Avast Causes Windows XP to Hang on Shutdown & System Tray to Freeze

[dwgesq]

I have installed avast Home Edition.  Ever since the initial installation, my system has hung on shutdown.  I have Windows XP.  It gets to the screen that says "Windows is Shutting Down" and then stays there.  I have to manually turn off my computer, then restart and shutdown again.  It did not do this all the time, but about 95% of the time.  Then, yesterday, I had two messages that my license key needed to be renewed, and that a new version of avast was available.  I installed the new version, and am now running version 4.8 Home Edition.  The system still hangs on shutdown, but in addition, my system tray has frozen several times.  It has never done this before and I have had the computer for almost two years.  I never had any problems with shutdown, either, before installing avast.  The avast is the only new program/software I have installed, and I can only conclude that this is related.  I have read some old posts on the message board, but they are old (2005) that seem to address similar issues, but they don't provide conclusive answers.  I am hoping that someone has managed to figure out the problem in the last 3 years, and I would assume that the newest version I just installed would account for this.  If I can't get this fixed, I will have to uninstall and find a new product.  I'm not interested in temporary fixes, or workarounds... I want my computer to run like it did before installing avast.  I love the avast product, but not enough to put up with headaches such as this.  Please help !!!!

[YoKenny]

Do you have User Profile Hive Cleanup Service installed and running?
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=1B286E6D-8912-4E18-B570-42470E2F3582&displaylang=en

Are there any errors in the Event Manager Application or System?
Analyze your event logs with Event Log Explorer™
http://www.eventlogxp.com

[dwgesq]

I don't believe I am using User Profile Hive Cleanup... should I, and will that solve this.. or would that be part of the problem if I am using it?

I don't believe I have Event Log Explorer.  I checked my Windows Event Viewer under System, and there is a "warning" and some "errors".  These consist of the following (I have x'd out the IP addresses)... these are not all listed together, it is just a compilation of what was listed under error/warning for the past couple days:

"The server could not bind to the transport \Device\NetBT_Tcpip_{1DB62F4A-43FF-468E-B4E8-038DCC5E8544}."
"The IP address lease xxx.xxx.x.xxx for the Network Card with network address xxxxxxxxxxxx has been denied by the DHCP server xxx.xxx.x.x (The DHCP Server sent a DHCPNACK message)."
"TCP/IP has reached the security limit imposed on the number of concurrent TCP connect attempts."
"Your computer was not able to renew its address from the network (from the DHCP Server) for the Network Card with network address xxxxxxxxxxxxx.  The following error occurred: The operation was canceled by the user. . Your computer will continue to try and obtain an address on its own from the network address (DHCP) server."

The problem is that I have the problems a lot more than these errors or warnings have popped up, so I am not sure they corelate, but I don't know what these mean (I am not an expert at this stuff, I just run the software).

But, I do know that the last time the system hung on shutdown was very close in time to this log, which appears as "information" rather than "error" or "warning":

"The WAM service was successfully sent a start control."

This would have been the very last log event prior to the system shutdown error.  There are no errors or warnings in close proximity.  There are other "information" messages.  I don't know if you can make heads or tails of this, but is what I can find.  If there is something specific I should look for, I can try to find it.

[YoKenny]

I don't believe I am using User Profile Hive Cleanup... should I, and will that solve this.. or would that be part of the problem if I am using it?

You should be using it. 

That is what it is for

Overview
The User Profile Hive Cleanup service helps to ensure user sessions are completely terminated when a user logs off. System processes and applications occasionally maintain connections to registry keys in the user profile after a user logs off. In those cases the user session is prevented from completely ending. This can result in problems when using Roaming User Profiles in a server environment or when using locked profiles as implemented through the Shared Computer Toolkit for Windows XP.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=1B286E6D-8912-4E18-B570-42470E2F3582&displaylang=en

You must have a legitimate copy of XP Pro installed or you will nor be permitted to download it.

"The server could not bind to the transport \Device\NetBT_Tcpip_{1DB62F4A-43FF-468E-B4E8-038DCC5E8544}."

I see those occasionally when the system needs to check if it needs a new IP address because the DHCP lease has expired.  This is a normal process of system initialization.

I don't know if you can make heads or tails of this, but is what I can find.

I had to use Google a lot to figure out what the Events mean and if they were important or not.

I like the Event Explorer application because it makes reading and cleaning the events a lot easier.

[dwgesq]

Okay, I installed User Hive Profile Cleanup.  I shut down once and it went fine.  That doesn't mean it's completely solved because the problem doesn't occurr every single time... but it gives me hope.  I'll try a few times today, and will let you know if that worked.  Thanks for your help so far!!

[dwgesq]

As an update, this seems to help... no further occurences after a few more shutdowns.  I'll post further if the problem comes up again, otherwise it's solved.  Thanks!!!!!