Author Topic: avast! vs System Restore XPSP2  (Read 60714 times)

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neal62

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #75 on: November 30, 2004, 05:31:02 AM »
I usually have system restore turned off. Since all of this came up I tried turning it on with the latest 4.5 542 version of Avast. I have WinsXp, SP2 all updates, the latest free version of Zone Alarm. Using Firefox 1.0. I experienced the same thing as Sasha and Tipton. Trying to turn system restore on caused my pc to freeze. Had to reboot and when I checked restore then it was in the off mode. Not a problem for me as I don't use it and do not intend to use it but thought I would give my input. :)

Update: After my reboot as listed above I then went to System Restore, was able to turn it on with no problems. I did NOT reboot at that time and turned it off and it worked with no problems. Looks like things are alright here now. ;D
« Last Edit: November 30, 2004, 06:30:44 PM by neal62 »

Offline Eddy

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #76 on: November 30, 2004, 05:37:25 AM »
As I said before. Changes in the system restore only fully take place after a reboot. ;)

That can make the difference

Tipton

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #77 on: November 30, 2004, 05:55:34 AM »
Neil, you have basically the same software config as mine. Try turning off system restore again, then re-boot, and try turning it back on again. On my system, it would lock up.  I would then hard reboot by pressing the button on the front of my PC. I could then turn system restore on and off fine. I would then re-boot again, and turn system restore on, only to lock up again. After another hard re-boot, I could turn it on and off fine again. Like you though, I don't use it, and leave it off.  I think system restore is useless!

Tipton
« Last Edit: November 30, 2004, 05:58:08 AM by Tipton »

neal62

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #78 on: November 30, 2004, 06:03:31 AM »
Tipton,

I was able to turn off system restore no problems. Rebooted, checked and found that it was turned ON when I went back to look. I turned it off with no problems, no freeze ups. I left if off as I don't use it anyway. HTH :)

Tipton

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #79 on: November 30, 2004, 06:07:01 AM »
Tipton,

I was able to turn off system restore no problems. Rebooted, checked and found that it was turned ON when I went back to look. I turned it off with no problems, no freeze ups. I left if off as I don't use it anyway. HTH :)

It was after I would turn it off, then re-boot, then try turning it on that I would lock up. I am leaving it off as well. I can get it to stay on, but I could easily re-produce lock ups if I wanted to. From my limetedtesting of the issue, it seems like if either Avast, or Zone alarm was turned off after a re-boot, I could not get it to lock up.

Tipton

neal62

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #80 on: November 30, 2004, 06:09:16 AM »
Well, just for grins I left both Zone Alarm and Avast turned on doing this testing. The results with both of these programs turned on were as I stated. So...I don't know why on some machines different things are happening. ???
« Last Edit: November 30, 2004, 06:09:43 AM by neal62 »

Gillie2tat

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #81 on: November 30, 2004, 09:00:50 AM »
OK everyone I apologise.  I hadn't realised you had to reboot the computer after turning off System Restore because in the past the only reason I have turned off System Restore was prior to going into Safe Mode.

I have however been experimenting and it occurred to me that it might be one or two components within the On Access Protection Control.  I therefore carried out a series of tests, turning off System Restore and then trying different things to see what would let me turn System Restore back on and what wouldn't.

I am running the Kerio firewall and you have my system details above in my Belarc report posted yesterday.

A Fail in my tests was if the system crashed in the way described above when I tried turning System Restore back on, a pass was if it let me turn System Restore back on.  Maybe we should all try this.

Incidentally when each item was turned off, all the others were left running.  I will try tonight when I get home to see what happens when everything except one item is turned off - I have to leave for work in a few minutes.

Firewall - failed the test.  Avast was switched on.
Instant Messaging turned off - passed
Internet Mail turned off - failed
Network Shield turned off - passed
Outlook/Exchange turned off - failed
P2P Shield turned off - passed
Standard Shield turned off - passed

Maybe if we all do this then some consistency will turn up.

Gillie2tat

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #82 on: November 30, 2004, 09:19:48 AM »
Results of test with everything turned off except one component in the On Access Protection Control, each component turned on in turn with the firewall turned off so I was sure it wasn't interfering with things - they ALL worked and passed the test!

Note that in the previous test my firewall was left running, I'll run that test again tonight if required with the firewall switched off because I really do have to go now!

S.Z.Craftec

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #83 on: November 30, 2004, 12:08:31 PM »
As I said before. Changes in the system restore only fully take place after a reboot. ;)

That can make the difference

Eddy, that wasn't the issue... When my wife still had that problem, prior to "out of the blue sky" fix, I performed reboot on my wife's machine and still had same problem... Of course, I'll reboot, when avast! was asking all of us to reboot systems after program update. That's natural... to be true, I rebooted 2 or 3 times after avast! 4.5.542 update, and prior trying to turn ON the System restore feature. Still was locking up her system... so, no rules in this case...

Tipton wrote:
Quote
...Like you though, I don't use it, and leave it off.  I think system restore is useless!

Yes, maybe it's useless, and I don't use it either... but, we have to think of something... no matter if we use it or not, this is just coincidency we found out that it's not working properly... we have to take into consideration, since we found that issue, it may be few other things that doesn't work properly in combination of few latest avast! builds and Windows OS... I've noticed, many new users and forum members like to say: "Great, no problems here, everything works wonderful... thanks..."

I bet they didn't even try enabling/disabling System Restore... we won't know for sure, until everybody try that... same thing with all of us... maybe someone found something else, and we still didn't see his/her post about that issue. That doesn't mean everything works great...

I for sure, want to know what's going on with that issue, because no matter I don't use System Restore, as long as there is even just only one thing not working properly, we have to think... maybe there are some other things not working as they should work. Some info would be great. My wife's System Restore disappeared all of a sudden, but that doesn't mean we should close this issue now. It's obvious, there are some other people still experiencing same problem. That means, something is still wrong with it... we have to work on this one, 'cause it looks it's a tough one...

Cheers !
« Last Edit: November 30, 2004, 12:12:37 PM by S.Z.Craftec »

Offline Vlk

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #84 on: November 30, 2004, 02:45:09 PM »
OK, I was now able to simulate the problem. It's not really a bug, neither in SR nor in avast, I'd just call it incompatibility. In short, upon loading, SR assumes some things are true and this is not the case when avast is loaded...

Anyway I've modified the avast file system filter driver so that it should now correctly handle this situation.

Version 4.5.546 contains the fix.


Thanks
Vlk
« Last Edit: November 30, 2004, 05:32:28 PM by Vlk »
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Offline Eddy

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #85 on: November 30, 2004, 02:47:22 PM »
Any idea why it happend on some systems and not on others although they have the same Windows and SP version?

Offline Vlk

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #86 on: November 30, 2004, 02:49:17 PM »
It's more or less timing issue.

SR held a registry access lock while issuing some file open requests. Avast, on the other hand, accesses the registry in the synchronous file open path. Result: a deadlock :)
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Offline Lisandro

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #87 on: November 30, 2004, 05:16:17 PM »
It's more or less timing issue.

SR held a registry access lock while issuing some file open requests. Avast, on the other hand, accesses the registry in the synchronous file open path. Result: a deadlock :)

I discovered the same thing but with another way...

I had used 'Run the logon scripts Synchronously' and 'Run the startup scripts Synchronously' testing why Norton GoBack was incompatible with the last version of XP SP2 and avast 4.5.523.

Vlk, is there a possibility to find the same some file system filter driver to solve this? The sympthoms are the same: crash (BSOD), some systems work others not...
I'll be very happy to solve this. Usually my System Recovery is disabled but, because of this, I had to enable it as I'm not  finding a way to use Norton Goback  :'(
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S.Z.Craftec

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #88 on: November 30, 2004, 05:46:33 PM »
I just updated avast! to 4.5.546 on both computers and problem on my wife's PC is completely gonne... Yesterday when I posted my reply, problem was 70% fixed, but let's say cca. 1 out of 5 times, system would hang again... today, everything seems to be ok... so far so good...

Thanks Alwil !

Cheers !

Offline Lisandro

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Re:avast! vs System Restore XPSP2
« Reply #89 on: November 30, 2004, 06:11:13 PM »
Now it's me that have a problem...
Please, don't let me alone  :P
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