I have Windows Defender installed on Windows 7 Home System. I get a message when I try to turn on Defender. I wanted to know if temporarily switching to Passive Mode & restarting computer “solve” the problem? I get a message when trying to turn on Defender that states it is blocked by group policy & contact system administrator. I am running computer as administrator & this edition of Windows 7 does not support the gpedit program (group policy editor).
When you install any 3rd party antivirus then windows disables windows defender to prevent two resident scanners being active and potentially conflicting.
Why would try install a 3rd party antivirus and then want to enable Defender ?
What is it that you are trying to achieve ?
I would like to take a full scan using Defender & then turn it off immediately afterwards is all I’m try to do. Thank you for quick reply.
You should be able to run a scan with windows defender without having to enable it, as far as I’m aware it is only the on-access element that is disabled.
Though you have to have the Periodic Scanning switched on, see attached image.
This is on my windows10 system and I have mine switched off, image 1 click to expand. You would have to check if this is an option on win7, which I don’t use.
That said I don’t know if that is available in win7, you could try a google search and see if/how you run a periodic scan.
Passive mode can be enabled within Avast if needs be, Menu > Settings > General > Troubleshooting, image 2.
I found a temporary work around to be able to scan. This work around may not work for more than a couple hours as registry will automatically reverse itself. I opened regedit (registry editor) & run as administrator. I then navigated to the left pane, navigate to the HKey_Local_Machine\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender.
Find DisableAntiSpyware key in the right pane and delete its value. For this purpose, you have to double-click on the REG –DWORD and set its value to 0. I closed registry editor & was able to open Windows Defender.
Added note: Turn off Real Time Protection in Defender if using any other antivirus protection program on your device.