Avast WEBforum
Consumer Products => Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security (legacy Pro Antivirus, Internet Security, Premier) => Topic started by: leekb on January 16, 2005, 05:36:23 AM
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Intel P4 2.6C/1GB RAM/WinXP SP2/avast! Home Build Nov2004 (4.5.561)/Standard & Network Shield Only.
I switched from TrendMicro to avast 4.5 Home recently. I noticed after the switch, a variety of applications (Office, Video Editing, browser, and many others, etc.) started to crash randomly (apps crash and closed by XP). The apps still managed to get started but they would just crash randomly for no apparent reason, sometimes in the middle of my work. >:(
My PC was super stable before. Nothing else had changed on my system except the new resident - avast. It became the prime suspect. I observed my PC for a few days and finally I found clues linking avast to the crashes.
Whenever an application reads/writes files, the avast icon in the taskbar tray spins. The spinning must be the indication that avast is working in background scanning the files. Interestingly, while the avast icon is still spinning, and I move the apps window (by selecting the apps window at its caption bar and move the mouse), the apps almost always crashes. Then I noticed further that not only moving the apps window causes the crash. Basically when avast icon is spinning, doing things with your mouse in the application (like right-click) also likely to crash the apps too. Now that I know when the vulnerable period is, I would avoid doing anything in the apps window whenever I see avast icon spinning, to avoid another crash.
Now has anyone seen this before?
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Are you sure every trace of Trend is gone? (including the registry keys)
Does changing the settings for the standard shield provider make a difference?
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Yes. Every single trace of TrendMicro is gone. When the crashes started appearing, I wanted to isolate the problem. So I formatted the hard disk and scratch installed XP.
The configurations in the Standard & Network Shields are default. What changes do you suggest?
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"play" around a little with the settings, it may tell us more about what is going on.
Also enable "debug" logging in Avast. When a crash happens, there may be an entry in Avast's log file with more info.
Does disabling eg the network shield provider, makes a difference?
The only time I have seen what you describe is when someone was using Opera as webbrowser and listened to a live stream while doing other things. Only Opera closed, the rest of the applications remained working without problems.
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I don't think avast!'s logging would record anything useful if it's the application that crashes, not avast!.
Anyway, the described symptoms really don't seem like anything that could be caused by avast!. To me, it sounds more like a hardware or OS problem (bad memory?)
A few examples of the crash messages (are there any additional information there?) might be useful...
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The apps crashes have become unbearable. It seems avast! is not for me. I have since switched to another virus scanner, which is also free for home use. All crashes mysteriously disappeared. Everything is working smoothly now.
Thank you guys for your help. I will relook at avast again when new versions become available.
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Unfortunatelly, you didn't supply any details about the crashes - so I really doubt we could do anything about it, when you're the only one having this kind of problems :-\
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Leekb, can't you post more about the crashes...
You can help avast to be better and you can enjoy this powerfull antivirus application so do all of we (happy avast users) 8)
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If I may jump in here, I haver had similar experiences. I have been running Avast for a while now, & have been having periodic crashes. Just after Christmas I started fresh with a new hard drive, new OS install etc. The crashes kept on happening. Saturday night, for no apparent reason, the computer re-booted, scanned the HD, repaired some damaged files, & then did it again 2 minutres later. The result is a 160 Gig of unreadable unrecognizable hard drive. I would up having to reformat & start afresh.
I am not using avast at this moment, however if you wish, I have a second computer I am trying to network. When I get it up & running I will run the same setup I had on my main box, with Avast & Sygate firewall, & see if I can duplicate the crashes.
I will keep you informed.
John
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As I said - it's impossible to say more without detailed info about the crashes (there was some kind of crash info displayed, wasn't it?)
But still - I can imagine avast! crashing programs it is somehow connected to (such as Outlook, maybe). If there was a bug in avast!'s drivers, the computer might crash. If there was a bug in Script Blocker (avast! Pro only), the browser might crash.
But there is no connection between avast! and Office or video editing applications (as reported in the original post), so I really don't know how avast! could cause such crashes, even if it contained an unresolved bug.
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I haven't put avast on my non-esential computer yet, but I have been running Prevx on my essential one & no slow dons, crashes etc. Talking to the guys at work about my experience with the computer lockingup & crashing, one buddy with a HP notebook sees the samethink with his system using avast.
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I haven't put avast on my non-esential computer yet, but I have been running Prevx on my essential one & no slow dons, crashes etc. Talking to the guys at work about my experience with the computer lockingup & crashing, one buddy with a HP notebook sees the samethink with his system using avast.
John, I used and tested Prevx. Man, it promisses more than could do. It works but you have a 'feeling' of security bigger than the reality... :( :-[
If you want to use avast. Please, disable Prevx while installing. You will save a lot of troubleshooting hours...
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I got a system here where Avast seems to be closing down Opera. I will do some testing on it and see if I can get any error or other message about it in a log file or perhaps even a system dump. Will post back if I have more info.
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Well tried several things. And it definatly is Avast that is causing Opera to close.
I checked every available log file, but there was nothing in them related to this.
No minidump was created (as could be expected).
Enabling 'show detailed info' showed me it always happens when scanning the Opera cache folder.
Disabling standard-shield stopped the closings.
Adding Opera's cache folder to the exclusion list also stopped the closings.
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Strange... what version of Opera and OS? Any firewall or similar apps?
Does the problem occur only on a particular web site?
Does it help when you disable scanning of created/modified files only? (if it's enabled, of course)
Would you be able to identify if a particular file is causing the problems? (in avast! Pro, you can turn on the creation of the full report file even for the resident protection task - although it's not a recommended setting, of course).
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what version of Opera and OS?
Opera 7.51 as well as with Opera 8 (beta) (registered versions)
OS = Windows XP Pro
Does the problem occur only on a particular web site?
Happens with all sites.
Does it help when you disable scanning of created/modified files only?
Not sure if I tried that already. But if I did, I will try again and let you know.
Would you be able to identify if a particular file is causing the problems?
Happens with all files in the Opera cache folder
documents and settings\[username]\application data\opera\[operaversion]\profile\chache4
and
documents and settings\[username]\application data\opera\[operaversion]\profile\chacheop
in avast! Pro, you can turn on the creation of the full report file even for the resident protection task - although it's not a recommended setting, of course
Currently I have set logging to 'debug', if you want me to change it let me know (and to what ofcourse)
If you have more questions or want any info, just let me know and I will provide it if I can.
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So, the browser closes after (when) the first cached file is accessed, or it works for a while?
I didn't mean the "debug" logging - because I don't think it is an error for avast (rather for opera). I just meant to turn on the creation of the report file and let "OK files" include there, so that you can see exactly what was scanned.
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So, the browser closes after (when) the first cached file is accessed, or it works for a while?
It works for a while than randomly (so it seems) the problem starts.
Opening Opera again, and it will work a while again.
I have changed the logging settings now as is shown in the picture.
I run Opera and let you know if there is anything (possibly) related to this when it happens again.
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It just happened again. Nothing in the log files.
I now have disabled "scanning of created/modified files only".
Let's see if that makes a difference.
It looks like it is only happening if I opening a new page, not if I have a page open and just are reading it.
Other applications that where running when it happened:
Seti@home
ZoneAlarm Pro
FireFox
Total Commander
HDTVPCI.EXE (Watching tv on the system through my video/tv-capture card)
Sambar server 6.1
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Sorry, I guess I wasn't very clear. I sort of supposed you have avast! Pro on that machine. You cannot change the reporting in avast! Home - the pasted dialog affects (regarding the Report file) the Simple User Interface only. To change it for the resident protection as well, it's necessary to edit the "Resident protection" task in the Enhanced User Interface.
Let us know if the "created/modified" files make any difference...
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You wasn't wrong about the version. I do have Pro ;)
It was me who forgot about the enhanced interface.
[Probably because I like the skins so much ;D]
I checked and where needed made the changes to the settings.
Will let you know if it crashes again or not.
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Sofar no closings. But I will give it another few days to make sure.
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Another idea what to check: you can try to run File Monitor (http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/source/filemon.shtml) to see if any particular file access error is causing the troubles (for Opera - i.e. if it closes after some error). Of course, the number of monitored events will be very huge... so I suggest to filter the output to "Opera" process only, and also to log only errors.
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Still no "spontanious" closings :-\
I have re-enabled 'scan created/modified files'
Let's see what happens.
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Still no closes sofar.
I now have reset every setting back to what it was before starting to debug except for the logging.
I also still run the filemonitor.
Let's see what happens now.
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4 days later and still no 'spontanious' closings of Opera. Not even one.
Guess whatever it was causing this, was solved in one of the beta's.
But if it happens again, I will start throwing every debug and monitoring tool I got on it.
And trust me, I got a lot of them ;D
Thanks for your time though Igor.
Really apreciated.
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It was mostly your time - thanks! :)
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I am using Windows 2000 Pro with Word 97 and Excel 97. If I enable avast, it takes forever (minutes) to start these applications. If I disable Avast, log off and log back on, the applications snap to the screen.
Any ideas?
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What CPU do you have? Does the avast! icon spin during the startup of Word/Excel?
Does it help if you pause the Standard Shield provider?
If it does - If you enable the "Show detailed info on performed action" for Standard Shield - what is it scanning?
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I too, use Word 97 and Excel 97 (with winXP Pro) and they load virtually instantainious (word a couple of seconds, but it has always been like that), with or without loading a document or spread sheet at the time of opening.
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What CPU do you have? Does the avast! icon spin during the startup of Word/Excel?
Does it help if you pause the Standard Shield provider?
If it does - If you enable the "Show detailed info on performed action" for Standard Shield - what is it scanning?
While Excel and Word are loading, the CPU usage is little to non. Pausing Avast did not seem to have any effect. I had to stop the processing, logoff, and then log back on.
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Yesterday evening Opera closed again. But just once. Was this a incident? I don't know. ::)
I have noticed that it only happens when refreshing a page or closing a page in Opera.
Avast starts to scan like crazy and after about 10 seconds (while Avast is still scanning) Opera closes and Avast stops scanning.
One thing is for sure. It is Opera together with Avast under certain conditions causing this.
And to me (sofar) it looks like it has to do with the on-access scanner.
If I disable "scan created/modified files" it never happens.
I didn't had extensive logging set and I wasn't checking everything with filemon when it happend last night. :-\
But it looked as if a very small xml file created by Opera was causing this.
I will keep an eye on it and keep extensive logging, filemon and some other monitoring things running and will let you know if I got more information.
Too bad I can't reproduce this error manually :'(
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Doesn't Opera save open web pages when it closes, so they can be opened quickly when you Open Opera?
Could this have anything to do with the avast activity?
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Yes you can set Opera to remember where it stopped.
But Avast starts scanning and than Opera closes.
It looks to me that this option has nothing to do with it, since it also happens when I disable this option.
Only way that solves the 'spontanious' closings is to disable "scanning of new/modified files' or disabling the on-access scanner entirely.
Amd it only happens when I close a tab, refresh a window or open a new window.
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Hi: I am back using avast again, V4.5 (very recently downloaded)
3 times today my system crashed. I was using QuickPar to repair a large download.
& at the same time I was moving some small files from a DVDrom to my hardrive.
I went to the watercloset, came back, & MS was doing a repair scan of my HD.
I let things reboot, & started over with the Quickpar repair & the file moving,
piucked up my book, found my place where I left off, & boom, down she goes,
reboot, longer repair time. And again the third time, downloading files, & doing
a Quickpar repair.
From past observations, if this happens 2 more times I am dead in the water.
Please let me know what log files you need, & how to configure Avast 4 home to
produce those logs.
I am running a gigabyte MB with an athlonn 2400 all software updates.
768 meg of ram (3*256 meg, all tested fine) no memory shortage by my
memory monitor.
Thanks
First John