I’m using windows vista on my laptop and I’ve been running avast for a few years now. Yesterday I decided to try windows essentials and this made a big mess to say the least. My machine locked up and would not boot up unless in safe mode. Come to find out, you must first remove avast before installation of windows essentials. I had not done this. So I removed avast and I still had problems with freeze-ups. I then decided to do a system restore to an earlier date to fix the problem. As soon as this was complete, everything went back to normal except my avast software. It started giving me the following message: “avast! service GUI component has stopped working” and Windows says it will search for a solution and notify me if found. So, I reinstalled the newest version of Avast 5 and its working fine except I’m still getting the pop-up message after a reboot or startup saying: avast! service GUI component has stopped working". Does anyone have a clue on how to remove this message? Thanks
I suggest an installation from scratch:
- Download the latest version of avast! Uninstall Utility and save it.
- Download the latest avast! version and save it.
- Uninstall avast from Control Panel (if possible). If, for any reason, you can’t run it, try booting in Safe Mode and doing it from there. Anyway, boot after that.
- Run the avast! Uninstall Utility saved on 1. If, for any reason, you can’t run it, try booting in Safe Mode and doing it from there. Anyway, boot after you’ve run it.
- Install avast! using the setup saved on 2. Boot.
- Register your free copy or add the license key for Pro.
- Check and post the results.
I saw your post in another part of the Avast forum and downloaded the uninstaller and the latest version of avest 5, followed your instructions and the result is the same. “avast! service GUI component has stopped working” The new version of Avast 5 is working fine without a problem, but for some reason the windows startup is picking up something (service GUI) it thinks is not working. Never seen anything like this.
Can you test if the Troubleshooting option of delaying avast services help?
Using Avast trouble shooting, I put a check in the delay start program and got the same message after reboot. ??? ???
Are there minidumps (mdmp) files here?
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast5\Setup
(or C:\Users\All Users\Alwil Software\Avast5\log).
Maybe you can zip them and send to vlk (at) avast (dot) com
Is there any remains of Microsoft Security Essentials? You have done system restore - it’s possible that some MSE drivers (or such) remains on your system.
I think you don’t have MSE uninstaller anymore, so if you have time, please follow this:
After Tech’s No.4 process, install MSE → reboot → uninstall MSE → reboot.
Then install avast again. This procedure should clean all remains of MSE.
Thanks…I’ll give it a try and get back to you on the results.
I fixed the problem!!! ;D 
OK…This is what I did to get rid of the message. I used the Avast uninstaller to fix the error message. I was prepairing to uninstall Avast 5 when I noticed the drop down giving me more than 1 option to uninstall several Avast programs. Just for the heck of it, I selected Avast 4 to be uninstalled because this is the version I was using before trying to install MS Essentials. As soon as I started the uninstall, it listed several files still remaining on my computer belonging to Avast version 4. Once complete, I did a restart and the message was gone!!! That said, uninstalling the remaining files belonging to Avast 4 stopped Avast version 5 from working on my machine. So, using the Avast uninstaller, I uninstalled Version 5 and reinstalled it from scratch and now everything is working as advertised. I have no desire to try running MS Essentials again, because I have learned the hard way that Avast works much better with a lot less trouble. Thanks to all for your help. I hope this fix helps someone else with the same problem. Best regards, JD Sands