Thanks, Engel! This looked right, but doesn’t seem to apply to Vista.
Running appwiz.cpl, Windows Defender doesn't even show up on the list of
installed Program and Features, nor under Windows features to turn on or off.
It is also not listed in the Windows Installer CleanUp utility
(http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290301/). And when I try to reinstall from
http://www.microsoft.com/athome/secu...yware/software, as the KB article
instructs, I get the message “You do not need to install this software
because Windows Defender is included in Windows Vista. You can access
Windows Defender from the Security section of the Windows Control Panel.”

Windows Security Center shows (under “Malware protection”) that Windows
Defender is turned off. “Turn on now” churns for a while, then says,
“Security Center can’t turn on Windows Defender. Please try again later.”

Any other ideas?


"Engel" wrote:

> Hello Nevet,
>
> Error message when you run Windows Defender: "Error Code 0x800106ba
>
> Try this
> http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=931849
>
>
> I hope this post is helpful.
>
> Let us know how it works ºut.
>
> --
>
>
>
> "Nevet" wrote:
>
> > Running Vista Home Premium. When starting the OS, I get an error message
> > from Windows Defender:
> >
> > "Application failed to initialize: 0x800106ba. A problem caused Windows
> > Defender service to stop. To start the service, restart your computer or
> > search
> > Help and Support on how to start the service manually."
> >
> > Attempting to manually start the service brought up another error:
> >
> > "Windows could not start the Windows Defender service on Local Computer.
> > Error 0x80092003: An error occurred while reading or writing to a file."
> >
> > I have uninstalled my third-party (McAfee) security suite so Defender is all
> > I have on this machine.
> >
> > I found similar reports on various newsgroups but no solution, workaround or
> > fix offered.
> >
> > Any suggestions?
> >
> > --Nevet