Installed Avast 4.8 build 1201. After installation, received registration license key number, re-booted, and all went well… until…another user (with administrator rights) logged on and no virus program loaded. A message box popped up requesting a registration key license number. When the same license key that was entered when program was installed, it read “Invalid License Number.”
I sent an e-mail to Avast tech support and received a reply that advised me to run regedit in Command line, proceed through the registry keys to the Avast program, right click on Avast, choose “Permissions” and permit “all users to have their rights.”
Followed these instructions to the letter and it Did Nothing. I only have virus protection when I log on. Others who use their logon have “No Virus Protection.”
An important security utility like this should, when installed, protect “All Users” without this registration nonsense.
Once installed it is loaded at startup for the system and is not loaded again at each user logoff/logon and each user should inherit it as a basic system function. If you check the task manager you should see the ash*** and asw*** processes running.
I am a bit concerned by your reported system version, many of us are now on WinXP SP3. Running XP SP1 means that you are running without a lot of Windows security updates especially since updates to the operating system are no longer supplied to those on WinXP SP1.
Since you are running without a firewall I hope that you are at least behind a router or else you are leaving yourself even more vulnerable to attack.
Thanks for your security concerns. I am behind a firewall that is installed on the home network. I find it strange that this virus program does not support a “multiuser computer” yet you can run this software on multiple computers using the same license. I’m quite surprised no one else has taken issue with this problem.
What alanrf said was that avast! for XP is “not a multiiser service”. E.G. It won’t work on Windows Server with “Remote Desktop” / “Terminal Services” clients.
If by “multiuser computer”, you mean a PC with a number of “User Accounts” as MS calls them, on the one PC, avast! normally has no problems. If that were not the case, there would indeed be a deluge of complaints as you suggest.
As I see it, avast is definitely a “multi-user service” (whatever definition of “multi-user” service I can think of).
When you install it, it should work for all users. This includes users that are logged on individually, OR simulatenously (using Fast User Switching / Remote Desktop or other multi-user mechanisms).
Now, what quincy is describing is definitely not a feature, and is not how avast is supposed to behave (on a clean system, it’s not how it behaves). It may be a conflict with something else installed on the system, or with some customized security settings etc.
I simply can’t believe that you don’t even see ashServ.exe running (have you checked the “Show processes from all users” box?)
I mean, ashServ.exe is the avast service which loads even before users start logging on. That is, it would have to have a crystal ball to actually determine if it will be YOU who’s going to log on, or if it’s going to be somone else this time.
My user account and the 2nd user account are both set up as “Computer Administrators.”
In the Windows Explore tree, under Documents and Settings, All Users, my folder is named “Owner” and the other user has a separate folder of another name, not as a subset of the “Owner Folder.”
The Task Manager view on my logon “show processes from all users”… lists as follows…
Image Name User Name
ashWebSv.exe System
ashMaiSv.exe System
ashServ.exe System
ashUpdSv.exe System
aawservice.exe System
ashDisp.exe Owner
All of these processess are listed in [b]Task Manager on the Other User Account Logon. Im totally confused at this point in time. Although I’m no expert I am not computer illiterate.
As a review…
Avast only loads on my logon which is where the program was installed and the license key was entered.
Checked other user logon and opened Task Manager. Opened Processes tab and all processes associated with avast are running. This is an accurate accounting which, as I see it, avast is not running for the other user even when logged on first or at any other time. A popup box requests a license key number and when entered, as I explaind previously, it reads “Ivalid License Number.”
