I realise this topic has been mentioned elsewhere, but I cannot find that it has been satisfactorily answered.
I’m using Win 7 64 bit Ultimate, and I have Avast Services set to start after other system services. However, unlike some other services, they still appear in “Services” as “Automatic” and NOT “Automatic (Delayed Start)”.
When my Virus Updates option is set to Automatic, at Boot Up, Avast almost immediately goes off to the web (as soon as networking is established) to seek updates. I can tell this because my NetMeter shows active traffic.
THE PROBLEM is that this slows down the start up of my whole system very considerably. I therefore have to set the Updates option to Manual to avoid this delay. I would like the Updates to be delayed until the whole Boot Up process for my particular machine configuration is 100% complete, and thus avoid slow starts, conflicts and the rest. Avast slowing down the boot-up also masks any problems with drivers, devices or software.
There seem to be two delay possibilities which are within Windows and not part of Avast. They are:-
to set the two services Avast! Antivirus and Avast!Firewall to start Automatic (Delayed Start)
using something like Glary Utilities, to set the Startup entry AvastUI.exe to be a delayed start (30 or 45 seconds)
In avast7 you need to edit (using notepad) avast5.ini the [InetWD] section of the C:\ProgramData\Avast Software\Avast\ instead of \Alwil Software\Avast5\avast5.ini file.
Broadband connections, add this line: AlwaysConnectedWaitSeconds=120 and AssumeAlwaysConnected=1 if not present (or edit AssumeAlwaysConnected=0 to AssumeAlwaysConnected=1)
I’ve done that (set at 240 secs) and I’ll see what happens next. I’ve restarted again but there are no current updates available so it’s not possible to see how Avast behaves. Boot seems a bit faster, though.
A couple of things.
Firstly, as a note to anyone else who tries this, editing with Notepad requires it to be started from the Progs menu with Admin privilege, and then open the avast5.ini file and edit it, confirm change on the avast challenge and then save the file. Navigating to it and then clicking it to edit won’t work as you won’t normally have sufficient privilege to be able to save your edited ini file.
Second, what, if any, is the correct format for comment lines in the avast5.ini file (like :: in DOS batchfiles, for example)? I hate to change these files without putting a note into them for future reference to say what’s been altered. Is it square brackets [Comment], perhaps?
The relevant section of the ini file now says this:-
You can simply reboot as that would effectively have avast ‘check’ for updates, whilst there might not be an update the actual check would still have a lessor impact.
These are just some of the things I just love (NOT) about UAC in win7, yes you need to run notepad as admin.
Format wise I don’t believe comment lines are allowed in the avast5.ini file.
As for the modification - the sections are in square brackets and for this modification the new lines (if you had to do that) must be after the [InetWD] section heading and before the next [section header] whatever that might be. Your layout looks find.
After tweaking delays on a couple of my startup batchfiles, and the changes you advised to avast5.ini, I tried the first proper “day start” boot-up this morning. Avast doesn’t charge off looking for updates midway through the boot-up process, and it all goes quicker and cleaner.
I’ve been reading this thread with much interest and was wondering if an editable delay feature could be added in one of Avasts drop down menus in a future update. Yes, Avast jumping straight in and looking for updates before full boot up is a nuisance and I’m sure many of us would like to see this more controllable in the program itself.
All the same, a nice work-around from DavidR.
I think the concern is that some, A) wouldn’t understand what the delay is about and B) some would no doubt use it incorrectly. Personally I think avast should extend the default update check delay so it doesn’t happen so soon in the boot sequence to say 3 minutes, that would probably reduce the requirement to even use the avast5.ini workaround much less a GUI change.
There have been many instances in the forums when people only want to have avast check for updates every week by setting the auto update interval to 10080 or a slightly lessor duration. Then when avast is rebooted it will check for updates as the counter would have been reset.