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Consumer Products => Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security (legacy Pro Antivirus, Internet Security, Premier) => Topic started by: insomni on January 22, 2005, 07:04:26 PM

Title: Avast disabled - possibly by malware(?)
Post by: insomni on January 22, 2005, 07:04:26 PM
I've been using Avast Home for about 2 years, I believe (and recommending and installing it for many people, btw), and have never had any problems with it. This past week I've been fighting off Istbar, which is the most virus-like adware I've ever seen. After discovering this malware and removing (or so I thought) it with Ad-Aware, I shut down my PC. The next time I started it up, Windows warned me that Avast was disabled. The icons showed up in the taskbar, but with the "crossed-out" symbol. Attempts to reenable protection did not work -- I got an error saying something about modules not being installed (sorry, I didn't write it down).

I then uninstalled completely and reinstalled (I went through this process normally and in safe mode, and both had the same results). The install seemed to proceed normally, but when I ran Avast it displayed the following error message:

Quote
Unknown Error
Storage cannot be created for the "Splash" task.

If I remember correctly, the registration code window then appeared. I entered my code and got the following two errors:

Quote
Configuration is not loaded properly. (Error: dbsCreateObject)

Quote
Program cannot save parameters to the storage! (Error: dbsCreateObject)

After this, Avast was in the same condition as prior to uninstalling and reinstalling: disabled and unable to be reenabled!

I also used the downloadable uninstall tool to make sure Avast was completely uninstalled prior to reinstall, but that didn't make any difference.

It may be a coincidence that Istbar showed up about the same time Avast stopped working, but I wanted to include that in case it's related. I did finally get rid of Istbar using SpyBot.

Does anyone know what might be happening here and how I can get Avast working again? I had to install another antivirus program in the meantime, but I would much rather be using Avast.

Thanks!
Title: Re: Avast disabled - possibly by malware(?)
Post by: DavidR on January 22, 2005, 07:53:32 PM
I would recommend that you get RejZor's avast! External Control program (http://freeweb.siol.net/razor256/downloads/avast_external_control.zip) it has many tweaks for avast! try changing the Database storage method from ODBC to XML.

Or look in Technical's  Understanding avast4.ini file (http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=1647.0) for manual edit of avast4.ini

I think that HiJackThis is the best way to resolve the 1stbar issue, visit Eddy's Website (http://members.home.nl/edeijl/) click the "HiJackThis Section" and also the "Malware removal instructions and applications" section, and follow the directions there and get back to us if you need more help....
Title: Re: Avast disabled - possibly by malware(?)
Post by: insomni on January 25, 2005, 03:45:10 AM
Thanks, David. Your recommendation to change the database storage method did the trick! I'm still not sure why this happened in the first place, but at least avast! is working again. Do you think something might have gotten corrupted? Thanks again.
Title: Re: Avast disabled - possibly by malware(?)
Post by: DavidR on January 25, 2005, 01:13:32 PM
Happy to have helped and thank you for letting us know what resolved the problem, that helps others browsing/searching the forums for a solution to a similar problem.

During the two years that you have been using avast other things are also changing on your system, not least OS updates, additional programs added, etc. sometimes there can be issues. Many times we never find out the true cause, but often members of these forums recognise a symptom and offer a suggestion that worked for others.
Title: Re: Avast disabled - possibly by malware(?)
Post by: Actarus on January 29, 2005, 05:08:59 PM
Thanks guys !

THat will just make my day !!  I have the exavt same problem as insomni.  So I'll try removing lstbar with spybot since already installed and proceed with hijackthis if first option is not succesful.

I'll keep you updated on the out come  ;)
Title: Re: Avast disabled - possibly by malware(?)
Post by: Actarus on January 29, 2005, 07:19:37 PM
Ok ... here's what I've done to solve my problem.

1st I scanned with spybot but nothing regarding that lstbar thing came out from the scan.

2nd I scanned  with ad aware, found 14 spyware on my system and many other negligeable objects.  I deleted all of them but did'nt solved the problem.

3rd I used the db converter and that's what did the trick for me anyway !

Thaks for the support guys !!  ;D