4 Ways to Make UAC Less Annoying on Windows Vista
The single biggest irritation in Windows Vista is the UAC (User Account Control) system, especially for people that do a lot of tweaking. When you are trying to make configuration changes, it seems like every couple of seconds you are hitting another UAC prompt. Sure, it's more secure… but what options do we have to make it less annoying?
There are at least 4 different ways that we can tweak UAC to be less annoying, most of which I've written about before.
Note: Disabling or modifying UAC is a security risk. If you want to be as secure as possible, you should likely leave things alone.
1) Disable UAC Entirely
The first thing that you can always do is completely disable UAC… the only problem with this is that you'll end up making the system less secure if you are also the type of person that downloads and tests a lot of software. I can't recommend that you do this, but at least you know that you have the option to.
2) Auto-Accept UAC Prompts for Administrators Only 
If you want to leave UAC enabled, but disable the prompts from showing up under your administrator account, you can tweak a setting that will "Elevate without prompting", so you never see the prompt show up. This is more secure than disabling UAC entirely, because an application started as a regular user can't perform an action that is meant for administrators. For instance, Internet Explorer can still run in protected mode this way.
Disable UAC Prompts for Administrators Only
3) Disable the Blackout Screen (Secure Desktop)
The most annoying part of UAC for me is the screen that blacks out everything other than the UAC prompt… because it usually takes forever to show up, and depending on your video card it can do weird things with your desktop. You can disable the secure desktop feature but leave the UAC prompts the way they are… of course this is potentially a security hole as well, since an application could fraudulently "click" the prompt for you. (Secure desktop prevents applications from doing this)
Make UAC Stop Blacking Out the Screen in Windows Vista
4) Create Administrator Mode Shortcuts Without UAC Prompts
Instead of disabling UAC in any way, what we can do is setup a few shortcuts that bypass UAC entirely. This is especially useful if you open a particular administrator-mode application a dozen times per day. The trick to this is using task scheduler to launch the applications, and then telling task scheduler to run the task. This is more secure than the other options, since only our special shortcut will bypass UAC.
Create Administrator Mode Shortcuts Without UAC Prompts
Extra: Make sure to Install Service Pack 1
If you haven't already installed Service Pack 1, you should make sure that you install it… one of the fixes included will limit the number of UAC prompts you have to click through to modify system files.
I'm curious what percentage of our readers have actually disabled UAC. I personally am using method #4, since it's the best in terms of security, but also eliminating the annoyance for the couple of applications I launch a dozen times per day.
Disclaimer: Many of our articles require making changes to your system. While we fully test and stand by our advice, there is still the potential for problems when making any configuration changes. Please be careful.
#4 is dangerous. The Black screen is because Vista loads a secure desktop. This way an application can't do this:
"Send keyboard key left"
"Send Keyboard key ENTER"
And bypass the dialog box, and has fun on your system.
Doing such thick would just as bad as disabling UAC. So far since UAC, attacks from executable files that has an identity crisis and is a picture, type of attack that screw with your system, doesn't effect people that run Vista, as they see something is wrong when opening that file (you get that UAC prompt). Granted WE are smart enough for such attacks, but I already got on of these files on my computer, and when I knew it was that kind of files, I of course wanted to delete it. So to delete it, I single click on it and press delete, but once by accident I doubled click. If I has WinXP I would have to get my WinXP and perform a re-installation (I mean it would take for me the same time to remove it than re-installing Windows). So UAC actually saved me, and I am really happy.
Granted that UAC needs some code optimization, but it's worth having it turn on normally.
Moreover, if you have the latest drivers from the chipset manufacture of the video card, Vista should not cause such problem in drawing the screen. If Vista interface runs fine on my test computer (PIII 800Mhz 512MB of RAM, with an Nvidia TNT2, (of course I disabled about everything in Vista to a point to drop it back down to XP… it's just a test computer, I never actually use it.) I don't see the problem.
@Bytes
I think you are referring to #3 instead? I should probably put a bigger disclaimer on this article. (doing so now)
I use method #2, which is what I need to get MS Live Mesh to run.
I had tried #2 a while ago. I ended up going back to the default settings because I felt naked to attacks. I've gotten used to UAC and find it a useful component of Vista. I operate most of the time as a limited user, and if I need administrative privileges I type in a password. I don't find UAC much more of a burden than Unix style administrator or root access type features.
I completely turned off UAC which, for me, is completely secure seeing as how neither I nor techs from my ISP haven't ever been able to get my d$%&* Vista machine online. I use an XP machine for the net.
I flatout disable UAC entirely. It is FAR too annoying, and Vista is virtually unusable with it enabled. Anyone with a decent antivirus/firewall setup and an ounce of common sense doesn't need a software nanny shaking a finger at you every damn time you try to install a font or copy a file.
Having been around since punch cards and Dos 1.0, I don't use any of the above methods as I think Vista is a total disaster. Prefer Linux and XP-3. Not opposed to change however by the time one configures the Vista comic book interface and tweaks the annoying O/S to actually do some work, days can be wasted. And Yes, I run my machines as Administrator however machines which have sensitive data on them Do Not have network connections to the outside world at all. Admittedly, my solution would not be practical if I were in a business environment. Regards.
I disabled it entirely. When I had it. I downgraded to XP.
Ben: I don't think that moving from Vista to XP is considered a 'downgrade'.
True unless you are a gamer XP3 isnt really a down grade but I am using Vista 64 and I totally disabled UAC but it does have its advantages in the buisness world I suppose. But the networks I work on I have disabled it because my users get crabby with it so I limit them thru the servers.
Vista's UAC is the main reason why I switched to using Ubuntu only. However when I do support people using Vista, it will be nice to use these tricks.
Thanks geek.
You should attach a warning about the Service Pack 1 upgrade crash, letting folks know about the "prerequisite" upgrades that MUST be installed prior to Service Pack 1. For those who don't know, the SP1 upgrade can crash your computer permanently if you fail to install the prereqs first.
There is a setting that is very useful but rarely ever mentioned by anyone. UAC by default has this "installer detection" enabled that attempts to make sure you always get the elevation prompt when you run an installer. However, there are often times it detects a program as an installer that has nothing to do with anything of the sort, or that you are installing a program that either specifically allows installing it for a non-admin, or the installer can by chance install as a non-admin even though they didn't specifically design it to.
There are some programs I like to install just for the current user and not system-wide, so I install them somewhere in my user folder instead of Program Files, and often the installer doesn't need to be run as admin in such a case.
The installer detection is one of the things that can make UAC annoying, especially because of falsely detecting programs as installers. I have it disabled on both my desktop and laptop (though you have to find out what to change in the registry if you don't have Vista Business or higher). Disabling installer detection doesn't make it any less secure. It does mean I have to specifically right click some installers and select run as administrator, but I consider that a good thing, because as stated above, sometimes that's what I want to do.
I remember reading somewhere that installer detection is only a temporary feature and will be removed in the future.