I have been using Avast free edition for years. All of a sudden (with the update just before the newest one) my windows XP SP3 machine stopped loading the Avast mail shield with windows. I am using Thunderbird mail client and have been for years. Avast loads up just fine, but once it is done updating itself, the mail shield turns off. At every boot I must manually turn the mail shield on. It turns on without issue. But, it is annoying to have to do this every time I start my computer when I never had to do it before. I did have it fixed a while back (I have NO idea how I did it. I think I uninstalled and reinstalled the mail shield component several times.) But, with the program update that came along just a couple days ago, I am right back to having to manually turn the mail shield on. Not a major problem, but it is NOT supposed to work this way. It always worked flawlessly in the past. Please do not tell me to uninstall and reinstall. I have done that a cazillion times with no joy. I have NO other anti virus or anti malware programs running. Only Avast. I have also tried the "repair" Avast option a few hundred times with no joy. Anyone? Anything?