Question about configuring avast! for uTorrent/other programs in general

[Invader Deejay]

I'm trying out avast! Home edition 4 after getting some positive reviews from a friend.  And so far, I am liking it, a lot better than my other antivirus.  I just have a couple of quick questions.

I use uTorrent a lot, and I was wondering what kind of configuration of avast! that I would need.  I already have port forwarding set up properly, but ever since I installed avast!, when I go to the uTorrent link that tests if the port is open, I keep getting an error saying that it is not.  I don't have any other firewalls like ZoneAlarm or Comodo, I unchecked uTorrent from the P2P Shield, and I've disabled the Windows Vista firewall, but I still get the same thing.

I've looked through the forums and the program itself, and I can't seem to find anything saying whether avast! even has a firewall, or a way to add uTorrent, or the forwarded port I am using to any exception list.  Could someone please help me with this?  Also, would the process for doing this be the same for any other programs or games that I install?

I'm running Windows Vista Ultimate x32 with Service Pack 1, and I don't have any other firewalls or antimalware programs installed except avast! and Windows Defender/Firewall which come default with Vista.  And this is a fresh install, I had to format last night for an unrelated issue.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[Eddy]

Just put a checkmark in front of uTorrent in the P2P provider and avast will scan the files.
That is all there is to it.
Since you have forwarded a port, I take it that you have a router.
Many routers nowadays have a firewall build in and make ports look like closed (stealth).
I do not see any reason to worry.
Everything looks like it should to me.

[Invader Deejay]

I heard that enabling the P2P scan for uTorrent causes problems with uTorrent because of the way it works, has that been fixed?  I've seen lots of forum posts saying the same thing...

I went into my router and changed the port I was forwarding, and now it seems to be working fine.  I don't know why it wasn't working right before considering I've been using that port for awhile, but oh well...

Just to make sure I understand, avast! doesn't include a firewall right?  So I should use the Windows firewall, or another one?

Thanks for the help

[alanrf]

You are quite right.  avast deliberately unchecked the utorrent box in the P2P provider because too mant avast users were experiencing performance problems with avast scanning the large number of write operations performed by utorrent as part of the way it works.  This was largely due to the logging that goes on in utorrent and (at least currently) there is no way of overriding the scanning of those file operations in avast. 

avast is not a firewall. 

The avast team is developing a firewall presently but the availability of that and how it will be deployed has not been announced.  So you should be using a separate firewall capability along with avast.   

[zkittyz]

hi so good

[Eddy]

Best is to use a hardware firewall. Intruders should be stopped BEFORE they reach a system, not while they are already on it.