[Resolved] Microsoft Security Essentials and Avast 5

[mwotsch]

Howdy!

I have been using Avast free for quite a while now and am quite happy with it. I noticed the other day that besides avast there was also Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) installed on my machine. I think I installed that a while ago under the assumption that it was a scanner like malwarebytes that provides no live protection. I wanted to uninstall it via Windows 7's control panel. The uninstall process got hung up somewhere (I can't remember where) and my computer became unresponsive for over an hour. Being the impatient person I am I ended up unplugging it.

A few errors occurred after reboot. I was told that a file for MSE was missing (again I don't know which one), but after a few more attempts I got the machine to boot just fine. No MSE messages of any kind. Everything seemed like it was in perfect order.

However, I then noticed that Avast was reporting that its real time shields were not running. Trying to get those to run produced "Shield unreachable" messages, which I have seen a quite a few entries for in this forum. The icon in the task bar still told me I was fully protected, though. Several installs and uninstalls later (via control panel and using the avast removal tool; in safe mode, normal mode, safe mode with networking) I found that when I install it (fresh after a reboot) everything seemed to be in order. I scheduled a boot-time scan after avast updated itself and rebooted. The scan took a long time and I left for lunch assuming I would be able to find the results in the log file. Unfortunately, when the system booted into the only user account on this machine (with admin privileges), I was unable to open the log from avast's UI. Additionally, when trying to get into the folder where it was supposed to be located, I was told by Windows that I do not have privileges to do so. Also, the real-time shields were off again. Trying to turn them on produced the same error as before (shields unreachable).

In addition to that avast's update did not seem to be working anymore. I tried to update it but it was stuck at initializing. Firewall is Windows 7 firewall, which does not block avast. I even turned it off, but still no luck.

Malwarebytes reports no infections (both in safe mode and normal, with full scan and quick scan). I uninstalled avast again and decided to reinstall MSE just so I could uninstall that again (hoping this might remove something that was not removed properly before). A reinstall of avast at that point resulted in the same problem. I now have MSE installed again, running a full scan. It seems to be happy.

I am not sure what is left to try. Microsoft does not seem to provide a removal tool for MSE. I am not sure if this issue is even related to MSE, but it seems that the avast problems started after the unsuccessful removal of MSE. There is nothing Norton on this machine. I even ran their removal tool as well, just to be safe.

As I said, my user account is an admin account.

Does anybody else have any ideas what I could try next?

[Pondus]

Microsoft does not seem to provide a removal tool for MSE.

MSE removal tool #23b  http://uninstallers.blogspot.com/
avast removal tool http://www.avast.com/en-no/uninstall-utility

[mwotsch]

Thank you for the removal tool link for MSE. I ran that and the avast removal tool (again). I then proceeded to install avast again (this time with right click -> run as administrator, which I think I had not done before). Avast ran fine after the install. I was able to update the definitions and the program (both were already up-to-date) and then rebooted my system.

Hovering over the avast icon in the task bar tells me that my system is secured. However, all shields are reported to have an unknown protection status. Trying to activate them still results in the same "shield unreachable" message. The program will not update virus definitions or the program itself (under Maintenance -> Update).

Virus definitions are version 110126-1 and the program itself is 5.1.889

[Pondus]

did you reboot after running the removal tool(s) before installing againe ?

Have you tried avast repair and reboot ?

For a repair of avast. Windows, Add Remove programs, select 'avast! Anti-Virus,' click the Change/Remove button from the pop-up window, scroll down to Repair, click next and follow.

[mwotsch]

I rebooted after the MSE removal, then did the avast removal and rebooted again.

I had tried the repair option before, but just did that again. No success. While the repair seems to have connected to an avast server, the actual program UI update process is still stuck at initializing and the shields don't run. Same "Shield unreachable" message.

[Pondus]

do you remeber if your comp was delivered with preinstalled AV ?

the avs that usually comes with computers are Norton / McAfee / TrendMicro

[mwotsch]

It came with a Norton trial, which is why I ran the Norton removal tool just to rule that out as a culprit.

Would I have to remove it in safe mode?

Also, do you even suspect that MSE could have had anything to do with this?

[Pondus]

Here is a tool that will scan for security programs, and remove..... so you can try and see what it find
anything


AppRemover  http://www.appremover.com/

Using AppRemover http://www.appremover.com/about/using-appremover.html

[mwotsch]

The appremover scan found Windows Live OneCare, which I was able to completely remove from my system. Appremover now only finds Malwarebytes (the free version with no live protection) and avast. No other security software is found.

I went and tried repairing avast via control panel and rebooting. Did not help.
I then uninstalled avast with the avast removal tool and rebooted. Installed it again as admin and rebooted. Still no luck. Avast shields remain unreachable and updates via the UI are not possible.

Should I try and remove malwarebytes next?

[CraigB]

You know that you are supposed to delet your program's through add remove program's first then reboot into safe mode and run the removal tool's  to finish of the cleaning process and reboot again, then run ccleaner to tidy up.

[mwotsch]

@craigb: I did not know that. While that is the way I had originally done it I eventually just used the cleaner since I thought it made no difference. However, it seems that the issue is now resolved. Here is what I did in case anybody else is interested. The steps outlined in this thread helped: http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=70222.0

1) Tried to repair (in normal mode) via control panel and reboot which made no difference.
2) Uninstalled avast 5 via control panel and rebooted into normal mode and then again into safe mode.
3) Removed any potential remnants of avast 4 with the cleaner aswClear5.exe (I ended up using an empty directory as a target. Not sure if any registry values were fixed or not). Again rebooted into safe mode.
4) Repeated step 3 with avast 5 as a target.
5) Reboot into normal mode
6) Ran ccleaner and removed all registry entries referring to symantec (1 entry), norton (1 entry), Microsoft Security Essential (several entries) and Windows Live OneCare (also several entries) and rebooted into normal mode. I find it interesting that even though I used the appropriate cleaners for these tools some entries needed to be removed still.
7) Clean install of avast. Works. Reboot. Still works!

All shields report that they are up and running, autoupdate works as well. Several reboots later it's still fine.

I am not sure which of the above steps are necessary and which are not.

Thanks for the friendly and very prompt support!

[CraigB]

Glad that is all working now, you'll find that there will probably still be remnant's left on your system that you will have to go though manually and delet, look in program data, program file's and user's/ your name/local and roaming, even in regedit if you go down the list starting at second on the list and open each one and just look under software you'll probably find leftover's from every program you have ever deleted. Be sure to only delet thing's that you know for sure that you have deleted or else you could be in trouble, messing with the registry can be risky.

[Pondus]

All shields report that they are up and running, autoupdate works as well. Several reboots later it's still fine.

yippie ka yay   congratulations    

[mwotsch]

There are still a bunch of entries in the registry that I thought I should be able to delete, but left alone anyway. I figured that removing the entries related to Norton, Symantec, MSE and Live OneCare were ok to remove.

Do you think that may have helped at all?

Thanks again for the help.

[CraigB]

If there under the software section's, yeah you can get rid of them, the less leftovers that are left anywhere on your system is better for your system.