Just FYI - Comodo Internet Security & Printing Problems

[mraikes]

Came across a problem Saturday that I hadn't seen before, so here it is for others that may encounter the same or similar challenge.

Desktop computer, not very old, running Win 7. Customer's complaint was an inability to print from MS Excel.

Primary symptom was a complete absence of printers in the Excel print dialog. Printers were in fact installed and appearing and printing fine from everywhere else, including MS Word. Only Excel was affected.

Fast forward through head scratching and fruitless experimentation.

Ultimately the problem was caused by the "sandbox" portion of Comodo Internet Security. When I turned off the sandbox, Excel printed normally. Turn on the sandbox, and Excel (only) stopped printing.

Time was short, the customer didn't care about a sandbox and was simply happy to print their stuff, so the story essentially ends there.

But I've been pondering it ever since, wondering what would end up sandboxed by Comodo that would affect only Excel. Haven't come up with any good idea, but at least if any of you run into something similar - check for a sandbox.

 

[ComputerRepairTech]

I stopped using comodo when i realized it was what was stopping me from installing intel chipset updates, i believe i also heard it stopping dragon naturally speaking or whatever.

 

[PC Ops]

Comodo works with whitelists. If something's not on the list it'll run it with restricted privileges and sandboxed by default.The files in question can be checked in the 'unrecognized files' map which you'll find on the main GUI screen. Just add the files of which you're sure are safe to 'trusted files'. Done.

I actually like Comodo IS, rarely see problems with it

 

[mraikes]

Comodo works with whitelists. If something's not on the list it'll run it with restricted privileges and sandboxed by default.The files in question can be checked in the 'unrecognized files' map which you'll find on the main GUI screen. Just add the files of which you're sure are safe to 'trusted files'. Done.

I actually like Comodo IS, rarely see problems with it

Good to know, when I see that machine again I'll check that out.

 

[PC Ops]

The moment Comodo Sandboxes something it'll show a popup in which you can click 'don't isolate this process again' or something similar. This way you can prevent something from ending up in that folder. Ofcourse the client will have to act on it, unfortunately most people totally ignore messages from their AV suite unless it flashes like a lighthouse and screams like a cat in distress

 

[ShinyTech]

I didnt even know anyone still used that AV software

 

[PC Ops]

I didnt even know anyone still used that AV software

Yeah... that's probably because they're not being mentioned in the bigger AV tests like AV-comparatives.org. Has something, if not all, to do with this (and what went on before that of course).

Truth is that Comodo actually has a very decent security suite. Lots of other software and services too btw.