WMS Idle Error On Computer Shutdown - How & Why You Should Disable Nero Scout
What Is Nero Scout?
Nero Scout is a media database application that makes it easier for other Nero programs such as Nero Wave Editor, Nero Burning ROM, and Nero Photosnap to access media files in your computer without you having to manually search the folders in your hard drive. It does this by adding several entries to your Windows Startup folder to enable it to launch itself when Windows starts and constantly running in the background scanning for new media files (music, videos, photos) which it then adds to its own internal media database.
My Experience With It
Upon installing Nero 7 on my laptop and desktop PC, I found myself with two slow computers. Using the Task Manager, I found four new entries running: NMBgMonitor.exe, NMIndexingService.exe, NMIndexStoreSvr.exe, and NmFirstStart.exe. No wonder why my computers were running slowly.
I also started getting the WMS Idle Error message every time I shut down my desktop computer. It was quite harmless; it simply made me have to wait for Windows to end a certain task and then display the WMS Idle Error message with "This program is not responding. It may be busy or waiting for a response from you. End Now or Cancel and return to Windows?" before I could walk away from the computer. But it was such a nuisance to have to click on the End Now button before Windows shuts down.
Research on the subject led me to conclude that it was Nero Scout causing these problems and not Nero 7 itself. So I took steps to either uninstall Nero Scout or disable it.
My Attempts To Kill It
First I wanted to see if I could remove just this one component of Nero 7, but after going through all the usual ways of uninstalling a program, I found out that Nero Scout simply refused to go away. So I decided to uninstall the entire Nero 7 bundle and then reinstall it using the custom installation feature. To my dismay, there was no option to deselect Nero Scout upon installation. So I started looking for ways to disable it instead.
Why Disable It?
Unless you are a very frequent user of Nero 7 and its bundled applications (which I am not), you would probably want to disable Nero Scout for the following reasons:
- It hogs system resources resulting in a slow computer.
- It has been known to cause problems with Windows, most notably the WMS Idle Error message upon shutdown, and cause problems with other Nero applications as well.
- A second media database isn't really necessary, is it? Windows already has its own.
How To Disable It
The good news is that Nero 7.0.5.4 (which was the version that I installed) now has the option to disable Nero Scout without having to tamper with your system's registry settings. To do this, double-click on the My Computer icon, right-click on Nero Scout, and select Options. Uncheck the box for Enable Nero Scout. Restart your computer and Nero Scout shouldn't bother you anymore.
If you're using an older release of Nero, download and install the latest update to be able to disable Nero Scout through its own interface. Or you can remove it manually by editing your system's registry. Click on the Start button, select Run, copy and paste the line below, and click OK.
regsvr32 /u "%COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\Ahead\Lib\MediaLibraryNSE.dll"
Restart your computer to complete the process.
Back To Normal
My computers' performance went back to normal after I disabled Nero Scout, and the Nero Scout icon in My Computer disappeared. Thankfully, I never saw those annoying WMS Idle Error messages again.
CD/DVD BURNING SOFTWARE
Comments
AUTHORI'm afraid not, Frank. Maybe you should try malware removal software?
Does this also get rid of the problem of svchost.exe using up all the cpu?
Great info. I'm done. Thank you Susan Ng.
- AUTHOR
You're welcome, Janarthanan. :)
Wow my problem solved.Thanks a lot and no words to praise you.Many of them told and advised to change my OS which is a laborius job for me and someone told your computer is attacked by virus.But as far as my concern you are great and wish you to continue your research and guide people like me.Once again thank u verymuch. Keepitup.
- AUTHOR
Thanks, eden500V and Jonesy. Glad to have helped. :)
Wow - How long have I stupidly put up with this annoying problem. I've erformed a search, found your article, made the changes and BINGO, its now resolved. Thanks!!
Amazing how simple it can be to communicate with people and have them understand a certain topic, you made my day.
- AUTHOR
You're welcome, David. :)
Thank you Susan for the information. I had the same problem with nero scout. I stumbled across your web site when I was trying to find out what was going on with my laptop. I turned off Nero Scout and now my lap top works much faster.
- AUTHOR
Glad to have helped. :)
Thanx for the help. I was at a wits end. tried to repair XP to no avail, even with microsoft help wasn't able to remove wmsidle. Disabling Nero Scout worked for me. Kudos
Excellent diagnsis and fix.
- AUTHOR
To re-enable Nero Scout, follow the same procedure and put a check for Enable Nero Scout in Nero Scout Options instead of unchecking it.
how to enable it back??
- AUTHOR
You're welcome, Farhan. :)
hey thanks...it worked :)
- AUTHOR
I know just how you feel, kolps. And you're welcome. :)
thanks thank u very much susan.its working.thank god i find u r comments and followed.now getting a nice sleep without thinking abt my lappy
- AUTHOR
You're welcome, orlando. :)
Thanks to you I was able to solve a problem of 6 months in my computer, now my computer runs fast and does not show the VMS Idle error when I shot it down. Very glad I found your article on this problem.
Thanks again Susan
- AUTHOR
Thanks, acer, Dr.vinayak, Bhaskar, and Khaledez. Glad to have helped. :)
Thanks allot allot allot Susan. It was like a magical solution for an everlasting problem. Your article is awesome, easy to get, to the point, organized, creative, and very informative. Your writing style is also amazing :) Congratulations for all your fans :) You really deserve it so much :)
Just to tell you how much I appreciate your article and the time you took to help others know how to solve the problem, I never felt I'm obligated to thank someone like that. You really are a gorgeous. Thank you so much Susan.
Thanks a lot. i was fade up with tht problem
Thanks its working
Great Hub you have here :) Please check out my website would love to network!
- AUTHOR
By the way, Laila, the process to disable Nero Scout in this article applies to Nero 8 as well. :-)
- AUTHOR
Thank you, GMCM West. I enjoyed reading your very expressive comment. :) I am honored to be part of the lifting of the Curse of the Scout. :D I'm glad to have helped you and Laila Rajaratnam as well. :-)
Thanks..glad I found this and have book marked this!I still use nero7. thanks for the tip!
JOB WELL DONE! HOOYAH to you young lady! This Master Chief is glad to have discovered your page. This has been not just an annoyance, but a tremendous burden to my wife and thus; me.. She had installed Nero 7 while I was downrange. When I came home for a brief stand down period, I fought this thing - day and night! It would not die or go away!
Your instructions are well written and as a result; very simple to carry out. I am happy to report that the; "CURSE OF THE SCOUT" is dead and buried! You have my thanks and respect. HAND SALUTE! HOOYAH!
You have a very bright future ahead of you, of that I have no doubt. My sincerest wishes for a more peaceful world in which to live and my gratitude for sharing your knowledge with the masses.
GMCM West
- AUTHOR
Hi, Kim. I'm using Nero 8 on my main computer. I haven't removed/uninstalled Nero Scout though, I've just disabled it. It hasn't caused me any problems since.
Are you trying to uninstall the whole Nero 8 package or just Nero Scout? From what I know, you can't uninstall Nero Scout separately. But you can disable it by unticking the Enable Nero Scout checkbox in Nero Scout Options. Click Start > All Programs > Nero 8 > Nero Toolkit > Nero Scout to find the checkbox.
Hope that helps.
Hello - Finally I found something about Nero scout options that is current. I am trying to get Nero Scout Options off my computer. I've tried uninstalling the "Nero 8 esstintials"; a popup box said "shell manager base is corrupt or missing" "Fatal error during installation". After some research, it appears that I need to run something called Nero General which removes this pesky thing. I believe that the nero scout keeps messing with my internal DVD player and knocking out the drives so I can't use it.
Help any suggestions.
- AUTHOR
Alan, it's been a while since I've configured Nero Scout on XP. As far as I can remember though, you'll find Nero Scout by clicking Start > All Programs > Nero > Tools > Nero Scout. :-)
I double clicked on My Computer but don't see Nero Scout. Where do I find it? I am using windows XP in Classic View.
- AUTHOR
Glad to hear that, Sherwin. :-)
Thanks for the help, Now I don't have problem with WMS.IDLE while i shut down my PC. SALAMAT JUB KA-A-YO.
- AUTHOR
Thanks, Adam. I was still using Windows XP at the time I wrote this article. Now I'm using Windows Vista and Nero 8. I was still able to disable Nero Scout in Nero 8 by unchecking the "Enable Nero Scout" box in Nero Scout Options as I mentioned in the article.
Clicked on Start > All Programs > Nero 8 > Nero Toolkit > Nero Scout. The Nero Scout Options box then appeared.
if you install nero 7 on windows vista, it does not install completely because of the incomptability. The nero scout options you mentioned does not work. I had to manually edit the registry and delete the Bad Key from the instructions here:
http://remove-nero-scout.blogspot.com/2008/10/remo...
Direct link if you click on my name 'ADAM'
Dropping this here for those of you for whom the trick susan mentioned does not work.
God bless you man. I really had to do this. My pc was very slow.
Thank you
great info thank you
- AUTHOR
Hi, Shelly. I'm actually using Vista on one of my computers now. Disabling Nero Scout on Vista and on XP is quite similar. Follow these steps:
Click on the Start button (now just a round windows logo), go to All Programs, open the Nero folder, go to Tools and you'll see Nero Scout in the list that drops down. Select Nero Scout then follow the same procedure on how to disable it above. :)
great stuff but how do i get this weed outa vista?
- AUTHOR
Happy to have helped, Peter. :-)
Excellent! Thanks for that, I had been unable to find a solution till this. Most appreciated.
- AUTHOR
Wow, I knew people were having problems with Nero Scout but I had no idea the symptoms had such a broad range. Thanks for sharing, Kurtis. :-)
I had a client site that were having serious problems with Word documents. One PC would load a document (from the network) just fine but another PC would take up to 5 minutes to load the same document. We eventually narrowed it down to Nero Scout, which was installed on the "slow" computer but not on the "fast" one. Once it was disabled, both PCs worked great. Just another data point that most people aren't aware of...
- AUTHOR
Maarten, I'm absolutely flattered that you think my article is helpful enough to put on your site. And to be translated into Dutch... why, I've never been translated before! Go right ahead. Haha! :-)
Rufus09, that's great! Thanks for taking the time to share your experience. Happy printing! Hehe. :-)
Thank you so much! I have been trying to install an HP Deskjet Printer all day long with no resolve. Then I remembered, I have had this error pop up when shutting down. The WMS Idle Error. So, while I was waiting again for the HP download to complete, I decided to go research this WMS issue and found you. I did exactly what you said to do. Now, my HP download went zoom right in! Everything working great.
Absolutely great!, I wunder if I could use your comment on my website, for use with our customers. I will have to translate it to dutch but this is no problem. Naturally I will name you as the original author of the piece
I also hate nero scout lol, thanks
- AUTHOR
You're welcome, Luke. :-)
Thanks Susan ng ! you really did a great job, I followed your instructions and disabled Nero Scout and life is back to normal !
Many thanks
Luke
- AUTHOR
Glad I could help, Paul. :-)
thank you so much it works!!! :D
great stuff susan ng,with the help of yours i could learn a lot about nero scout and how to disablei t.even my system slowed down al ot due to extra resources taken up to operate nero scout.now woth nero scout uninstalled,my system is back o n track.thanku
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