Is my purchase valid forever ?
Your initial purchase is for a one year subscription of PestPatrol. The subscription entitles you to pest database updates, software updates, and on-line technical support.
The subscription renewal fee is 50% of the current cost of purchasing a full license (currently $39.95), a total renewal cost of $19.95 USD for an additional year of PestPatrol. This renews your entitlement to all software updates, pest updates and on-line technical support.
The PestPatrol licenses are perpetual - in other words, you can use the software for as long as you wish on one computer beyond the end of your 12 months, but you are not entitled to any updates or on-line technical support.
I need a replacement installer
If you did not take advantage of the Extended Download Service, you may still obtain a replacement installer through the helpdesk, provided you are within your 12 month subscription period. Please check your purchase confirmation email that was sent out by the vendor at the time of purchase, as this contains a purchase order number and date of purchase that will enable us to establish your customer status.
If you require a replacement installer, please create a ticket and inform us of the following information:
- Purchase Order number
- Purchase date
- Your name
- Address the credit card used to make the purchase is registered to
- Original vendor you purchased from
This will enable us to verify your customer status. Please note, we cannot provide a replacement installer if we are unable to verify your customer status.
Am I entitled to technical assistance?
Customers of all Editions, including the evaluation editions, are entitled to free on-line technical assistance. We do not provide a telephone support service; all support is provided on-line through our website and Helpdesk.
The first place you should start before seeking technical assistance is to ensure you are running the latest version of PestPatrol and that your files & scan strings are fully up to date by running PPUpdater. This can be launched from the PestPatrol Updates tab.
When using the helpdesk, please be as specific as possible in your description so that we can reproduce the symptoms and solve the problem. Be sure to report exactly what problem is and exactly what went wrong, including the exact wording of any error messages you may be receiving.
Our staff may ask you to Email them an attachment with a log, or a file. You may be asked to re-install PestPatrol or to conduct some maintenance on your system such as update your Operating System or run Windows System Tools such as Scandisk or defragmenter. Please be sure to familiarize yourself with these functions and tasks. Further information about these can be found in your Windows Help files.
I am having problems updating PestPatrol
If you are encountering errors when running PPUpdater, visit our Downlad Page and please upgrade to the latest version. Under Components, find PPU Updater.
Click on the “ Download Icon ”. Please choose “ Open ” or “ Run from this location ” when prompted.
If you see a Security Warning asking ‘ Do you want to install and run SetupPPUpdater.exe from download.pestpatrol.com ” – please select “ Yes ”, then follow the on-screen instructions.
The installer asks you where PPUpdater should be installed – IMPORTANT – The default is:
c:\Program Files\PestPatrol\ Please change this, if needed, to your current PestPatrol directory if it is in a different location. If PPUpdater is downloaded to a location outside the PestPatrol directory, it will create a duplicate evaluation version of the program.
Scan does not start at 0 - the object count jumps quickly to a high number
Before PestPatrol starts scanning your hard drive, it immediately scans the registry for all the spyware it knows about, as well as scanning all running processes, spyware cookies and startup processes. During this brief process the 'objects scanned' count appears to jump to several thousand very quickly - this is a normal process.
When the hard drive scan starts, the object count continues from whichever number it reached when scanning for spyware. This scan takes place very quickly, so you may not notice it has even happened.
If you wish to test this, create a new empty folder in the root of your drive, then select just this empty folder to be scanned using the "Available for scanning" pane. (Click on the + to expand the drive to find the folder if required).
Scanning of the empty folder will start once it has scanned the registry and other known spyware areas, but as the folder is empty, nothing but these areas are actually scanned and you will see how quickly this initial scan runs and what the object count reaches.
Turning off PestPatrol Sounds
To turn off sounds in that are generated when running PestPatrol, open the ‘Options > Interface' tab and uncheck the sound options.
CookiePatrol generates a ‘plop' sound when it deletes spyware cookies entering your computer. If you do not wish to have this sound, double click on PPControl in the system tray and choose:
“ CookiePatrol > “Disable Sound ”
You may also download a silent wav file to replace the current sound file. Click the following link, and download this zip file to your computer:
Extract this file to your C:\Program files\PestPatrol folder to overwrite the current sound file.
What is the Extended Download Service?
The Extended Download Service is offered to you by Digital River, the online eCommerce billing company at the time of your purchase. It is not actually offered by PestPatrol. It allows you to get a new download of the PestPatrol installer for the life of your product license (one year) if you need to reload it for any reason.
An option is offered to remove this item before continuing with your purchase, and you must press “Update Total” after changing the quantity ‘1' to ‘0' If you did not remove it from your shopping cart prior to purchase, and wish to receive a refund, please contact Digital River directly for resolution by calling toll-free: 1-800-656-5426 from within the US; or 1-952-253 8400 from outside the US.
If you have the Extended download service, and you wish to make use of this to replace a lost installer, please refer to your purchase confirmation email from Digital River for instructions of how to use this service, alternatively you can contact them directly.
Please note: this extended download service does not permit additional installers to be downloaded for use on other computers. Your license agreement for PestPatrol is one license for each computer you want to protect with PestPatrol.
What platforms will PestPatrol run on?
PestPatrol only runs on all 32-bit Windows platforms:
- Windows 98
- Windows ME
- Windows NT
- Windows 2000
- Windows XP
Minimum system specification:
- Pentium II
- 96mb RAM
- 20mb free hard drive space
PestPatrol does not run on the Mac or Unix platform. PestPatrol and CookiePatrol integrate with Internet Explorer, these components are not compatible with any other browser type.
How to delete pests previously excluded from detection
To remove pests from the Excluded list, please open PestPatrol to the “ Options –What to Exclude ” tab, here you will find a list of what has previously been excluded. Please highlight these one at a time by clicking the row to select it, then use the “ Remove ” icon to remove from the list.
Once complete, close PestPatrol to save your changes, then run a fresh scan. Previously Excluded pests will now be detected in your next scan and can be deleted as normal.
Other products detect pests that PestPatrol misses
There are several explanations as to why your PestPatrol software has not detected the same files as another scanning program.
- Your program or Scan strings may be out of date. Please run PPUpdater to ensure you have the latest files and scan strings. We provide weekly updates to keep you protected from the latest pests.
- PestPatrol may not be configured to scan the same files as the other scanning program. Open the " Where to search " tab and select " All files " and " Thorough " options.
- PestPatrol may not be scanning all the pest categories. By default, many categories are not included in a scan. Open the " What to search for " tab and ensure all categories you wish to be scanned for are selected.
- You may have previously excluded that pest or its program files from being scanned. Open the " What to exclude " tab, ensure a directory has not been excluded from scanning that may contain pests.
- The files detected by the other products may not be specifically malicious programs, they may be tracks, logs and events that PestPatrol does not scan for.
- There may be a fault in the program. Test the PestPatrol detection ability by using our test files . You may download any of the test files to a test directory, then scan it. PestPatrol should report these found on the Detected Log. (Ensure that the " What to Search for ' tab has ' Misc ' and ' Misc Doc ' enabled with a green tick).
- The pests may be tracking cookies which will not be detected. PestPatrol does not detect simple tracking cookies as nearly all of these are not harmful in any way. Only Spyware cookies are detected by PestPatrol.
- Not every company detects the same products. The files being detected by another scanner may have been investigated by PestPatrol and have passed our rigorous matrix test.
Why are pests not detected in the Recycle Bin?
The Recycle Bin is not scanned as pests cannot run from this location. Also, programs other than the operating system cannot delete files in the recycle bin. The recycle bin doesn't exist as a physical location, but rather is a virtual directory. So scanning it is a waste of time if nothing is found, and frustrating to users if something is found, as it can only be deleted by the operating system.
If you have pest files in your recycle bin, you can delete these by emptying the bin.
How do I disable PestPatrol?
The main PestPatrol program is only active when the window is open. Other PestPatrol components may be running in the background; such as PPControl, PPMemCheck and CookiePatrol. These components can be stopped and started rather than disabled.
The best way to control these components, is to have PPControl running in the system tray and when you require one of them to be stopped, double-click on PPControl and select the component you wish to stop, and choose " stop " and to re-activate, choose " start ". For visiting certain websites, it may be only CookiePatrol you need to stop, to prevent the deletion of spyware cookies which are essential to the operation of that website.
To stop all running PestPatrol components, double-click on PPControl and select " Unload ", this will ask if you want to stop other PestPatrol components which are running. Select " Yes " and all PestPatrol components will be stopped until you manually restart them or reboot.
The 'Options - Automatic Scans' tab allows you to control which components are loaded at boot. If PPControl is not already running, you can activate it from here.
File Count does not match other scanners count
In PestPatrol, when ‘All Files' are selected, this mode will not scan every single file on your system. There are certain file extensions which will never be pest files and are therefore not scanned. In addition to this if a file has a size of 0 kb, it will not be counted by PestPatrol. It is therefore not possible to expect our file count to match that of other scanning products.
My shopping cart is empty when I try to place my secure order
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If you are blocking cookies with Internet Explorer, open:
Control Panel > Internet Options > Privacy Tab and change the cookie slider to 'Medium'
If you are running a firewall or other software that blocks cookies, please configure this software to allow cookies to be used on our website.