It seems to be solved... but I'm not sure as I could only test when avast updates/upgrades were not involved, i.e., the avast installation does not change before and after the restore.
I didn't check. You mean at least when no upgrade occurred in the meantime, you can restore without having the self-defense module deactivated? I hope so...because there's still no way to deactivate it in safe mode (if booting in normal mode is impossible for any reason) because:
1 if a password was set on the settings, it's rejected anyway in safe mode
2 if there's no password, you can access the settings panel in safe mode but your changes won't be taken into account
3 the reason: avast runs in safe mode without any service, and the settings depend on these services.
The big change now is that you can scan in safe mode, as manual scans can now be done without avastsvc.exe. The other thing is for the rest, all that can't run, it's just normal as for the services to run in safe mode it would imply that Windows would load Avast drivers in safe mode, which will never happen, that's what safe mode is for.