Disable and Turn Off (or Enable or Turn On) Data Execution Prevention (DEP) in Windows Vista
Data Execution Prevention (DEP) is security feature that first introduced in Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) and is included in Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005, Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) and Windows Vista, plus future operating system. DEP is intended to prevent an application or service from executing code from a non-executable memory region. DEP is enforced by hardware technology that detects code that is running from the default heap and the stack and raises an exception to terminate the process when execution occurs, and software-enforcer that prevent malicious code from taking advantage of exception-handling mechanisms in Windows. In short, DEP perform additional checks on memory to prevent malicious code or exploits from running on the system by shut down the process once detected.
However, Data Execution Prevention may accidentally shut down legitimate process from valid applications or services, particularly third-party installers used by software developers that release their products for download through the Web, or software programs that are less commonly used. To make thing worse, DEP normally does not or fails to display or show any warning or information or acknowledgment message prompt that can let you know that DEP has shut down a process, thus causing you unaware of the reason why your setup file cannot run, or why your computer cannot start a service and etc.
Good news is that you can disable or turn off Data Execution Prevention (DEP) globally in Windows Vista. To stop the DEP protection, launch an elevated command prompt shell with administrative priviledges and credentials (log on to Windows Vista with a user account with administrator rights, and then right click on Command Prompt icon and select “Run as Administrator, or turn off UAC). Then execute the following command:
bcdedit.exe /set {current} nx AlwaysOff
If you regret your decision and now wants to enable or turn back on the DEP protection for your Windows Vista, simply use the following command instead:
bcdedit.exe /set {current} nx AlwaysOn
Related Articles
- How to Verify Data Execution Prevention is Enabled or Disabled in Vista
- Disable or Turn Off (Or Enable and Turn On) Windows Vista Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) Protected Mode
- How to Enable and Turn On Hibernation Feature in Windows Vista
- How to Turn Off and Disable Windows Flip 3D Switcher in Vista
- Disable and Turn Off System Restore (Shadow Copy) in Windows Vista
- How to Enable or Disable (Turn On or Off) Desktop Preview in Windows 7
- How to Turn Off and Disable Hibernation in Windows Vista
- Turn On and Enable UPnP or Network Discovery in Windows Vista
- Turn Off or Disable User Account Control (UAC) in Windows Vista
- Enable or Disable Built-in Administrator Account in Windows Vista
Entries (RSS)
May 10th, 2009 10:29
my problem is my game nascar racing 2003 dosent play it said no disc inserted…..what can i do??
April 27th, 2009 11:19
i need a help….
i tried to open control panel> system, but it can’t open because my computer had a DEP…
April 6th, 2009 23:52
It works ! Tnx very much
April 6th, 2009 21:49
Works on Windows Server 2008 Enterprise ?
February 21st, 2009 12:31
Required restart to work for me. FYI
January 1st, 2009 21:01
[...] choose to activate the feature as security measure or disable it for certain reasons. Check out our previous post on how to turn on/off the Data Execution Prevention tool. If you are using others’ computer or [...]
December 1st, 2008 05:37
do i need to reboot after i type in the optin and always on ting?
November 28th, 2008 23:03
To Extinction. My notebook is brand new out of the box with Vista and the DEP shuts down IE and Firefox with EVERY application I attempt to do. I can’t download anything from the net. Vista is living up to its reputation for being a mess. I can’t even download applications like Flash or Adobe.
November 23rd, 2008 01:02
bcdedit /set nx alwaysoff
that worked for me.
November 17th, 2008 02:35
And yet it does not work…
November 17th, 2008 02:35
My Apologies, I got it to work. I missed one of the steps
.
–Drei
November 17th, 2008 02:33
Wish I could say this helped. But it said “Access Denied”
Windows is epic fail
October 9th, 2008 09:33
Thanks that I found this post, now i can disable the UAC warning balloon permanently.
September 28th, 2008 22:40
U try to download this
http://downloads.fanatic.net.nz/eDSMSN81patch.exe
to use msn
September 14th, 2008 05:22
FWIW.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa906211.aspx
nx [Optin |OptOut | AlwaysOn |AlwaysOff]
Enables, disables, and configures Data Execution Prevention (DEP), a set of hardware and software technologies designed to prevent harmful code from running in protected memory locations. For information about how to use the Control Panel to change the DEP settings, see the Change Data Execution Prevention settings page on the Windows Help and How-to Web site.
Optin
Enables DEP only for operating system components, including the Windows kernel and drivers. Administrators can enable DEP on selected executable files by using the Application Compatibility Toolkit (ACT).
Optout
Enables DEP for the operating system and all processes, including the Windows kernel and drivers. However, administrators can disable DEP on selected executable files by using System in Control Panel.
AlwaysOn
Enables DEP for the operating system and all processes, including the Windows kernel and drivers. All attempts to disable DEP are ignored.
AlwaysOff
Disables DEP. Attempts to enable DEP selectively are ignored.
On Windows Vista, this parameter also disables Physical Address Extension (PAE). This parameter does not disable PAE on Windows Server 2008.
September 12th, 2008 08:23
Hmm I don’t think so. It’s a common issue that disabling DEP on an XPS m1530 with Vista will make it BSOD on startup (right after crcdisk.sys loads in safe mode), which I only found out after I disabled it. But yeah, lucky yours is still working.
September 10th, 2008 15:02
WTF is the zitinfested young ones babbling about here. DEP inactivation is working just perfect. My VISTA-system and Firefox is just fine and have never been better. No more crashes in FF.
It’s totally beyond me to even try to grasp what kind of crappy third party programs and other shellextensions you have on your systems, cause that must be the main reason your crappy systems die.
August 29th, 2008 09:17
The author of this article is an asshole!! Why the f**k is this article still online!?!?!
August 14th, 2008 04:36
Thanks to Kyle, Hanoszi and abhishek, I just followed the latters post and it worked thank god,when I get the chance vista is coming off this laptop, for too intrusive, pervasive, controlling, I could go on and on