Features

[DavidGGG]

Hello, I have a few small questions about Avast! Home Edition for which I couldn't find the answers anywhere:
1. Is the "windows registry" guarded in any way? How then?
2. Is the "hosts file" guarded in any way? How?
3. Can real time protection easily be disabled without having to uninstall Avast?

That's all! (The majority of the questions I managed to find the answers to myself.)
Best regards,
David Strand, Sweden

[Vlk]

The answer to all these three questions is negative (i.e. avast doesn't do anything like that), at least in the current version. This should change in version 5.

Cheers
Vlk

[DavidR]

Hello, I have a few small questions about Avast! Home Edition for which I couldn't find the answers anywhere:
<snip>
3. Can real time protection easily be disabled without having to uninstall Avast?
<snip>

What is it you are trying to achieve with this ?

Providers can be paused or terminated and all on-access protection can also be disabled by the user. Right click the avast 'a' icon and select Stop On-Access Protection (to resume Start On-Access Protection) or you can be more selective using 'Pause Provider' and select which one you wish to pause.

However the reason you want to do this is probably more important than how to do it ?

[Kaitlyn]

You can easily get protection for the hosts file if you download Spyware Blaster.

[DavidGGG]

Hi! Thanks for the replies, and quick too!

I interpret it as it IS possible to temporarily disable real time scanning then. This is a good feature e g when installing new software or when having problems with AV!

Can you stand one more question? Here it goes:
I've read Avast has no rootkit scan but I also read it does a "boot time scan". Does it check for rootkits during the boot time scan?

Thanks!

PS I know I can add this feature as well as hosts file guard with additional programs. I'm comparing features for free AVs that's why I ask. Will publish this probably at wilderssecurity.com forums and maybe later at wikipedia.

[Lisandro]

This is a good feature e g when installing new software or when having problems with AV!

No, sure it's not. None good software requires to disable the AV, on contrary, if the software won't conflict with the AV,  the AV shouldn't be disabled in any case. Which programs are you referring to? I have none installed with avast disabled...

I've read Avast has no rootkit scan but I also read it does a "boot time scan". Does it check for rootkits during the boot time scan?

No, it does not scan for rootkit even in boot time.

[DavidR]

There really shouldn't be any reason to disable your anti-virus when installing new programs, think about it, this is probably the time when you want it running.

I don't understand what these so called problems might be.

avast doesn't specifically have a rootkit detection module but some of the files that initiate the rootkit might well be detected before it gets established. Once established they are hard to detect by normal means, again any boot-time scan would be signature based and any rootkit may not be active at that point.

[DavidGGG]

Thanks for the replies guys, I'm all set now. 

Regarding need to disable AV: I wouldn't install, e g, a firewall without disabling AV first. And also, I believe firewalls and AVs due to the complexity and digging deep into the PC may well actually cause trouble from time to time, and in those situations, I really want to be able to disable it for a while. Disabling an AV for long periods of time I don't think is a risk as long as you don't do stuff like browse or introduce new files into the PC while the AV is off. (Disabling a firewall might be a risk even if only for a short duration though.)

[Lisandro]

Regarding need to disable AV: I wouldn't install, e g, a firewall without disabling AV first.

Yes I will. With avast, I will install the firewall with it (avast) running.

And also, I believe firewalls and AVs due to the complexity and digging deep into the PC may well actually cause trouble from time to time, and in those situations, I really want to be able to disable it for a while. Disabling an AV for long periods of time I don't think is a risk as long as you don't do stuff like browse or introduce new files into the PC while the AV is off. (Disabling a firewall might be a risk even if only for a short duration though.)

Indeed, firewall could bring trouble in suites (all-in-one-programs) but not with a standalone antivirus.

[DavidR]

I have just done a clean reinstall (upgrade) of my firewall and I didn't disable avast. No matter how complex or digging deep it might be if your firewall isn't doing anything illegal then your AV shouldn't have any issues; after all it is looking for infected files and not any registry hooks it might be setting to monitor anti-leak, program or component control activity.