DIVX player go away

February 26, 2016 1:22 AM

Can you please tell me how to safely, totally and permanently remove DIVX player from my Mac? If you know how, please explain it to me like I am 5 years old your least tech-savvy relative who is nevertheless an adult computer user.

DIVX seems to continually 'gum up' the works and if I get another prompt to download an upgrade that doesn't actually seem to be able to be downloaded (or even found) I will cry.

posted by esto-again to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

Before you (or anyone else) follows the steps below, please be aware that you are using the command line to make alterations to your computer, and furthemore are executing commands that are destructive using elevated administrator privileges. You should be very careful when entering and running these commands, as a mistake could inadvertantly cause your computer to fail to boot and/or cause loss of data. I recommend you ensure that you have a good backup of your computer before proceeding, or failing that, at least a backup of your most important files. These commands cannot permanently destroy your computer however.

Despite the scary disclaimer I’ve written, you should be just fine executing these changes.

• Open Terminal (From Launchpad, this is under ‘Utilities’)
• Enter the command launchctl unload /Library/LaunchAgents/com.divx.update.agent.plist and press Enter
• Enter the command launchctl unload /Library/LaunchAgents/com.divx.dms.agent.plist and press Enter
• Enter the command sudo rm -r /Library/Application\ Support/Divx and press Enter. You'll be required to enter your account password because these files are owned by the system. The sudo command grants elevated privileges to the command being executed. You shouldn’t be prompted for your password again for the remainder of these steps.
• Enter the command sudo rm /Library/LaunchAgents/com.divx.update.agent.plist and press Enter
• Enter the command sudo rm /Library/LaunchAgents/com.divx.dms.agent.plist and press Enter
• Enter the command sudo rm $HOME/Library/Preferences/com.divx.* and press Enter
• Click on the Apple menubar item (top left of your screen), then click System Preferences…, then right-click on the Divx icon and choose “Remove “Divx” preference pane”. This step may not need to be performed as the previous step should have removed the pane files, but I’ll include it for belt and braces
• Restart your Mac, this should allow any files that were in use to close and be completely removed

posted by NordyneDefenceDynamics at 2:22 AM on February 26, 2016 [3 favorites]

Alternatively, you can install one of many apps that makes uninstalling other apps as easy as putting the unwanted app in the Trash. I swear by Clean My Mac, which I've installed on my parents' Mac for painless uninstalling and other maintenance. The app will trash the Divx app you don't want as well as all of the associated files targeted by the Terminal commands in the answer above mine.
posted by emelenjr at 8:12 AM on February 26, 2016 [1 favorite]

http://onnati.net/apptrap/
posted by humboldt32 at 10:21 AM on February 26, 2016