my avast sheilds won't turn on

[Shaun Wada]

my shields have been disabled. when i click the "fix now" button or any button to turn the shields on, nothing happens. i thought it was my computer freezing up, but the other buttons on avast work fine. what should i do?

[iyogisolutions1]

Hi Shaun Wada,

  Please make sure that your computer doesn't have any other security software in it.It is not recommended to have more than one security software in the computer at the same time. It will cause conflicts in your computer which will seriously compromise your computer's performance. Hope you got our point.


You can download the removal tools of respective softwares from the following link.

http://thewebatom.net/uninstallers/security-software/

May I know which version of avast and windows are you using?

Have a wonderful day. Good k@rma!

[Lisandro]

I suggest you an installation from scratch.

[norel]

Mine was doing the exact same thing on a new install of Avast on a machine that had Malwarebytes Antimalware. I uninstalled MB but it still did it. Searched my files and found two prefetch entries for MB. Deleted them and then searched the registry and found two MB keys that didn't get uninstalled. As soon as I deleted them Avast started working. I've had similar problems before when two antiviruses are clashing. They just freeze up until you get rid of one of them.

[CraigB]

Mine was doing the exact same thing on a new install of Avast on a machine that had Malwarebytes Antimalware. I uninstalled MB but it still did it. Searched my files and found two prefetch entries for MB. Deleted them and then searched the registry and found two MB keys that didn't get uninstalled. As soon as I deleted them Avast started working. I've had similar problems before when two antiviruses are clashing. They just freeze up until you get rid of one of them.

norel  Malwarebytes is not an anti-virus, it is designed to work along side your AV and does so perfectly well with avast.

Shaun Wada as mentioned in reply 1 make sure you have cleaned all remnants of previous AV's, removal tools are provided in the link supplied and you should reboot after each tool has been run.
Once any other AV's or leftover remnants have been removed you can then try a repair of avast via remove programs ( double click on avast then scroll down to repair and click then ok ) once repair has finished then reboot, if problem still persists then a clean install as Tech mentioned maybe the solution.

[Shaun Wada]

would having more than one anti virus running and conflicting, explain my computer mysteriously freezing up? that's been happening several times in the last few days. i found one malware, deleted it, the problem got better. but since then, it's happened 2 more times, not as severe though.

[CraigB]

would having more than one anti virus running and conflicting, explain my computer mysteriously freezing up? that's been happening several times in the last few days. i found one malware, deleted it, the problem got better. but since then, it's happened 2 more times, not as severe though.

Yes you definitly cannot have two av's on your system at the same time , even is one is disabled there are still active low level drivers running that will cause conflict, remove other av's via control panel\remove programs then reboot and run the correct removal tool and reboot again http://thewebatom.net/uninstallers/security-software/

[norel]

craigb, I think you're right. After removing all traces of MB mine still has problems. The Avast service doesn't want to start. I have AvastSvc.exe set as an exception in Windows Firewall, but having no other ideas I removed it and now things seem to be working. It's been an intermittent problem all along though so I'm not convinced it's over. I wouldn't think the Avast service would have to be made an exception if it's set to run automatically through services.msc but who knows. I'll report back with any new info.

[CraigB]

craigb, I think you're right. After removing all traces of MB mine still has problems. The Avast service doesn't want to start. I have AvastSvc.exe set as an exception in Windows Firewall, but having no other ideas I removed it and now things seem to be working. It's been an intermittent problem all along though so I'm not convinced it's over. I wouldn't think the Avast service would have to be made an exception if it's set to run automatically through services.msc but who knows. I'll report back with any new info.

If the windows firewall is in it's default state which is no outbound protection then no exclusions are neccessary for avast in that firewall.
Your system sounds like you may still have remnants of old AV's still lurking about, the link provided http://thewebatom.net/uninstallers/security-software/ has removal tools for most of the well known AV's around so have a look through there and see if you have had any of those AV's before and run the tool for each that you may of had ( reboot after running each tool ) then if a repair of avast doesn't work i suggest a clean install of avast.

[norel]

I'm 99.99% sure I'm not infected. Before the problem started I had formatted, reinstalled Windows XP SP3, updated Windows Updates, then installed Avast 6.0.1289. Everything has been working good except for Avast which has been a thorn in my side on this machine (Dell Dimension 2400). The only thing I installed remotely resembling another antivirus was Malwarebytes, and there's nothing left of it (hidden or otherwise).

Going back and reading some older posts, it seems to be a conflict in the startup process. The odd thing in this case though is it's only a problem after the first update and reboot in the morning. Subsequent updates and reboots go smoothly, but the next day, same thing all over. The Avast service shows that it's "Starting," and it takes about five minutes then it does start on its own. It also creates a new desktop icon like when you run a Repair.

Services.msc reports that the Avast Service depends on "avast! Standard Shield Support." From what I read, this has something to do with the file aswMon2.sys. My system has this file in two locations, System32\Drivers and C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\Setup\INF.

I think tomorrow after I update I'm gonna start in Safe Mode and see what that does. I'm starting to think it'll be easier to just start the damn thing manually.  

[ady4um]

@norel,

Windows Safe Mode -> run the removal utility for Avast (http://www.avast.com/uninstall-utility), using the correct version / edition of Avast and the correct folder.

Reboot into Normal Mode and install the latest stable version of Avast. Please download it anew (as oppose to using and older setup.exe, even of the same version).

After the re-installation, please reboot immediately (before configuring anything else or updating).

Once you reboot, go to
Avast main GUI -> settings -> troubleshooting -> "load Avast service only after other system services". Save and REBOOT AGAIN.

Configure Avast as you want / need, use it for several days and test everything. If all works correctly, register it.

Please report back.

[norel]

ady4um, I did everything exactly like you said but it's back to its old tricks. This sounds strange, but it behaves like it's running a repair. Whenever I do the first update in the morning, then restart (whenever that might be), the Avast service delays about five minutes before starting. It updates okay, but the virus definition version doesn't update until I restart. When I restart and the service finally starts it creates a desktop icon and and a start menu folder. If I restart twice back-to back, the service starts normally the second time. The bizarre thing is it only behaves this way the first time I update in any 24 hour period.

I double checked the other services to see if there were any "Starting" or "Shutting down" that might be causing Avast to delay but they're aren't. I set every service to start automatically but that didn't help so I returned them to default. The Remote Procedure Call service is enabled and Autoruns reports that the avast! Standard Shield Support (driver aswMon2.sys) should be running at startup. I disabled "Enable rootkit scan on system startup" but that didn't make any difference. I'm sure there's a log that would show what's going on but I'm not sure which one or how to read it. If someone can tell me which one, I'll post it if that'll help. Avast is working great otherwise so I'd like to figure this out if possible. Thanks.

[ady4um]

@norel,

Please double check you have no other security tools installed. Since you have a "new" installation of Windows, there might be some "extra" tools included by the manufacturer. Norton and McAfee are frequent examples.

Please report if you found out any security tool, still installed or that you think you have eliminated.

Have you added the "troubleshooting -> load avast services only after other system services"? After that, please reboot.

Do you have any other "things" automatically running when the system boots up?

Is Avast listed in "Add/Remove Programs"? Can you try a repair from there and reboot immediately?

[norel]

Hey ady4um, there's some security software and other tools on another disk but I didn't install anything from it. I haven't found anything else I believe is security software.

Yes, I've got Avast set to load only after the other system services have loaded.

Yes, I've tried repair repeatedly.

I have a few other programs that load at startup, but what has me baffled id it only does it after the first update and restart. All the rest of the time it works flawlessly. 

I just installed Java Runtime 6.1.0.29. It didn't have Java before so I'll see if that changes anything.

[iyogisolutions1]

@norel,

Could you please check whether you are having any windows updates are available.

If its there please update it and restart the computer. Then go ahead once with Avast repair and check it.

If you face still same issue.

In System configuration tool (msconfig), please check the services tab with check mark on hide microsoft services and make sure that no other antivirus services. Then disable the unwanted services like google updater and have a check.

Thanks

Have a Wonderful Day. Good Karma!