Hi,
I just installed avast! 5.1.889 on Windows XP Home SP3 after I had removed a previous version with the uninstall tool and additionally cleaned the registry with ccleaner.
Now no website loads in either IE or Firefox. The error message states that the connection was reset by the server.
I had disabled Windows XP firewall, no use.
I have disabled all shields one by one, and it seems that the Web Shield is stopping the connections. If it is stopped, Internet works.
I also discovered that Windows XP firewall did not have avast! as an exception, after adding it Internet worked with the Web Shield activated, but only until the next reboot.
Also, I cannot register avast! (but no error message appears), and the update cannot connect to the update server.
I can ping the websites, but telnet 80 is not working (as it does on another computer).
Well the XP firewall has zero outbound protection and these exceptions don’t actually do anything, so it would appear to have been a lucky coincidence when connections started to work.
The web shield doesn’t monitor https traffic so it should work.
Not being able to register would indicate that all is not correct with your installation and this may be what is causing the problem with the web shield.
Try a repair of avast. Add Remove programs, select ‘avast! Anti-Virus,’ click the Change/Remove button and scroll down to Repair, click next and follow. You may need to reboot after the repair.
I repaired (twice and repooted), but no change.
I can load https sites with Web Shield enabled, but still no other pages.
Mail is also not working (Thunderbird, IMAP, several provider).
Disabling Web and Mail Shield, and everything is fine.
Except that I cannot update virus definitions, or program, even with all shield disabled - cannot connect to server error.
I uninstalled, used the cleaner tool and ccleaner and reinstalled. I rebooted after every step.
The avast! installer reported “Error: Cannot connect to server”, but finished successfully after the initial scan.
All problems persist.
Maybe something’s wrong with my TCP/IP stack? Shouldn’t be the network driver as both LAN and WLAN are having the same problem. Could that be - and how to check/repair?
Hi DavidR,
I checked the regsitry keys and the folder exists.
The other link provided does not work (ERROR: You are not allowed to view this article or the article does not exist. )
Downloading messages actually works now (Webshield on, Mailshield on).
When sending, the following message pops up:
Fehler beim Senden der Nachricht [Error sending the message]: Der Mail-Server hat keine korrekte Begrüßung gesendet [The mail server did not sent a correct greeting]: Cannot connect to SMTP server 2xx.2xx.1x.1x7 (2xx.2xx.1x.1x7:587), connect error 10061.
and then:
Senden der Nachricht fehlgeschlagen. [Sending the message failed]
Die Nachricht konnte nicht gesendet werden, weil die Verbindung mit dem SMTP-Server smtp.xxx.de mitten in der Transaktion verloren wurde. [The message could not be sent because the connection with the SMTP server smtp.xxx.de was lost in the middle of the transaction]
I don’t know why the support site link doesn’t work for you, I have just opened it. I don’t know if you have cookies disabled, in may use cookies.
Your email appears to be being sent using port 587, this isn’t the normal SMTP port (25). Have you disabled SSL in your Thunderbird email account settings for those that are having the problem ?
Avast should be able to handle the secure connection, if your email accounts are set to use SSL avast can’t scan them and I don’t know if that would give the timeout problem you are experiencing.
I use the Thunderbird provided settings: Port 587 and STARTTLS and username/pw.
I tried various port combinations with Mail Shield on & Web Shield off, nothing went through:
No encryption port 25, STARTTLS port 25 and 587, SSL/TLS 465 (default) 443, 143, encrypted and normal password.
Except for 443 I immediately received an error (Timeout - can’t be actually) upon clicking Send. For 443, it seemd to connect but then after 5s error again.
Turning Mail Shield off, and ports 25, 587 and 465 work.
I used two SMTP gateways, same result.
I am probably ok with Mail Shield off, but Web Shield should be on, but then no http traffic goes through.
I can read the knownledgebase article now, requires additional registration.
Sounds like a nice solution, but not for my problem. I did as described anyways, but same result. Error - timeout and not correct greeting.
And it should not work in the end, as the smtp servers require authentication, which the Mail Shield proxy cannot provide.
I have essentially the same problem. Nag screens forced me to update from Avast 4.8. I download the 57 Mb Avast 5.1.889. Things went smoothly, but I wasn’t able to connect to the internet or send/receive email without disabling the Web and Mail Shields. Subsequent research suggested that Avast 5.0.667 might be more stable. I downloaded AwsClear5.exe (Avast’s uninstall doesn’t work) and uninstalled Avast 5.1.889 in Safe Mode (WinXp Sp3). Then I downloaded and installed Avast 5.0.667 (approx 53 Mb). I continued fiddling with the [WebShield.Expert_Settings.SSL_Accounts] settings and was able to send/receive email via OutLook Express 6 by setting [Encryption] to “None”. Meanwhile, I had been trying to download a 20Mb FireWall utility over my 56k dialup connection–and progress was glacial. The download window showed that it was using only 1/2 of the available bandwith. I finally figured out that Avast 5.0.667 was updating (and eating up my bandwidth). I’ve been through this kind of thing before–where you download a 50 Mb program, and then it downloads another 50 Mb. Moreover, I suspected that I might not have ad Avast 5.1.889 configured properly. There was no way to disable Avast’s download–which I didn’t want. Apparently Avast killed my download when I tried to kill it via TaskMgr. So I reset the computer, verified that my email still worked, and decided to try to reinstall 5.1.899. I removed Avast 5.0.667 in safe mode. Then I reinstalled Avast 5.1.889. Avast had preserved my [SSL_Accounts] settings, but I still wasn’t able to connect to the internet or send/receive email without disabling the Web and Mail Sheilds. So I re-uninstalled Avast 5.1.889 and re-installed Avast 5.0.667. I verified that I had internet/email access. But this time, I ran the AVS update and let it run. And it ran for about 2 hours using about 75% of my dialup-connection’s bandwith (very, very slow). After it completed updating the virus database, I retested my email/internet connections. Both failed. In short, Avast 5.0.667 works great UNTIL it updates itself; and then it doesn’t work anymore. So I disabled the Web and Email Sheilds. Here are pictures. Hmmm. Well, I have the error message pictures, but can’t seem to post them.
The weirdest one was the new SECURITY WARNING popup that appears each time that I try to display a new page on this forum. The popup is titled “Do you want to view only the webpage content that was delivered securely?”. It goes on to say: “This webpage contains content that will not be delivered using a secure HTTPS connection, which could compromise the security of the entire webpage.” I didn’t expect a high-security connection to this forum. I just kept clicking “yes”. Anyway.
I hope that works for you as I find it strange how you can connect to https and not http with the web shield enabled if there was a problem with winsock as I would have thought that would have been across the board and even with the web shield disabled.
Sorry to say but I didn’t think it would work, as the symptoms were an indication of a winsock issue as you wouldn’t have been able to connect even with the web shield disabled.
Try this, manually set firefox to use the avast localhost proxy.
Tools, Options, Advanced, Network, Connection section, Settings button, from the next window, select Manual Proxy configuration. In the HTTP Proxy: enter localhost, in the Port: enter 12080 (see image), click OK and restart firefox.
With a proxy set for the web shield in firefox and the web shield disabled would fail as the proxy isn’t running so there would be no point in testing that condition.
I’m at a loss as to why the connection reset error is happening as I thing it is effectively getting through the proxy for the connection reset error to be displayed. Unfortunately this area network connections isn’t something I’m familiar with.
Can you check some settings? For mail, TB should be set up like the example for pop3 attached (imap similar imap.gmail.com, port 143, no encryption). whatever the servers are for your accounts. Under mail shield/expert settings/ssl accounts you should see something like attachment 2 for your accounts.
Problem solved - I have reinstalled Windows. ;D
I am convinced that there was a problem with my network adapter, IP stack, sockets, whatever. Another update program could not connect to its server either as I discovered. Strange why FF and TB and ping, trace, nslookup had no problem, but some oter programs did. Anyway, I couldn’t find the problem, reinstall went quick, avast! runs fine now.
Thanks for your help. Good to know that this is an active forum.
