Let's take this from the top
Norton/Symantic is a suite of unrelated programs purchased from unrelated vendors and kludged together with a shell, updatet etc
The put registry entries all over the place
Even when disabled or not running and no services running they are still there
Even if Removed there are leftovers/ fragments/ mouse tracks etc
If you want to run Symantec/ Norton run Symantec/ Norton
you can also use other "on demand" AV and Antispyware products for a second opinion
BUT
If you are going to install any other AV or Suite you Have to completly clean up from the Symantec installation- as I posted above - add remove programs AND use thier removal tool
Remove also any other AV such as Avast
reboot
then get a second opinion
http://dl.antivir.de/down/windows/registrycleaner_en.zip
will remove additional Symantec/ Norton entries
some of these registry entries locations will want to be used by your new anti-virus
and if they are already occupied or in an unknown state unpredictable bad things happen
post back what the Antivir tool finds
you will now have a stable platform to install your new anti-virus
as I said before
Good luck
If your Norton is paid for or came with your computer and you do not want to change post back
I think I already took it from the top quite clearly.
As I already wrote, my employer has a license for Symantec AntiVirus. I don't pay a cent to use it, don't need any subscription for virus definitions, etc.
No, I have absolutely no other Symantec or Norton products running, other than SAV. No suite at all. Got it?
You write "you do not want to change". It isn't a question of wanting to change or not wanting to change. Yes, if I hated SAV, couldn't stand it, or my subscription ran out, and now I wanted to use a free one, I would uninstall it, to try something out in its place, like Avast.
I don't hate it, and do not have a subscription that will run out. Do I love it, think it's perfect? No, not at all. Things aren't black and white like that. So, I wanted to see if I might like Avast better. So, I installed Avast, and completely disabled SAV, checking manually to be sure nothing was running in the background from SAV--no drivers, no services, not processes, nada, zilch, zero. You can write all you want about "something from Symantec must be running", but I checked it carefully, and nothing is.
Are there leftovers and fragments of Symantec on my system? Sure there are. There are files there, for instance. Why would files of one program stop another one from running? Yes, there may be registry entries, but if none of them allow anything from the Symantec app to run in the background, what difference should that make? If I have Microsoft Word installed on my computer, then install a different word processor, say openoffice, no problem for both to have files and registry entries on my computer, no? Yes, different with AV programs, in that one cannot have more than one running in the background. Well, SAV is not running in the background, in no way, shape, or form. So I don't see why "fragments" of SAV, files, etc., could cause a problem with Avast.
Not really worth my time, to spend a lot of time trying to thoroughly uninstall SAV, just to try out a different AV. That doesn't mean I am completely satisfied with SAV, and wouldn't like to try a different one. I would. But it's not worth a lot of time and trouble to me. (And I really shouldn't be spending so much time writing here either.)
So, IMO., it is really a poor business decision of Avast, to not let its background scanner run, if it detects any trace of a different AV app on the system. Detecting a trace, does not mean that the other app is running. And there are probably a lot of people like me, who might like to try Avast, to see if they might want to switch to it, but do not want to have to completely uninstall their current AV app first. If it becomes too much of a hassle just to try out Avast, why bother?