avast! antivirus service hangs in "starting" state

I see there has been alot of talk about the AAVM / RPC issue, I have this one as well.
Running Win2K Pro SP4.
Downloaded & installed latest avast.
Each time I boot, the avaast icon has the red slash & clicking on it yeilds the message “AAVM subsystem detected a RPC error”
RPC service is running and starts automatically.
avast! antivirus service is in a “starting” state.
After several minutes, service starts and all seems well.

What is causing the service to fail to start immediately?

Thanks

It is caused by the way Windows handles services/applications at boot time. Startup delayer seems to work for a lot of people in cases like this.

Do you have any other antivirus installed in your computer?
Did you have in the past? Which one?
RPC error is generally related to other antivirus present or, at least, firewall blocking. Do you use a firewall? Which one?

Anyway, RPC error is most likely correct by this procedure:
Go to Control Panel > Add/Remove programs > avast! antivirus > Remove
Then choose Repair function in the pop up window (Repair).

I have tried all of these things twice, without success.

Thanks for your help.

Can you answer my questions about antivirus programs?
What programs do you have on startup (both folder and Registry keys)?

There may have been Norton Antivirus on this machine at one time, I see the Symantec Common folder exists.

I have also installed ZoneAlarm basic.

Please see the following discussion: http://forum.avast.com/index.php?board=2;action=display;threadid=9435;start=msg79944#msg79944

Thanks
Vlk