Author Topic: Vista firewall + Avast updates  (Read 23549 times)

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Offline Confused Computer User

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Re: Vista firewall + Avast updates
« Reply #30 on: April 09, 2009, 06:06:10 AM »
Here are two links you might want to look at.

The first is another forum discussion, really short.
http://www.vistax64.com/system-security/86099-vista-firewall-control-standalone-app.html

The second is another forum discussion but gives some pointers on how to figure out the Windows Built in FireWall.
http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/92748-windows-firewall-advanced-security.html
Computer Systems:

Intel Pentium 4 641 / 2GB RAM / Vista Home Basic SP2 / avast! 5.0 Home / SAS Free / MBAM Free / Windows Defender / Windows Firewall / Spyware Blaster/ Secunia PSI / Firefox 3.6 / Opera 10.5

Core2Duo T8300 / 4GB RAM / Vista Home Premium SP2 (32 bit version) / Same Software.

YoKenny

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Re: Vista firewall + Avast updates
« Reply #31 on: April 09, 2009, 06:27:41 AM »
When I looked at Vista's native firewall I do not see any entries for avast! so if you have all outbound blocked then avast! can not communicate properly because it has applications that need to communicate outbound at one time or another.  You could figure out what the applications are by trial and error or Vista Firewall Control Free will alert you easily what they are and you can choose to Enable/Deny All the time or One time only.

I'm not a fan of software firewalls as I have written about their being redundant when one is behind a hardware firewall that is included in most high speed Internet modems or are knowledgeable about what is running on their system and what should be communicating outbound so when I saw Vista Firewall Control Free I decided to investigate and saw how easy it was to use and only takes a little over 2MB to run so I decided to keep it.

You may be interested in watching what Bruce Harrison one of the developers of Malwarebytes MBAM has to say about software firewalls that lead me to my way of thinking:
http://www.revver.com/video/1118865/malwarebytes-developer-interview <== software firewall discussion starts about 8 minutes into the video.
« Last Edit: April 09, 2009, 06:31:25 AM by YoKenny »

Malachy

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Re: Vista firewall + Avast updates
« Reply #32 on: June 26, 2009, 05:28:10 AM »
I know this is an old thread, but I just had this problem and wanted to post my solution in case anyone is still having this problem.  Here is how I was able to resolve it...with the understanding that I am using Vista x64 SP1 with Windows Firewall with Advanced Security with outbound connections blocked.  I was having two problems after I installed Avast!: I could not update avast; and I could not browse the web.

To resolve these issues, you need to add two outbound rules:
1.  Add avast.setup.  For me the path is: "%ProgramFiles%\Alwil Software\Avast4\Setup\avast.setup"
2.  Add ashWebSv.exe.  For me the path is: "%ProgramFiles%\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashWebSv.exe"
Regarding number two, I am guessing (and this is just a guess here) that all web communications in or out (over ports 80, 443, 8080, etc...) pass through the Avast Web Shield...like a proxy.  So if ashWebSv.exe is blocked then the result is like blocking your web clients (firefox, IE, etc...)

I hope this solution works for you...it worked for me.





Offline Lisandro

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Re: Vista firewall + Avast updates
« Reply #33 on: June 26, 2009, 02:18:21 PM »
Thanks for reporting.
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