Problem with ACS495 interface

[dschwagler]

I recently installed avast! 4 home edition. It works extremely well with one exception. It locks out the use of my Altec Lansing ACS495 interface and all my wave files. It also prevents me from listening from any music CDs on my computer. I have uninstalled avast! and everything wors normally again. Any help would be appreciated as I do like your program.

[Lisandro]

It also prevents me from listening from any music CDs on my computer.

What do you mean? The files cannot be reached, the CD spins but nothing happens...  

I have uninstalled avast! and everything wors normally again.

Did you try only 'disabling' some avast! providers and see which one is the cause of this strange behavior? I can listen music without any trouble and, of course, read/write CD as well  

[dschwagler]

I have not tried disabling certain items in avast! to see if one area is causing the problem. I will do that. Here is what happens, all my wave files are present in my media folder but they cannot be opened or tested, I get a message that the file is not present or bad. If I put a cd in one of my drives the drive sees it as an audio cd in MY COMPUTER but my multimedia player says there is no cd present. The program appears to interfere with my audio programs, CD PLAYER, VOLUME CONTROL and ACS SPEAKER MANAGEMENT.

Thanks
Dave

[Lisandro]

I suggest two things:

1. Run avast! Cleaner (it's a standalone program to correct Registry keys and other messes done by viruses). I'm not sure it can handle your specific kind of infection/trouble but there is a chance of it.

2. Try to install/repair your Media programs (WMP or your own). See if you can restore your file assotiations with it.

[dschwagler]

Tried disabling portions of avast!, still will not let me access my audio files. Installed different audio files and they will not work either. My cd burner and my zip drive works but my audio software is not accessible. When I open my ACS495 speaker management program it tells me there is no device connected. I have uninstalled my drivers for this and reinstalled and still have the same problem.

I guess we'll continue to try things.

Thanks
Dave

[igor]

That's really strange... conflict with audio drivers/tools?  
What operating system are you using? Can you tell us a little more about this ACS495 thing? What exactly is it, how is it connected, ...

[dschwagler]

The ACS495 is an Altec Lansing speaker system. Connected via a usb port. They use their own drivers and management software to manage volume and ballance for the system. With avast! installed and when I open up the window for the ACS495 management all settings are blanked out and not accessible. I am using Win 98. Hope this helps some.

Thanks

[Lisandro]

It's very difficult to me to help you... If I can make the last suggestion/question, do you have enough free RAM to run all the open applications? Grayed commands, sometimes, regards to a leak of memory.  

[igor]

I am afraid this will be quite hard to solve... since we don't have the system to check.

Let's make a little experiment... start regedit, go to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunServices
select it and export the selected branch (for backup purposes). Now, select the value avast! on the right side and delete it.
Then, do the same for the key Run (instead of RunServices) and its value ashMaiSv (if present).

This should disable avast! completely. So, after you restart your computer, avast! will not be loaded.
Now, you can check if your speaker system is working properly. If yes, go to the avast! installation folder and run ashServ.exe. This will start avast!. Now, the speaker system should stop working... is it correct?

To put avast! registry entries to the original state, you can simply import the two files you have exported at the start.


The second thing you can try it renaming the file aswmon.vxd in the avast! installation folder to some other name (instead of removing, you can also move it anywhere else). This will completely disable the Standard Shield provider (that is the one most likely to cause the conflict - if there really is any conflict). After reboot, Standard Shield will not be loaded. Does your speaker system work in this case?

[dschwagler]

I thank you for all your help and will get back with more information later. I have fdisk'ed and reformatted my hard drive because of other issues and some of those may have been causing the problem. Once I get everything back to normal I will reinstall avast! and try again. Until then I am accessing the internet from another computer which I just installed avast! on and it works perfectly. Will check back later.

 

[Lisandro]

Happy with you now  

[dschwagler]

OK, back up and running now. Tried to install avast! on a clean computer running Win98 SE, but when it reboots the two blue balls do not show up in the system tray and when I open up the program to look at the settings it runs very slow. I enter my registration number and try to update it and it says the registration number is not valid. Any ideas?

Thanks

[igor]

Do you have the system clock set correctly?

[dschwagler]

 :)That was it. I had the year wrong.

Thanks
Dave