Avast Online Security

[Kesetyan]

Hi,

I have been experiencing a minor irritation with Firefox on my XP Pro SP3 desktop where the bookmark toolbar loses its icons.  I can get the icons back by closing and then re-opening the toolbar but cannot find a permanent solution.  On top of this (but probably not directly connected) my Avast Online Security icon has disappeared from the toolbar, I get no green ticks etc. on pages when I search for websites and the AOS plugin is no longer listed in Firefox.

I did reinstall Firefox when I was trying to resolve the bookmark toolbar issue so perhaps this is the cause of the AOS problem.  I know some havehad problems with AOS and have had to disable it but I have not had problems and have found it useful - is there a way I can get it back? 

I would be grateful for any advice, thank you.

[CraigB]

Try using the Add Remove Programs/Change option, first uninstall Browser Protection then reboot and re-install.

[Kesetyan]

Hi Craig,

Thanks for your quick response.

I tried what you suggested but may have not done everything correctly as odd things happened to my Avast interface afterwards.  Firefox did recognize the Avast plugin and seemingly installed it as it reappeared in the Firefox extensions list.  However the icon did not reappear on the taskbar and the green ticks did not reappear on the search pages.  More worryingly, in Avast 'Settings', Avast Account status showed as disconnected and in the 'Active Protection' area everything had disappeared.

I tried a repair install but that did not help so I used a recent backup image of my system drive to return to my previous position.  Other than the issue with Firefox, Avast is working normally again and has updated correctly. 

As the issue with Firefox is a minor irritation, I can live with it for the time being so there is no immediate panic.  It is possible that I did not carry out the 'Add/Remove Programs' routine entirely correctly so I will explain what I did:
I opened 'Add or Remove Programs' items in the Control Panel;
navigated to Avast and clicked the 'change/remove programs' button;
clicked the 'change' button and then 'continue';
on the 'Which componants do you want to install?' page, I unticked everything under 'Shields', and 'Language' and everything bar 'Browser Protection' under 'Tools' before continuing.
I thought that 'Browser Protection' would then be uninstalled so I could do a fresh installation of it.  Is this where I went wrong as the installation appeared to go ahead straight away?  Had unticking the other boxes caused the loss of the A'ctive Protection' items?

I would be grateful if you could give a step by step guide to using the 'Add Remove Programs/Change' option for Avast as I have appeared to have misconstrued what you meant.  Sorry to be a nuisance and a bit dim about this.

[CraigB]

You only needed to untick the Browser Protection box then reboot and go back to change/remove programs and re-tick the browser protection to re-install the feature - unticking the other 3 main shields in the left column was where you went wrong ( don't touch them )  other features under tools is personal preference and don't untick your language.

[Kesetyan]

Hi Craig,

Thanks for your helpful reply.

I have now done what you have suggested - there has been a little progress but no final resolution to the the problem.  This is what has happened:

After running 'Add or Remove Programs', removing the Avast Browser Protection', rebooting the system, installing Avast Browser Protection, rebooting and opening Firefox, Firefox recognized the extension and installed it.  It then appeared in the extensions list as enabled but the Avast icon did not appear on the toolbar.  Choosing the option to customize the toolbar, there was an Avast Browser Protection icon available but it was grey - nevertheless I dragged it to the toolbar but it remains grey and is not fully functionable.  If I click it, a small window opens but it always says 'Unknown Site'.

The problem would seem to be with Firefox and appeared after the update to version 29 and has remained with version 29.1.  I use the same version of Firefox in my Windows 7 desktop and there is no problem.  I have disabled the only additional Firefox extension I have on my XP system (Saved Password Editor 2.7.2) to see if that is causing a conflict.  If that is the case, I will report back.

Thanks for your time.

[Kesetyan]

Hi Craig,

This is to give you an update of the situation:  I am pleased to say that the issue is now resolved and was due to corruption within Firefox possibly caused by an update not functioning completely correctly.

To solve the issue, I first uninstalled the Avast Browser Protection, and then did a complete uninstallation of Firefox including all personal settings (I used Revo Uninstaller for this to get rid of related registry remnants that were left behind by the Firefox uninstaller).   Fortunately I had a backup of my Firefox profile created some time before the problem first occurred which meant I was able to reinstate most of my required bookmarks at once with only a minimum of fiddling to get back to my position immediately before the Firefox problem.  I then reinstalled the Avast Browser Protection extension successfully.

Thanks for your help.  Although it did not provide an immediate solution, it did enable me to confirm Firefox itself was the problem and after sorting Firefox out, your advice was very useful.  Happily we can now say that the issue is resolved.

Best regards, Kes.

[CraigB]

Glad you worked it out