After testing tor three days, I have just bought Securline VPN for one year. The test version worked fine but the regular version doesn’t connect.
I made a system restore to last week point. I uninstalled and installed all my avast! premier produst but without success.
After observing the problem i have seen that when I passed to licensed product the TAP driver (the driver wich is used as a virtual network ethernet adapter to activate the encrypted tunnel for transferring data to remote server (virtual private network connection)) stopped working with a generic and confusing message “Sorry, unable to connect”.
I had to work a lot (about two days in my Christmas holydays) for solving the problem manually, but i have not fully understood the problem.
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First of all, a system restore to a previous good status of Windows O.S. didn’t solve;
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reinstalling of the full Avast Premier antivirus product, didn’t solve.
I have definitely seen that the problem is the OpenVPN TAP driver named “avsTap”.
I am an informatic professional and web developer but never i worked with virtual vpn network drivers nor vpn software as a developer of code.
I found evidence that it is not possible to uninstal and reinstall correctly the OpenVPN tap driver.
So, naturally, it is not possible to connect without the virtual VPN adapter.
I tried from an elevated (run as administrator) command prompt as follows:
```
C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\OpenVPN\driver\win64\ndis6>dir
Il volume nell’unità C non ha etichetta.
Numero di serie del volume: D2F0-F077
Directory di C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\OpenVPN\driver\win64\ndis6
31/12/2014 06:14 .
31/12/2014 06:14 …
31/12/2014 06:13 126 addtap.bat
31/12/2014 06:13 10.530 aswTap.cat
31/12/2014 06:13 6.913 aswTap.inf
31/12/2014 06:13 44.640 aswTap.sys
31/12/2014 06:13 154 deltapall.bat
31/12/2014 06:13 88.816 tapinstall.exe
6 File 151.179 byte
2 Directory 661.109.903.360 byte disponibili
C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\OpenVPN\driver\win64\ndis6>type deltapall.bat
echo WARNING: this script will delete ALL TAP virtual adapters (use the device manager to delete adapters one at a time)
<hr/>
i tried to uninstall manually from device manager but the nodes didn't disappear.
<hr/>
“tapinstall.exe” remove aswTap
C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\OpenVPN\driver\win64\ndis6>tapinstall remove aswTap
ROOT\NET\0000 : Remove failed
ROOT\NET\0002 : Remove failed
ROOT\NET\0003 : Remove failed
No devices were removed.
<hr/>
I found by Google that [b]tapinstall.exe[/b] utility is an OpenVPN version of Microsoft [b]devcon.exe[/b] utility for
managing device drivers by command line instead of device manager GUI. (I never used devcon.exe
and it's too much complicated install tha original devcon.exe utility for Windows 8.1 because it needs the installation of the complete
visual studio platform for device driver developers.... ).
<hr/>As you can see i made some tests so you see two nodes ROOT\NET\00n
Now:
C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\OpenVPN\driver\win64\ndis6>tapinstall status net
ROOT\VNET\0000
Name: Shrew Soft Virtual Adapter
Device is disabled.
ROOT\NET\0001
Name: VirtualBox Host-Only Ethernet Adapter
Driver is running.
ROOT\SUN_VBOXNETFLTMP\0001
Name: Controller Realtek PCIe GBE Family - VirtualBox Bridged Networking Driver Miniport
Driver is running.
ROOT\SUN_VBOXNETFLTMP\0002
Name: Qualcomm Atheros AR9485WB-EG Wireless Network Adapter - VirtualBox Bridged Networking Driver
Miniport Driver is running.
4 matching device(s) found.
<hr/>
You can see
0000 - my shrew soft VPN adapter for my work with my company VPN CISCO Gateway
(i am an IT Manager in ARTEA - Italy).
0001 - fhe virtualbox network adapter
(i use virtualbox for tests in different versions of O.S., browser and so on.. for testing of
web GIS software that i develop)
i can see also the device drivers of my ethernet network adapter and wireless network adapter.
<hr/>
C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\OpenVPN\driver\win64\ndis6>tapinstall status test
ROOT\NET\0004
Device is disabled.
1 matching device(s) found.
<hr/>this is the node created for test purpouse with:
tapinstall install "awsTap.inf" test
I observed that in device manager, under the node "network adapters" (in italian "schede di rete") there are four entries marked as "unknown device".
Three of the four entries have the same hardware id "awsTap" and the fourth, my test, has the hardware id "test".
None of this entries has a driver correctly installed. I tried to install manually the first entry point to your path C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\OpenVPN\driver\win64\ndis6.
I obtained the following messages (translated from italian):
There was a problem during instation of the driver for the device.
The device driver was detected but there were an error during installation.
avast! SecureLine TAP Adapter v3
unable to find specified path.
I tried to install awsTap.inf directly by right clicking on the file and selecting "install". I obtained the error "element not found"
I tried a second time and this time the driver was correctly installed.
As none was changed in the awsTap.inf file I think there is some problem in detecting the path of the awsTap.sys file or some other that i don't know.
Now in device manager i found that all unknown device nodes of class "NET" where installed with Avast! driver !!
(really cute about easy installation!!! ... if you consider that i spent about 60 euro to buy Avast! SecureLine product).
Now i had to delete from device manager GUI the duplicated awsTap entries, i had to manually install a fake "generic software driver" to the entry "test" and finally i succeded in deleting that entry.
Finally i tested your SecurLine VPN Service and connected correctly!!
I have not really understood while Avast! (or better OpenVPN's) inf file failed.
But now the product works and i cannot spend a life to know all that is knowable about installing a driver and the structure of an inf file.
All is interesting but the life is limited and it's a good thing to study strictly only the necessary things.
If someone can explain i wil be happy..