Autoplay, Autorun

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Autorun refers to the concept of the computer reacting to insertion of some (portable) drive, CD, DVD, or such, and usually to the windows implementation of this concept.

In windows:

• AutoRun
  • Can be disabled using TweakUI, Drive properties (per drive), Device Manager (per drive), and editing the registry (different options)

• Autorun.inf mostly alters the way Autorun/Autoplay works (see MSDN: 'Autorun.inf Entries')
  • setting labels, setting icons, adding items to autoplay

• AutoPlay
  • is the name of the popup that tells you what a (portable) drive contains, and whether you want to view, play, or do something else with it.
  • Vista's version is more detailed