Hi all. Here's some additional information which may help in troubleshooting this bug.
I'm having the same problem. System is Win2k with all available critical patches from MS installed. Additionally, Media Player 9, DirectX9.0, .Net Framework 1.1 and MS Office Professional 2003 with SP1 are installed. This is a computer I was reimaging for a customer so it was a clean install. Computer is Compaq Armada e500, PIII 700 with 256MB RAM.
I first followed Eddy's suggestion but that did not fix the problem. I then followed Technical's suggestion to change DB to XML and it also did not fix the problem.
When I look at the services right after bootup (before avast comes online) RPC service is started and Avast Antivirus service says "starting".
Looking at Event Viewer, System log has "Event ID 7022 - The avast! Antivirus service hung on starting" for each reboot I have done since installing avast.
Also, though probably not relevant, after I changed the DB to XML I checked Event Viewer again and found the following error in the Antivirus log:
Event ID 90 - During the parsing of C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\DATA\avast4.xml XML document, following error occurred: C.
I didn't cut that off. It ends with "C." Like I said though, I'm sure this isn't relevant to the original problem because it didn't occur until I changed the DB to XML. Just thought I'd post it.
Anyway, have to get this computer to my customer so I will have to remove avast and go with something else. Unfortunately that means I will probably not be of any help with further troubleshooting as avast runs fine on my home system. I will continue to monitor this thread though. I recommend avast to everyone who asks, install it on all systems I build/fix for my home customers and have purchased the corporate edition for a couple of my business customers. I think it's an awesome program and will continue to recommend it. Keep up the good work.
Thanks,
Mike Glenney