support.avast.com Down? Avast on Vista64 problem...

[soundguy72]

Avast Pro on my Vista-64 machine is stuck at 99% done, 16 hours into a scan of a 250GB hard drive.  When I try to "stop" it, it pauses instead.  Can't start avast control panel either.

This is a new install on a new machine, schedule handled by WHS.  On-access works fine, all other installs of Avast on WinXP boxes work fine.  Can't connect to http://support.avast.com... Firefox and IE both load a blank page and proclaim themselves done.

[DavidR]

It is up now.

I don't know if this was a temporary thing at the time you tried to connect or something more sinister like a HOSTS file blocking avast.com, but that too should also block the forums.

What type of scan were you doing, Thorough, with archives, etc. ?

With it at 99% done, is the avast 'a' icon still rotating ?
What folder has it stopped in, last scanned file, reported, etc. and are there any large files, .avi files, etc. ?

What CPU% is being used in Task Manager for avast processes, they begin with asw or ash ?

I don't have any experience of the WHS version, but I wouldn't have though installing from there would have this kind of impact.

[soundguy72]

It is up now.

I don't know if this was a temporary thing at the time you tried to connect or something more sinister like a HOSTS file blocking avast.com, but that too should also block the forums.

Strange, my laptop still loads a blank page in both IE and FFox, but another computer in the house gets the login page fine.

What type of scan were you doing, Thorough, with archives, etc. ?

It was created from WHS, and I'm away from that system right now, but the session log reports that it was "scan with content file type recognition" for  infectable files on all hard disks.  There's one drive currently, 250GB.

With it at 99% done, is the avast 'a' icon still rotating ?

Don't recall... but I think so.  This has happened the past two nights, so I expect it to happen again tonight.  If it does, I'll make note.  I am intrigued by the logs showing a run-time of just under 2 hours (and scheduled to start at 2am)... I stopped it via reboot 14 hours later at 4pm.

What CPU% is being used in Task Manager for avast processes, they begin with asw or ash ?

I don't recall, but it wasn't significant.  The machine was still very usable, and I usually run Task Man minimized to get a CPU Load Meter, and it was normal.

Thanks!  If it happens again tonight, I'll get you the rest of the info.  It almost appears to me that it's not exiting cleanly.

[soundguy72]

Stuck at 99% complete again... Task Manager reports ALL ash/asw processes to be using 00% CPU...  ashDisp.exe, ashMaiSv.exe, ashServ.exe, ashWebSv.exe and aswUpdSv.exe  Hard drive activity light is not flashing such that it would indicate a virus scan is going on...

No, the "a" icon is not rotating, but the "play" triangle is pulsing to indicate a scheduled scan is running.

[DavidR]

I take it there was nothing in the HOSTS file for 127.0.0.1 avast.com (or you would get the same blank screen here, if using the same system) ?

Well I don't used WHS nor the Windows Task Manager so I don't speak from any experience here, but as you say the log shows a scan duration of 2 hours.

When the next scan ran and appears to hang at 99% the avast icon isn't rotating, there is zero CPU activity, so I don't know if that is just not closing the WHS scan Task (I assume the log would also show a 2 hour scan duration).

I will have to hope one of the Alwil team picks up on this.