Does Avast scan the Preview Pane for viruses? I saw in a newspaper column that a person should disable the Preview Pane to avoid unwanted material. Thanks.
yes…avast should scan emails even before they appear in the preview pane…
Shgoh is right. Please note however that previewing is the same as opening the email to your email client. That means that webbugs may be activated. Webbugs are not viruses but something that indicates to the sender that your email has been received and viewed, this is especially useful to spammers so that they know to send you more spam.
So even with avast! or any virus scanner I still prefer not to use the preview pane. You never know what kind of garbage may pop up in it.
If you must preview messages I would use a program such as MailWasher that can view messages on the server without activating webbugs, viruses, and such.
Thank you, shgoh, for your quick and reassuring reply! Long live Avast!
And thank you, Jarron. I had just sent my thank-you to shgoh when your very helpful reply arrived. I already had turned off the Preview Pane to see how I liked not having it. It didn’t seem like a lot of trouble, although I had to get used to double-clicking any message I wanted to open. So, although I’m not sure which way I’ll go, I’m grateful for all the help.
If the e-mail is highlited, you can use CTRL+O key combo to open the e-mail.
P.S.
The 1st e-mail message is usually highlighted .
It is always better to close the preview pane in the unsecure Outlook Express…
avast will catch the virus if you correctly configure it: Internet Mail provider running (ashMaiSv.exe) and set ‘scan inbound mail’ 8)
Thank you, Technical, for your reply. I’m afraid I don’t understand your message–because I’m not real computer savvy.
How do I correctly configure avast to catch the virus? I don’t remember ashMaiSv.exe.
I’m also unsure about your meaning. If properly configured, will avast catch viruses in the Preview Pane? Or should I never use Preview Pane, even with avast correctly configured?
Perhaps I should have mentioned that I’m using a mail program called IncrediMail. In the avast help section, I found the following:
“Internet Mail—Provider Settings
Internet mail provider is used to protect the e-mail process by other e-mail clients than MS Outlook, a MS Exchange.” Then there’s a choice between “Normal” and “High.”
Does this apply to me?
Thank you for your patience. I guess I need step-by-step help here.
Depends. If you have more than 256Mb of RAM, you probably can configure avast to scan all files (open/created/modified) without a lack of resources.
If you slow down your system too much, please, write at least, the following lines:
Scan files on open:
WS?,VBS,VBE,JS,JSE,HTA,WSF,WSH,SHS,SHB,HTM*,PIF,EXE,PIF,COM,SCR
Scan created/modified files:
ACE,ARC,ARJ,BZIP2,CAB,COM,ECE,EXE,GZ,GZIP,LHarc,MIME,PST,RAR,TAR,WinExec,ZIP,ZOO
What do you mean? ashMaiSv.exe is the executable file of avast Mail Service. You must have it running to scan your emails.
I suggest you close your preview pane in IncrediMail (the behavior is the same on Outlook Express). Properly configurated means:
- all windows patches applied (specially SP1 and those ones related to OE)
- avast sensibility set to ‘High’
- good firewall
If you are at the Internet Mail settings yes, this applies to you.
But it’s better to change the Standard Shield sentivity to High too.
Do you have any other question? ;D
Thanks again, Technical. I will stop using Preview Pane and will check my configurations. Sorry about not remembering what ashMaiSv.exe is. I recall setting up avast to handle IncrediMail, but I didn’t remember how I did it! Still don’t, in fact, but I’m sure I can work it out.
Midway, you gently asked and I tryed to answer… this is our life in these forums. 
I started to use mozilla 2 days ago.Is there a way to turn off and on the preview pane like in OE?
-max
Midway, you gently asked and I tryed to answer… this is our life in these forums.
And I certainly do appreciate all your efforts, Technical. I’m just a bit slow at understanding.
yes you can…go to the menu on top…view…show/hide…untick message pane
Thanks bud!
-max