselessly) no matter what?

also: why are there TWO sidebar.exe's running when there's only one?

 

That is not the case here...one sidebar, no winmail.

In order to speculate, I would have to see more of what you have running.

 

figured out the sidebar.exe situation.

one instance of sidebar.exe is for the Vista clock and temperatures. i'm using the standard Vista gadgets for those.

the other instance of sidebar.exe is for all the non-Vista gadgets i have.

winmail: still puzzled as to why this is getting activated when i'm not using it ...

 

Run msconfig and see if you can find the WinMail instance under the STARTUP tab.

 

^ tried that. only MS programs that loads are Defender (although NIS 2009 has turned it off -- but i understand that parts of Defender run regardless of it being "on"), Sidebar, ehTray and WMP.

am i the only one NOT using Windows Mail that has winmail.exe load?

 

I cannot answer that, being only a single being; however, it does not run on my Vista Home Premium/SP1 machine.

 

speculation--what is msgtran64.exe?

malware that sends emails using your contact list?

 

msgtran64.exe

http://spywarefiles.prevx.com/RRHDBE44727729/MSGTRANAGT64.EXE.html

thought it might be either ASUS ware or Vista something-or-other, but no luck yet confirming. this is a pretty fresh install -- just ten days live. and i don't think i've done anything particularly risky in terms of browsing.

while i was digging, i also found "WB VGA Service" -- dunno what this either.

 

boot into safe mode...do these two appear?

disable the first one with autoruns and see if winmail appears again on normal startup

 

no on both in safe mode. (downloading Autoruns now ...)

did more digging. turns out msgtranagt64.exe is the 64-bit version of msgtranagt.exe, which is used by ASUS for Function Key functionality. so i think that's okay -- and probably not related to winmail.exe.

other thing: i have no contacts. and i just fired up Windows Mail -- to see if there was anything going on there. nothing has been set up, no mail, no contacts, no server settings ... i've got 6GB of ram, so the 20 megs that winmail.exe is sucking up isn't slowing me down. but i still have no idea what it's really doing ...

 

There can also be processes started out of Task Scheduler in Vista

 

JohnDoe has a good point. and good thing i checked the Task Scheduler. nothing about winmail.exe there, but it seems Vista still has me signed up for that Customer Experience Improvement Settings, even though i declined (and the settings in Control Panel clearly indicate "no") along with "OptinNotification" set to run. killed those.

ran Autoruns.

winmail.exe doesn't load at startup from what i can see. the puzzle continues.



also ran Malwarebytes scanner -- i'm clean.

and also curious: Windows Mail takes up more memory as time goes on. about 4MB on boot, right now it's 11MB. but i've done nothing at all related to that.

after i actually open and then exit Windows Mail it disappears from processes.

???

 

Look in everything, not winlogon...

that said, I have a thought. Kill the process in task manager and go into program files and rename winmail.exe to oldwinmail.exe

Reboot. See if you get any error messages

 

Some firewalls (ZAAV, for instance) have the ability to "Kill" programs when they attempt to run. I've thought about setting IE7 in this manner ...

 

was hoping to resolve this without the renaming trick. i just want to know why (oh why) this is happening in the first place.

here it is under the Everything tab. is it okay to just switch these two off?

 

I assume it's an Asus laptop? Are you running Direct Console?

For some reason known only to Asus, even if you're not using the realtime message feature of Direct Console it insists on loading Windows Mail on startup.

I couldn't find any way to prevent this from happening other than manually disabling Windows Mail:

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/165150-windows-mail-enable-disable.html

 

I just wanted to see if you would get an error, but it looks like stonedpenguin has the answer because you are running Direct Console.

So, diable direct console and reboot.

 

Edit the thread title, I just read the first word and got excited!

 

yes! came to the forum back in the day looking for notebook advice. who knew it was such a resource for all manner of tech geekery. thanks for the help, all!

no more WinMail.exe! thanks, penguin, for the link.

Direct Console is pretty handy. the read-out display panel on my notebook (it's solely a G-series feature, i think) gives me memory and CPU usage, battery power, etc.) plus it controls (read: allows me to disable) the lights.