I originally posted under “I need help with Avast 7.” I am reposting this under the above topic so that it will be obvious if someone is looking for a cure. My problem was that Avast had overwritten, or taken possession of the registry key having to do with VBScript.
Through my Google searches (which have been very extensive) it seems to be documented that some AV programs do take possession of/overwrite this registry key. That certainly seems to be so in my case. I would like to share this resolution so that if any other Avast (or other AV) users run into this, there may be some help for them through this thread.
First, I could NOT find this key at all, even though a query through Command Prompt indicated that it was in residence.
HKCR\CLSID{B54F3741-5B07-11cf-A4B0-00AA004A55E8}\InprocServer32
Not only did I manually search many times, but I used the “Find” to search my entire registry for this key on 3 separate occasions and each time it came up with nothing. I have an old Gateway laptop running XP and I found the key in the registry on that computer, but not on my Dell desktop.
Through a thread I was led to MicrosoftFixIt 50181. After running this, I was able to find this key.
Before you do anything else, make a backup of this registry key and a restore point.
Under this key/InprocServer32 it shows
(Default) REG_SZ C:\Program Files\AlwilSoftware\Avast5\AhAScr.dll (here’s the problem)
Default Engine REG_SZ C:\Windows\system32\VBScript.dll
ThreadingModel REG_SZ Both
(Default) needs to be changed to show C:\Windows\system32\VBScript.dll under Data – the same as it shows under Default Engine. But first you have to take possession of the registry key. There are online guides to show how to do this. It was still a bit confusing for me, but I managed to get it right. Just do a search entitled “take possession of Registry Key” and you will find what I found.
After you take possession of the registry key, you just right click on the (Default) and select modify. In the box type C:\Windows\system32\VBScript.dll and click ok.
How I tested mine:
In the Event Viewer, when you select an entry in the viewer and the box opens, at the very bottom/left it gives a link where you can go online to find information for the item. When I first discovered my VBScript wasn’t working was when I clicked on that link and it brought up the ding and the error box telling me “Can’t find script engine for VBScript for script.”
As soon as I finished changing “C:\Program Files\AlwilSoftware\Avast5\AhAScr.dll” back to “C:\Windows\system32\VBScript.dll” in the registry key as described above, I went to Event Viewer and all was well again.
I hope this helps someone else on down the line who is Googling for an answer to why their OS “Can’t find script engine VBScript for script.”