Why do my programs not function correctly and/or complain that I am not an administrator, when in fact I am an administrator?

In Windows Vista, programs are only allowed limited access to the system, even if you are logged in as an administrator.

Programs that need administrator-level access to the system must be explicitly allowed to do so. To do that, follow these steps:

  1. Right-click the program or start menu item
  2. Click Run As Administrator

For more information, please read an overview of UAC and What's changed in Windows Vista.

Note to Administrators: The behavior of the Run As Administrator command is different from the Run As... command in Windows XP.

This command does not run the program in the context of the built-in administrator, as you might have expected.

If the currently logged on user is a member of the Administrators group, the program is given administrator access to the system, but still runs in the context of the currently logged on user.

However, if the currently logged on user is not a member of the Administrators group, the program will run in the context of the administrator account that was used to authenticate with the UAC dialog.