Hello Rekrul, it seems you're using Avast Free v18 on XP/Vista machine right?
Yes. I know it's unsupported, but for now it's what I have. I don't want to nuke a (mostly) working system and install a later Windows from scratch (not that I have a copy of a later Windows version) without something to fall back on. I don't really have the money to buy a new system, and to be honest, at this point, I don't like any of my options. I hate that Win10/11 has forced updates and spyware. I'd be (mostly) fine with forced
security updates, but they also force you to accept "feature" updates that add or remove things. I'm
NOT OK with that. I was eying Win7, as I mostly just surf the net and run emulators, but even some emulator authors are dropping support for Win7/8.
I've considered Linux, but I know virtually nothing about it, other than a few CLI commands I've used that were ported to Windows. And I have a bunch of Windows Batch scripts I've written to automate some stuff that I do. I wouldn't know how to port them to Linux without learning a whole new scripting language.
There is a topic for v18 and some members posted similar situation there.
Thanks. I think I may have even posted in that topic a few years ago.
As far as I know, there is no stable way to re-register v18 Avast on XP/Vista environment.
The only way to dismiss these "expiring" messages are clean reinstall of Avast, as written there below.
It would be nice if Avast would publish a non-expiring license for V18.
After testing here I cannot find a stable way to re-register nor remove red X for expired Avast 18.
Clean reinstall seems to be a only stable option, while Avast cannot get new license it works (i.e. no red X) without license except for short period of time after boot.
Maybe I'll wait until it expires and then see if it still downloads defs. If so, I don't care about it having a red X as long as it doesn't keep bugging me to renew the license.
BTW, you can close these "no X" window by taskmgr; just choose "Avast Free Antivirus" from Task-manager and click "End task".
I tried that and it didn't work. In fact I've found that it is impossible to kill
ANY running Avast instance with Task Manager, or the freeware Process Explorer (which probably just the exact same thing as Task Manager internally.
BTW, I was mistaken about not being able to shut down. I made a shut down script that deletes some temp files, backs up another file and then issues the shutdown command. That's what I tried to use and it didn't work. The next time, I used the Windows GUI shutdown option and
that worked.
I still get a red "x" on taskbar icon, but avast still gets def updates and seems to be running, despite the expired licence.
I'll see what mine does I actually have 18.8.xxx installed, as it was the last version for XP.
We are told licence of free versions should not expire, but that does no seem the case with Avast Free Antivirus v18.
I've only ever used Avast Free and I've
always had to re-register it every single year. What a company says and what happens in reality are often two different things.
Funny story: Google claims that if you have no Google software installed on your system, the Google Updater will uninstall itself. A few years ago, while re-installing Avast to fix a problem, upon rebooting, I failed to notice that the Avast installer had re-checked the option to install Chrome. Of course they put the "option" down in the corner of the window. I should have been paying more attention, but I didn't think it would come up again, since I'd already told it
NOT to install Chrome. Anyway, it installed the Google Updater, then tried to download Chrome, but was blocked by my firewall. Problem averted, I figured.
Then about a month later, I was looking in Task Manager and saw Google Updater running. And of course there was no uninstall option ("It's automatic!"), and no tool to clean it off your system. I wasn't about to install Chrome just to uninstall it and see if the Updater went away. So I stopped the service, killed the task and deleted the files. Then I went in and deleted the 300+ entries it barfed into the registry. After removing everything Google, I was left with two entries that Windows wouldn't let me delete. I think they eventually disappeared on their own.
So it installed Google Updater without my permission, hid itself, stayed running on my system, and didn't provide a way to remove it. That's pretty much the definition of malware. I decided then and there that I would
NEVER install any software associated with Google.
I suggest you post any further questions or observations in the Windows XP/Vista section here: https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=220639.0
Thanks. I'll post if mine still works after it expires.
To be honest, I liked Avast when I first installed it many years ago, but with every update, I liked it less and less. I'm only still using it because I don't know of any other (good) options for XP. I hate that they use a non-standard window for the GUI. I can't count the number of times I've opened the GUI, then accidentally closed the browser behind it because I keep getting tricked into thinking that close box is for Avast I use a relatively small screen size, and the Avast GUI almost perfectly fits within the borders of a web browser. I also hate that scanning small files doesn't usually produce a report unless it finds a problem. That and the GUI seems kind of unresponsive at times. Sometimes I click something and it has to think about it for a second or two.
