i have 3 young children using an account on my pc, which runs vista. i have the parental controls set to only allow certain sites and certain programs, but i need to know how or if i can make it where they cant go in to the my computer screen and get into the hard drive and alter any of the folders there, like the windows folder or the programs folder. preferable all of them. is this possible and how?

Windows usually hides system and protected files by default. I suppose what you could do is set windows not to show hidden files and folders and then hide all the contents of your harddrive?

Limited users don't have modify privileges to the Windows and Program Files folders by default in Vista. You can change the privileges by right-clicking and choosing propeties on a folder. There under the security tab you should find the permissions.

In the Permissions tab you can DENY permission to do certain things to each file or folder - you'll be able to deny write permission, or deny any control to them there.

there are only two accounts on this pc, mine and theirs. when i try to change any of this stuff for their account, it affects mine too. their account name wasnt origanaly on the list that comes up, but i went in and try to add it, then made the changes, but it still affected my account. i'm stumped.