I have been running Vista for over a year now with almost no problems. I recently started having this problem (3-4 days ago) where DEP is killing applications.

This started with iTunes. Next was Yahoo Messanger. Now Excel is being killed when I try to start the application. I have Norton 2008, so I don't think it is a virus. I recently downloaded service pack 1, but I have not seen any similar issues searching the web for DEP problems.

I cannot think of any reason that these applications would be killed, but I am worried that more will start to be affected as this goes on.

Any ideas?

Hi

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How to perform a Startup repair:
http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/ [...] epair.html

How to perform a full system repair:
http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/ [...] vista.html

Thanks, I tried the system file checker, and it found nothing. I uninstalled Service Pack 1 and that didn't help either. At this point my wife has become frustrated enough that she will allow me to remove Vista and go back to XP.

That's nice.

Sorry you have such a weird issue. DEP issue you are having is the FIRST I have ever seen and I even did a Google search for it. My conclusion is that this is not an intrinsic Vista issue but some kind of anomaly.

Have you tried system restore?
Have you installed any apps recently?
Any new security products?

If you restore to a date before this happened it just might go away and never come up again.

Look, XP blows up all the time. I can't tell you how many re-installs I have had to do on my and on customer PCs over the years! Quirky, weird, inexplicable things, Dr.Watson visitations, 45 seconds till the right click menu opens, hopeless spyware infestations and just sluggishness over time - this is the very nature of XP. You can just BANK on it. When this happens people deal with it because they see no alternative. When it happens to Vista what do they start thinking? Don't drink the Apple flavor aid, please.

'dude - Reading his posts and the lack of effort tells me the OP wanted a reason to go back to XP anyways. No sense wasting the effort.

The only apps I have installed are Hauphage WinTV software to try to get the s-Video inputs on the video card to work. Thats not working either, but thats another story.

I have not updated the security since January, with the release of the latest Norton Antivirus.

I had to do a restore recently. I was having wiring issues in my office at home where the power would shut off to all the outlets, but didn't break the CB. Fixed that, but because the power had been so inconsistent, Vista blew up and I had to do a restore. That took things back several months. Everything seemed to work fine still at that point. Then I installed Service Pack 1 and the DEP killing apps started happening.

I will give a full restore a try.

Get rid of Norton. Please. For your sake, your wife's sake and everyone else's sake. Something lighter on resources like Panda or ESET NOD 32. Avoid anything Norton or McAfee... especially McAfee. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Norton is the root of all the trouble you're having right now... uninstall it and see what happens.

DEP is not about a specific application being heavy (like norton may or may not be). DEP is about preventing program code from being executed in memory where it shouldn't.

Yes, but Norton's over-protectiveness may have messed something up. Being a resource hog isn't the only problem Norton has... it could easily be causing the problems with DEP.

You could always try turning DEP right off and see if it helps.

Use this command line to disable via the command prompt (run as Administrator) in an account with Admin access.

bcdedit.exe /set {current} nx AlwaysOff

If it doesn't help and you want to turn in on again use;

bcdedit.exe /set {current} nx AlwaysOn

I wouldn't recommend turning off dep for good, though. It might (depending on what is going on) make the error go away. But it won't remove the root cause of the problem. And without dep, you are an easier target for malicious code

It's funny cuz my old system ran winxp pro flawlessly for 3 years on a processor that didn't use dep, I recently upgraded processors and windows and have since had nothing but problems in the form of bluescreens... since I disabled dep I haven't had anymore of them and all my programs started working normally. Games that would stop responding and programs that wouldn't install or run properly are working like they should.