Uninstalling Spybot S&D

[wahashimoto]

Basically, I want to uninstall Spybot. It was an excellent program, but McAfee, for some reason, requires it to be gone to install.

My comp is pretty messed up as it is (I know it MUST be loaded with some sort of viruses/spyware) as I have to open everything by right-click, run as, then check the box.

Now, I'd simple go to Add and remove programs, but the previous problem I mentioned prevents me from opening anything in my Control Panel. So, I tried the uninstall icon in the Spybot Program Files.

This is what it said:

"File: "C:\Program Files\Spybot - Search and Destroy\unins000.dat" does not exist. Cannot uninstall."

So, yeah. Could someone point to me in the right direction.

Thanks in advance.

[spybotsandra]

Hello,

In order to completely uninstall Spybot - Search & Destroy, please consider the following link:
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/howto/uninstall.html

Best regards
Sandra
Team Spybot

[PepiMK]

Uninstalling that way might not help - I have no idea on how exactly McAfee recognizes our software is installed.

Actually I have no idea why they would require our software to be uninstalled, even though the ASC has agreed on improved communications, no one at McAfee informed us about any incompatibility. I've asked them for details.

[PepiMK]

Well, the ASC has these nice contact addresses for quick contact between members in case of conflict. It's been more than a week now without any answer from McAfee, so I cannot really tell you if there is a problem, or where it would be. But since they're arrogant enough to not even answer, I guess it's just the typical marketing bullshit.
Will continue to bug them to find out more.

[PepiMK]

Sorry to say it, but no one at McAfee wants to help you, it's basically "as intended". Without them even telling on what parts of Spybot exactly they recognize, I cannot even help you to remove Spybot-S&D in the proper way.

Seems McAfee has forgotten the democratic cornerstone of innocent until proven guilty, doesn't even look like they would invent some reason like Symantec did, but will need legal action to force them to withdraw that requirement.

[Da Gopha]

Sorry to say it, but no one at McAfee wants to help you, it's basically "as intended". Without them even telling on what parts of Spybot exactly they recognize, I cannot even help you to remove Spybot-S&D in the proper way.

Seems McAfee has forgotten the democratic cornerstone of innocent until proven guilty, doesn't even look like they would invent some reason like Symantec did, but will need legal action to force them to withdraw that requirement.

Hi there,

I've flagged this on the McAfee Forum - am a very big fan of Spybot, but now that I have McAfee VirusScan Plus 2008 installed, I've found that I can pretty much not use Spybot any longer - to my great disappointment.

http://forums.mcafeehelp.com/showthread.php?t=216783

http://forums.mcafeehelp.com/showpost.php?p=496901&postcount=1

I'm starting a new thread on this as well (http://forums.spybot.info/showthread.php?t=20922) - am hoping that we might be able to find a mutual solution to let McAfee's SystemGuards recognise Spybot.

Cheers,
Gopha.

[PepiMK]

Ok, I'm sick of McAfee. A quote from todays correspondence (Anna Stepanov):
Also, could you please point me to where we are forcing users to uninstall your product? I know that McAfee provides guidelines within our own Support documentation in the case of 100% CPU usage when using both McAfee VirusScan 11.0 and Spybot S&D, but I am not aware of where we are forcing uninstallation.After only ten weeks of discussion, they suddenly don't know what we're even discussing any more! So my answer was:

Now, ten weeks into the discussion, with technical reasons even speaking against a forced uninstallation (immunization topic), that only leaves marketing, and for marketing reasons, it's quite plain illegal. So, unless you can [A.] explain to me why you would not be doing improper competition through that, could you [B.] please provide the asked-for postal address [for a Cease & Decist]?Answer from Warren Nickerson, McAfees Attorney, short and simple:

[B.]You may send correspondence to my attention, using the information in my signature below.To me, that's admitting to illegal practices, and I'm afraid the situation won't get resolved until the attorneys had their fight, which, as you might know, usually takes a few months up to years.

[Da Gopha]

Ok, I'm sick of McAfee. A quote from todays correspondence (Anna Stepanov): After only ten weeks of discussion, they suddenly don't know what we're even discussing any more! So my answer was:
Answer from Warren Nickerson, McAfees Attorney, short and simple:
To me, that's admitting to illegal practices, and I'm afraid the situation won't get resolved until the attorneys had their fight, which, as you might know, usually takes a few months up to years.

I've usually had good response from McAfee Tier 2/3 agents - who speak with R&D about such matters reasonably quickly. The name Anna Stepanov is very familiar, and my Tier 2/3 may have had dealings with her in the past - not sure if she's Upper Tier, or Front Line. Unfortunately, looks like my Tier 2/3 contacts have moved on now, so I can't flag this directly with them by email.

I will however, raise this again on the McAfee forums to get them to discuss it immediately on their regular feedback sessions to R&D if at all possible.

I've had instances in the past when I've reported false positives back to McAfee, and these have been removed within days of my reporting them. Other things have taken a lot longer. I'd consider this to be as critical as a false positive, so it should be treated as such.

Will keep you posted, but I agree that it's pretty disgraceful. And that's coming from me, who's used McAfee all his life, and works very hard to bug-fix and troubleshoot their products from an end-user PoV. Equally, I'm a big fan of Spybot, so I'm after some resolution on this so I can use both products harmoniously.

The point is very much that you can't actually install McAfee until Spybot is removed. There isn't even an 'ignore' option, or an option to tell you to uninstall Spybot, and then reinstall afterwards.

It's a case I think that users will be forced to remove Spybot without good reason, and given that they've paid for McAfee, they'll be inclined to do so, because Spybot's free and they'd prefer to compromise on that rather than on a paid-for product.

Will keep you posted. We've got some further activity on: http://community.mcafee.com/showthread.php?t=216783 that may be of interest.

I'll bounce back and forth to see what's happening, and flag this with the Moderators on the McAfee forum.

Kind regards and seasons greetings,
Gopha.

[Da Gopha]

Ok, I'm sick of McAfee. A quote from todays correspondence (Anna Stepanov): After only ten weeks of discussion, they suddenly don't know what we're even discussing any more! So my answer was:
Answer from Warren Nickerson, McAfees Attorney, short and simple:
To me, that's admitting to illegal practices, and I'm afraid the situation won't get resolved until the attorneys had their fight, which, as you might know, usually takes a few months up to years.

More developments at: http://community.mcafee.com/showthread.php?t=216872&page=2 (read down from post 13)

It appears that you may be best taking the legal approach...

With kind regards,
Gopha.

[chewdz]

For me, i install mcafee first, after which i install spybot. Until now i do not have any conflicts/problems.
But for ur case, maybe u can do likewise. :santa:

[MacGyver]

I'm trying to uninstall 1.4 so I can download 1.5. I attempted uninstalling before because my provider said it wasn't necessary. The uninstall was never complete and I just disabled it, and so I when I decided SD was indeed necessary I ventured to open it up and update the program, etc. Now I'm very confused...the program seems operational and to be working, BUT I can't uninstall it from my add/remove programs because it's not there, it doesn't show up in my program list, tho it's on my start menu, and when I try to uninstall any other way, it says I can't because it doesn't exist. I've followed the directions on your uninstall page, but they were impossible in my case. I've got XP. I thought about just downloading 1.5 anyway, but i feel like I've got something really screwed up here. I really just need to get rid of everything and start over if I can. HELP!!! (please) :)

[spybotsandra]

Hello,

Maybe you have got some items left.
But you can install the new version over the old one.
No problem. :)

Best reards
Sandra
Team Spybot