PNRP is a distributed name resolution protocol allowing Internet hosts to publish “peer names” and the corresponding IPv6 address. This basically allows every machine running PNRP to have it’s own name on the internet without having to register a specific domain name. Originally available in Windows XP SP2, it is now part of Windows Vista, and requires IPv6 to work. Here’s an article that talks about PNRP, and even describes how to get it working. There is also tons of information on Microsoft’s Technet. As most users aren’t able to use IPv6 yet, the service probably isn’t necessary for you, but since it’s set to manual by default, there’s little reason to disable it. Keep reading →

If you have a network with other devices on it, you may need this service. This service is responsible for looking on the network for devices, and including them in a ‘Plug and Play’ fashion among the hardware available to your computer. An example would be locating a Media Center Extender on your network, and allowing Media Center to communicate with it. If you don’t have any devices other than your computer that connect to your network (wired or wireless), you probably don’t need this one. Keep reading →

Here’s one you definitely shouldn’t disable, and Vista doesn’t give you the ability to do so through Services.msc. Plug and Play (PnP) automatically discovers hardware attached to your computer, and helps make it operable. This shouldn’t be confused with UPnP, which is used to connect to devices via TCP over a network. Keep reading →

As explained on TechNet, this service collects performance data automatically from local or remote computers. You can then view the data using System Monitor or export the data to spreadsheet programs or databases for analysis and report generation. Note that this service isn’t required to run the Performance Monitor, available as part of the Perfmon utility. If you’re not into viewing all your stats, it’s safe to disable this one, but since it’s set to manual by default, it only starts up when asked for anyway. Keep reading →

Description: Subscription music services cannot extract metering data from portable devices that support metering. This problem occurs when the services try to synchronize metering data on a client computer that is running the Microsoft Windows Media Format 11 Software Development Kit (SDK) and Microsoft Windows XP. Keep reading →

On Windows Vista computers, you find that the Windows Firewall service is not running. When you try to manually start the service, you get the error mentioned below. This problem may also occur for the DHCP Client service, or the “Diagnostic Policy Service� service.

Here are the errors for the “Windows Firewall” service:

Windows could not start the Windows Firewall on Local Computer. For more information, review the System Event Log. If this is a non-Microsoft service, contact the service vendor, and refer to service-specific error code 5.

In the System event log, you see the following event:

Source: Service Control manager Eventlog Provider.
Event ID: 7024
The Windows Firewall service terminated with service-specific error 5 (0x5)

Peer Networking Identity Manager is part of Microsoft’s Peer-to-Peer Networking component, which also includes Peer Name Resolution Protocol and Peer Networking Grouping. Identity manager permits the creation and use of peer-to-peer identities in PNRP and grouping. If you don’t use Windows Meeting, or other P2P enabled programs, or have disabled PNRP, then it is safe to disable this service, though it is set to only run manually by default. Keep reading →

Peer Networking Grouping is part of Microsoft’s Peer-to-Peer Networking component, which also includes Peer Name Resolution Protocol. By default, grouping is the security layer that defines the security model behind group creation, invitation, and connection to the group. If you don’t use Windows Meeting, or other P2P enabled programs, or have disabled PNRP, then it is safe to disable this service, though it is set to only run manually by default. Keep reading →

First available in the Advanced Networking Pack for Windows XP, PNRP is a distributed name resolution protocol allowing Internet hosts to publish “peer names” and the corresponding IPv6 address. Other hosts can then resolve the name, retrieve the corresponding address, and establish peer-to-peer connections. Noah Horton, Program Manager in charge of PNRP, has a lot of information on this service at his blog, and Wikipedia also has a page. In short, if you don’t use Windows Meeting or other applications or games that make use of PNRP, then there is no harm disabling this service, though it is already set to manual by default. Keep reading →

After you download updates from Windows Updates on a Windows Vista computer, you may experience following symptoms:

• You receive a dialog appears that indicates that the host process for Windows Services has stopped working.
• After you restart the computer, a Windows Update dialog box appears. This dialog box contains the following message:
  

  Some Updates were not installed
  Failed: xx updates
  Error(s) Found:
  Code 800706BA