On my W7x64 Home Premium computer I opened one of my apps and avast advised opening it in Sandbox which I refused. Along about the same time, the avast7 update notice was popping up from systray, which I told to go away for awhile.
So when I continued to open my app outside of avast Sandbox, the computer froze. Only recovery was to press the power button to shut it off. I blame that on the intervening avast Sandbox and/or avast 7 update operations, because ordinarily I have no problems with that app.
After rebooting computer, I decided to take care of avast first, so told it to update from v6 to v7, but it said the package was broken. I tried a repair, but it refused, still saying the package was broken. So I had no choice but to uninstall and download the complete avast v7 setup file and reinstall clean.
Downloading free avast from the avast website was a PITA because it doesn't work right with
www.google-analytics.com blocked, which I do in my HOSTS file from the mvps.org folks. But I finally figured out a route to get it downloaded, because I've been through that particular PITA with avast in the past.
Then it was another PITA because I do custom installs, and it wasn't obvious how to activate that in the avast installer. At first all of the checkboxes were grayed out. I tried it again, and finally figured out that it was necessary to click on the 'custom icon' at bottom-left of the installer box. What's wrong with using words, or maybe an info popup there? Why isn't that explained in the custom install box or pathway anywhere? That's a bad change in design from the former custom install procedure.
I dodged the Google Chrome bullet because I already knew that avast has become subservient to google, so we have to be very careful! Unchecked that box during the install.
Finally, I found several new things in avast7 which I don't want and had to disable them. For sure I dumped the problematical Sandbox and all of the social and sharing junk. I still worry about you or someone taking over control of my computer and don't see any way to kill that completely. Privacy also now becomes an issue with avast v7, as it has been for awhile with anything associated with google.
Overall it was a really significant PITA. I was/am tempted to quit avast and switch to MSE, but haven't yet... Just blowing off steam, I guess.
