Question...

[MitchC]

       Hi,

          I'm a new user to this forum, but not to Avast.  I've had free Avast for about three years, and have the most current orange ball version of the program.

      My computer runs its virus scan every time it goes into screen saver.  This morning it found three viruses.  Two of the viruses were able to be removed to the chest, as the computer usually does.  The third virus was not able to be removed, and recommended I do a restart, and rescanning of Windows.  As I was doing the rescanning, without the Windows XP coming on, I kept getting a message that said  "Zip Archive is corrupted".   

      My computer is nine years old, which I know is ancient.  I was intending to replace it soon, but I was told to run it until it dies, and not get rid of a working machine. 

      My question is:  Is the message I'm getting anything serious, and can it crash my computer.. or should I ignore it?  Also, what happens if I keep getting it, it keeps telling me to reboot, and then I get the message, or repeated viruses are found, every time the computer scans in screensaver?

        Any advice would be appreciated.  Thanks.

        Mitch

[DavidR]

What is the infected file name, where was it found e.g. (C:\windows\system32\infected-file-name.xxx) ? 
For detection on on demand scans, check C:\Documents And Settings\All Users\Application Data\Alwil Software\Avast5\Log  (Windows 2000, Windows XP). The path could be different depending on if you have updated to avast6 rather than a clean install,  C:\Documents And Settings\All Users\Application Data\Avast Software\Avast\Log.

This is especially significant for the one that couldn't removed. Was it detected and removed on the boot-time scan ?

As for corrupt archives (zip) that isn't a problem as a) essentially it isn't saying it is infected and b) there is nothing you as a user can do about it if it is truly corrupt. It may simply be that for whatever reason avast can't unpack it to be scanned, so it reports it as corrupt (it may not be).

So all in all I don't think you have a lot to be concerned about.