Author Topic: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working  (Read 98974 times)

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info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #90 on: July 22, 2008, 10:43:07 PM »
Just a note to report that I lost my connection after a run time of *exactly* 4 hours.  I stopped On-access protection but was unable to re-connect with either Firefox or Internet Explorer.  After looking around to see if I could re-establish the connection, I glanced at the timer in the avast! panel mentioned below and it read 4:02:xx.

Is it true that avast! updates every four hours (I had the auto-update turned on)? 

I had right clicked the avast! icon/On-Access Protection Control/Web Shield/Details and was watching the time and number of pages scanned when suddenly I lost the connection in a Starbucks.  It was slightly different this time in that disabling/enabling avast! did not re-establish my connection and Firefox didn't hang as it sometimes does, so it may just have been one of those strange co-incidences; but, I wanted to mention it in case any else notices the same behavior.  Windows was unable to repair the connection for me.

I did not do the dump on this occasion because I suspect that it may have been a fluke and I don't want to waste people's time, I'll run again watching carefully but, after rebooting, I was immediately able to log-on again.

miscreant

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #91 on: July 22, 2008, 10:50:51 PM »
Just a note to report that I lost my connection after a run time of *exactly* 4 hours.  I stopped On-access protection but was unable to re-connect with either Firefox or Internet Explorer.  After looking around to see if I could re-establish the connection, I glanced at the timer in the avast! panel mentioned below and it read 4:02:xx.

Is it true that avast! updates every four hours (I had the auto-update turned on)? 

I had right clicked the avast! icon/On-Access Protection Control/Web Shield/Details and was watching the time and number of pages scanned when suddenly I lost the connection in a Starbucks.  It was slightly different this time in that disabling/enabling avast! did not re-establish my connection and Firefox didn't hang as it sometimes does, so it may just have been one of those strange co-incidences; but, I wanted to mention it in case any else notices the same behavior.  Windows was unable to repair the connection for me.

I did not do the dump on this occasion because I suspect that it may have been a fluke and I don't want to waste people's time, I'll run again watching carefully but, after rebooting, I was immediately able to log-on again.

Yes by default it updates every 4 hours.

info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #92 on: July 23, 2008, 12:10:30 AM »
Thanks miscreant.

info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #93 on: July 23, 2008, 03:05:15 AM »
Well, my system has been running for 4:47 minutes and is still connecting to the net.  However, I just turned it on after about two hours in hibernate so I don't know if I will be able to provide any meaningful data.  I've disabled the avast! updates but I've done it before and the problem has persisted.  I'm just waiting for a re-occurrence to upload the dump now.

fooldog01

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #94 on: July 23, 2008, 05:51:39 AM »
Yikes! I have been busy tinkering with other stuff for a while and just putting this Avast issue on the backburner. I finally decided to report back and the thread is at almost 100 posts?! So I see I am definitely not alone...

Anyway, the problem persists. Every single time I start the computer up and begin browsing the web, it takes all of about 10 minutes for the browser to stop working, regardless of whether it is Firefox or IE7. As soon as I stop the Web Shield the browsers begin functioning perfectly again. Shutting down Web Shield seems to be the only thing that fixes it too. Stopping Zone Alarm and Windows Firewall (And basically every other process I can think of) has no effect.

I want to point out that if I then go back to the protection control and restart Web Shield, the problem doesnt seem to reoccur HOWEVER, the icon claims only 3 processes are running where Web Shield should be the 4th. If I open up protection control again it shows Web Shield is running fine with the timer tickign and all, but hovering over the A icon reports essentially that it isnt. No idea if that is relevant but it is an interesting tidbit.


miscreant

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #95 on: July 23, 2008, 11:59:42 AM »
I wish i could help more :( .I have vista premium and avast and firefox and it doesnt happen on my machine.I guess its hard to stick in there ,but i hope you do ,as i would like to know what the cause is too.
m

info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #96 on: July 23, 2008, 12:23:49 PM »
miscreant, Are you running Vista Home Premium with SP1?  Are you also running Zone Alarm?

miscreant

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #97 on: July 23, 2008, 12:42:43 PM »
Im running vista premium sp1,however im not running ZA :( , I use sphinx vista firewall control instead).It seems many users are not using ZA ,and still experiencing the problem so i guess it rules that out anyway?
m

info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #98 on: July 23, 2008, 12:49:36 PM »
Thanks.

info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #99 on: July 23, 2008, 01:36:33 PM »
Vlk, 

OK, immediately after experiencing the problem, I disabled avast!'s self-defense, went to Task Manager and right clicked the AshWebSV.exe process and clicked on Create Dump File but, the computer seemed to hang while on "wait while writing file..."   I waited about 8 minutes for it noticing that the hard drive was not moving at all, canceled and tried again, but this time Vista came back with an access denied message.  I stopped On-access protection and it was still in there so I tried again, and again got access denied.  I looked around the root directory and the Alwil directories, my home directory, with hidden files visible and didn't see anything that looked like a dump file.  The procedure never got to the point of asking me to name the file.  Perhaps I should have waited longer.  What would the file have been named in case it was created (where might it be, I may have missed it)? Do you have any idea what else I might do?

This time I was able to get Firefox to reconnect by disabling avast on-access protection.  I also noticed that some links on open tabs were able to connect before disabling (i.e. Google and others) but links on others which were open (avast! forum) I was not able to connect.  I had not opened those links that I was able to open prior to the problem occuring.  Links from unopened bookmarks were not able to connect at all, home page did not connect.  All this was fixed with disabling on-access protection. 

This is really starting to wear me down. :-)
« Last Edit: July 23, 2008, 01:55:59 PM by info »

info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #100 on: July 23, 2008, 06:09:22 PM »
Update: I located the dump file by creating another one while things were running well \appdata\local\temp\.  I made two of them just to test without a problem, it only took a few seconds.  I'll try once more when Firefox stalls again.

miscreant

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #101 on: July 23, 2008, 06:18:39 PM »
Thats good news .I really hope the cause can be found.I notice that many with the problem also use spybot.I know this has some registry blocking techniques.Could that be somehow blocking registry writes after avast update?.I know it has a good reputation ,but everything must be considered in these cases.The problem with spybot and such apps is that even if you uninstall ,it doesnt put back any registry entries it may have changed to block malware.Thats why i wont use that either.I know its a long shot but everything must be considered .I hope vic can check out that dump file pretty quickly.
m

info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #102 on: July 23, 2008, 06:27:22 PM »
miscreant, I forgot to mention that the dump file I made when the stall occurred was empty (0 bytes) so I am not sure that I will be able to make one at all.  I agree that all must be considered but I think I had the problem before I installed Spybot S&D.  In retrospect I cannot be 100% sure though.
« Last Edit: July 23, 2008, 06:29:55 PM by info »

miscreant

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #103 on: July 23, 2008, 06:40:50 PM »
miscreant, I forgot to mention that the dump file I made when the stall occurred was empty (0 bytes) so I am not sure that I will be able to make one at all.  I agree that all must be considered but I think I had the problem before I installed Spybot S&D.  In retrospect I cannot be 100% sure though.

Mmm if that is the case then it cant be that.I guess i grasping at straws here trying to find a common app (as well as avast) that may be causing the problem.I know with spybot before immunization ,a registry backup is recommended otherwise if you uninstall the immunisations may stay.This is fine in theory as immunisations shouldnt mess anything really,but not something that i would wish to risk.I have a disk image so maybe ill install ZA and spybot and see if anything comes of it.What ZA version are you using?
m

info

  • Guest
Re: Web Shield causes all browsers to stop working
« Reply #104 on: July 23, 2008, 07:04:35 PM »
fooldog01: Welcome back!  ;D