"Failure - Security Options" error after upgrading to ver 6 on Vista Ultimate

Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security
1

I upgraded on Vista Ultimate virtual machine to Avast 6 a few minutes ago. I did it as an internal upgrade. Everything seemed fine after the installation. Online Armor was ok with it as was WinPatrol. So, I allowed Avast to reboot the machine. It booted to a blank window. It took me awhile to do anything as the mouse would move about but I could not get out of the blank window. Finally, I suddenly got thrown onto the main window for the default hidden Admin account (which I unhid long ago) for Vista. I should have been presented with a login screen where I would log into my Admin account not into the default Admin account. I noticed that Avast did not load on the default Admin account as it should have. Other programs loaded but I also noted I had no internet connectivity. After everything but Avast loaded, I tried to use the Start button to switch to my Admin account. I found the screen was frozen although the mouse moved but I couldn’t do anything.

I tried to bring up Task Manager and could not. Instead, I got a error message I had never seen before (googling later indicates it’s a common error message for Vista and frequently has to do with installation of Antivirus programs not intended for Vista). The error message stated: Login process has failed to create the security options dialog.

Since I could do nothing with the Vista machine, I shut it down and chose (it runs on Microsoft VPC 2007 SP1) to delete all changes to disk since I had started the machine. That put me back, when I rebooted it, to how it was BEFORE I installed Avast 6. (So, Avast 5.1889 is running fine on it now).

How do I successfully install Avast 6 on this machine? It has no Vista service packs but I read that Avast 6 is supposed to run on all versions of Vista so the lack of service packs (due to lack of virtual disk space) should not be a problem. Thanks.

2

Do you have any other security software on your machine other than what you mentioned?

What product of Avast are you using?

3

No other security programs.

I am using Avast free version. (I’ve really enjoyed Avast 5).

4

I suggest an Avast uninstall and clean install:

  1. Save a copy of Avast 6.0.1000 and save it to your HDD:
    Free: http://files.avast.com/files/avast6final/setup_av_free.exe
  2. Download the Avast Uninstall Utility http://files.avast.com/files/eng/aswclear6.exe and save it to your HDD (it has uninstall tools for all Avast versions and products).
  3. Disconnect from the Internet at this time.
  4. Go to Control Panel and uninstall Avast through Add/Remove Programs if possible and reboot.
  5. If Step 4 fails, boot into Safe Mode (hit F8 repeatedly) and run the Avast Uninstall Tool. Uninstall all previous versions of Avast at this time.
  6. Reboot.
  7. Install the newest version of Avast and reboot.
  8. Get Internet access and register your copy or add the license key for Free, Pro, or AIS.
    Free – http://www.avast.com/registration-free-antivirus.php
  9. Update the Avast definitions.

Let us know if this fixes your problem. Thank you.