Posts Tagged ‘Internet Explorer’

Disable ‘Automatically detect settings’ in Internet Explorer

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

This script allows you to turn off (or on) the ‘Automatically Detect Settings’ check box in Internet Explorer.

I have not been able to find a way which guarantees that this will not be checked. You can set a Group Policy into Internet Explorer Preference Mode, but if a user later changes it, then it will not change back. If you Disable Changing IE Proxy Settings, then the Preference Mode Setting seems not to work.

I have set this script to run at logon, as part of our general login script. It only modifies that one setting, no others. It reads the entire of the binary value, modifies the one binary value that needs changing and then writes back the entire value.

Option Explicit
On Error Resume Next
'Create a constant for the HKEY_CURRENT_USER object
Const HKCU = &H80000001
'Define variables
Dim strComputer
Dim strRegistryKey
Dim objRegistry
Dim strRegistryValue
DIm binValue
strComputer = "."
strRegistryKey = "Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Connections"
strRegistryValue = "DefaultConnectionSettings"
'Connect to the Registry
Set objRegistry = GetObject("winmgmts:\\" & strComputer & "\root\default:StdRegProv")
'Retrieve the current settings.
objRegistry.GetBinaryValue HKCU, strRegistryKey, strRegistryValue, binValue
'Change the 'Automatically detect settings' box to unticked
binValue(8) = 05
'binValue(8) = 13 - Enable this line to check the box instead of uncheck
'Save the changes
objRegistry.SetBinaryValue HKCU, strRegistryKey, strRegistryValue, binValue

Can ping a website but cannot browse to it

Sunday, March 6th, 2011

Just finished repairing a PC which could ping websites, but could not browse to them using Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox.

Turns out that Norton is once again to blame.

A fix is given on the link below. In short, use the Norton Removal Tool to remove any offending applications, rebott, and the joy of the Intenernt shall return to your PC.

http://amiatypist.blogspot.com/2009/12/can-ping-can-not-browse.html

Maybe at somepoint manufacturers might start bundling decent security software with laptops and PCs.