Author Topic: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]  (Read 36236 times)

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Offline alanb

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #60 on: November 12, 2005, 08:16:21 PM »
Try setting the following (98SE is notoriously bad in these areas):
Settings -> Control Panel -> Power Management:-

   System Standby:  Never
   Turn off Monitor: Never
   Turn off Harddisks:  Never

HTH

Offline Lisandro

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #61 on: November 12, 2005, 08:34:36 PM »
and gracefulrpcshutdown=1
Monkeycustard, did you follow Startfighter suggestion and added this line into avast4.ini file settings?
Click Settings in my signature and search for section [AAVM]
http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=1647.msg10268#msg10268
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Starfighter

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #62 on: November 14, 2005, 01:32:42 AM »
Monkeycustard,  (I like that name!!!!)

Ahh, I thought (silly me) that you were running plain ol' Windows 98 (no SE).  Well, I know that on my other computer (has Win 98SE and dual boot with XP) there is an important update to Win98SE which is known as the shut-down patch (available on Microsoft's update website).  It's imparative to get that patch in order for avast! to shut-down properly -- in conjunction with the GracefulRpcShutidown=1 line added under the [AAVM] section of the avast data file known  as: avast4.ini
It is located in the following path:
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\DATA

I know for sure, based on my personal experiences  that avast! should work perfectly fine either with Windows 98 and 98SE.  If it doesn't then there must be something else wrong with your system causing it to hang on shut-down.




monkeycustard

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #63 on: November 25, 2005, 09:33:48 PM »
Hi guys

Many thanks for the advise it's greatly appreciated.


Try setting the following (98SE is notoriously bad in these areas):
Settings -> Control Panel -> Power Management:-

 System Standby: Never
 Turn off Monitor: Never
 Turn off Harddisks: Never

HTH

This didn't work I'm afraid.




there is an important update to Win98SE which is known as the shut-down patch (available on Microsoft's update website). It's imparative to get that patch in order for avast! to shut-down properly -- in conjunction with the GracefulRpcShutidown=1 line added under the [AAVM] section of the avast data file known as: avast4.ini


Tried the patch and the GracefulRpcShutidown=1 line but also did not work.

I've since reinstalled windows (too much free time on my hands). The first thing I reinstalled after that was Avast and the restart problem was still there. 



disable fast shutdown (if you haven't already).
To do so



The disable fast shutdown option is there in SE but disappears after the patch is downloaded.  Since the reinstall the AAVM section has disappeared from the ini file. ???


 ???

Offline Lisandro

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #64 on: November 25, 2005, 10:04:30 PM »
Since the reinstall the AAVM section has disappeared from the ini file. ???
Are you sure? All section is not there? Of just the line you've added? Of course, that line is not there by default and should be added in each new install (not upgraded or updated).
But, like we can see, this did not solve you're trouble... sorry...
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monkeycustard

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #65 on: November 26, 2005, 01:12:44 AM »
Are you sure? All section is not there?

Def not there. I can cut and paste it here if you are curious

Offline Lisandro

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #66 on: November 26, 2005, 01:57:43 AM »
Def not there. I can cut and paste it here if you are curious
No... I believe you...
I just can't imagine avast4.ini file without [AAVM] section... Maybe for me it's created soon as I always change the default settings of this section...
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YSB

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #67 on: December 12, 2005, 09:11:01 AM »
Has anything changed in the latest Avast update? Since my last post on April 7 things have been pretty good. Since the last update of Avast trouble seems to have come back. At the same time as the shutdown problem came back I've also discovered that Freecell doesn't work anymore and Winfax keeps crashing.  This all seems to have started right after the last program update. I want to try un-installing Avast and seeing what happens but I haven't had time to do that yet. Any ideas?

Thanks.

YSB

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #68 on: December 12, 2005, 09:44:25 AM »
Ok, I just confirmed it. I un-installed Avast and Freecell came back to life. Then I re-installed Avast and Freecell stopped working. All this just started with the latest release of Avast.  I can't test the other issues since they are intermittent and it would take a few days to test for them.

I once read on MS's KB that some security programs will crash programs with small stack sizes and Freecell for Win 98 was compiled with a small stack. MS's only solution was essentially to reverse compile Freecell using Visual C++ and recompile it with a larger stack (or do some other type of binary edit to increase the stack size post-compile. I don't remember exactly). The problem is, it seems that Freecell isn't the only program with this issue as several other programs are crashing as well that didn't crash before and there's no edit given for those other programs.

In short, while the last version of Avast worked fine with Win 98, the latest version seems to be making trouble.

Any ideas on this one?

Thanks!
« Last Edit: December 12, 2005, 09:46:04 AM by YSB »

Offline igor

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #69 on: December 12, 2005, 10:06:45 AM »
Sorry, but I'm quite sure there were no changes to Win9x resident protection recently (or even in the last months)...  ???

YSB

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #70 on: December 13, 2005, 12:22:10 AM »
I don't know where the change was or wasn't but things worked fine before the last release and now they don't. Un-installing Avast cures the problem and re-installing brings it back. Some change must have been made that is having an indirect effect on the system.

Any ideas at all?

Thanks.

YSB

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #71 on: December 13, 2005, 12:31:22 AM »
I went looking for that article on the MS KB and I found it. I don't kow if it means anything to you or not but here it is.

Offline Lisandro

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #72 on: December 13, 2005, 01:33:57 AM »
Did you install any Microsoft update lately?
Did you install or uninstall any other security software (firewall, antispyware, Spy++)?
Can you boot in Safe Mode (pressing F8 while booting)?
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YSB

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #73 on: December 14, 2005, 07:48:57 AM »
Did you install any Microsoft update lately?

No.

Quote
Did you install or uninstall any other security software (firewall, antispyware, Spy++)?

I did recently install an antispyware app that I didn't like and promptly un-installed it. For the life of me I can't remember which one it was. I just went through a long list of names and it's not coming back to me. It is no longer on the system (unless it left something behind when it was un-installed) and it was not on the system when I did the experiment of un-installing and then re-installing Avast.

Quote
Can you boot in Safe Mode (pressing F8 while booting)?

Yes



Thanks for your reply.

Offline Lisandro

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Re: Avast! causes system crash [Win98]
« Reply #74 on: December 14, 2005, 11:52:10 AM »
Quote
Can you boot in Safe Mode (pressing F8 while booting)?
Yes
Well, maybe you can boot in Safe Mode and uninstall avast from Control Panel and then try to boot as usual.
You can run Avast Uninstall for complete uninstallation and boot.
Maybe a Registry cleaner tool could help you on getting rid of trash left behind from that antispyware application...
Which programs are automatically started at boot time? Do you know how to get this info? (http://www.mlin.net/StartupCPL.shtml)
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