avast won't uninstall or open

Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security
1

Here’s the entire background story behind my problem:

First off, I just recently switched to Windows 7. My Symantec antivirus software won’t work on 64 bit, so I needed a free antivirus program in the mean time to help protect my computer from viruses. I downloaded avast flawlessly and ran a virus scan immediately. I tried uninstalling Corel Paint while running the virus scan on avast because it wasn’t working properly. It said I had to close the avast to continue half way through uninstalling Corel Paint, which I did. I successfully uninstalled Corel, and my avast icon disappeared. Unfortunately, when I tried to reopen it, an error message popped up. And it reads:

“The program can’t start because MSVCP71.dll is missing from your computer. Try reinstalling the program to fix this problem.”

I tried to uninstall it so I could just reinstall it again and not worry about repairing it. I went to the control panel->programs->uninstall or change a program. I selected avast! Antivirus and clicked uninstall. When I tried to do that, this came up:

“There was an error during product uninstillation.”

So I looked up a few things and downloaded the avast uninstall utility to see if that would work. It didn’t because of the avast self-protection module. It said to go to settings and then troubleshoot (I can’t even open avast to begin with, so this is impossible).

I then tried to reboot and run in Safe Mode ( I did). And now when I try to run the avast uninstall utility the same exact error message pops up. I even went back and tried to uninstall it from the control panel again. Didn’t work.

I’m at a dead end here. I have to have an antivirus program, but I can’t even download another one with avast still on my computer because of incompatibility issues. If anyone can be of service here…I’d be grateful to no end. Thanks.

2

Just to confirm.
You’re using 4.8 version and even on Safe Mode the ashClear is saying that self-defense is on?

3

Yes, unfortunately.

4

Well that isn’t possible as avast doesn’t run in safe mode, so if avast isn’t running the self-defence module can’t be running, if avast is running then you aren’t in safe mode. I don’t believe that has changed in win7, but I don’t use win7.

That is the whole purpose of safe mode to be able to run it with limited applications and drivers, etc. so that problems can be investigated and hopefully resolved.

How are you getting into safe mode ?
You should notice that in safe mode you only have 800x600 resolution and 256 colours. Again I don’t know if that has changed in win7, about time if it does have normal resolution and colours.

5

I just rebooted in safe mode again and tried using aswclear to make sure it still wasn’t cooperating. It gave me the same self-defense message again.

6

I’m mashing F8 while rebooting. I hit the arrow keys down until I see Safe Mode. I hit enter and let it load. I’m in safe mode right now as we speak actually. I have no idea what’s going on with this computer.

7

Have you got any system restore points to restore the computer?. Try crapcleaner registry scan & clean up the computer

8

If when in safe mode, you check whatever is the win7 equivalent of Task Manager, what avast processes are running, they begin with ash and asw ?