I've recently acquired a roommate. A buddy of mine temporarily moved in with me while his place is being renovated. I've asked him respectfully to stay off my computer when I'm not around because it has work-related documents on it and I want to make sure nothing happens to them. He's not an avid computer user and a lot of times I hear him say "What just happened?" when he's on it. One day I came home from work to find the screen saver disabled. He said he needed to check his bank account quickly and he doesn't know what happened. I've thought about putting a password on it, but that's a hassle for me and I have too many passwords to remember as is. I've heard that I can put a timer on it so it wont turn on when I'm at work. Can I do that, or is it a myth?

I've never heard of a timer that you can set, but I haven't used Windows Vista or Windows 2000. I know you can set it to require a password when the screensaver is interrupted or when waking it up from sleep mode. However, that would not alleviate your issue with not wanting any password protected stuff going on.

Bite the bullet, use a screensaver password. Instead of creating a new password, use one that you've already created for some other application or software.

I don't think there is much you can do about it without setting a password on your machine. Just set a password that you normally use or maybe the password that you use in your office computer. Otherwise, take off your power cable and lock it in your drawer.

Best advice to you is backup your data and safeguard it before your buddy visits a website that drops your machine in the dirt and you lose your important data and obviously a good friendship.

nah screensaver password can be routed simply by rebooting... go for a bios password.. lots safer...

A bios password is the easiest to circumvent, just clear the CMOS and its gone!