I installed Avast 4.8 a couple of weeks ago and worked fine. A couple of days ago I started to receive a popup from Avast to restart windows. The trouble is that after restarting and booting process is complete, in another minute the popup appears again. This happens each time I reboot.
I am running Windows XP Pro SP2, Avast 4.8 with 1195 program.
Any ideas what could cause this?
Frank1
Operating system restart needed by avast message - First check the contents of the C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\Setup\setup.log file, which should show you why it thinks the reboot is needed.
This may be solved, in some systems, by deleting the file C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\Setup\reboot.txt. With the avast self-defence module it will complain so disable that first, Program Settings, Troubleshooting.
Thank you DavidR for your suggestions.
I am not at that computer now. I will check it out in about 7 hours from now and get back with the result.
Thanks
Frank1
You’re welcome, that’s me for the night, just after 2 a.m here and my bed is calling.
I removed the reboot.txt file and rebooted. The popup to restart windows appeared again. The reboot.txt file returned. I am unable to keep it deleted.
I got desperate and tried to do arepair via the Add or Remove Programs. Still the same. Then I thought I should uninstall Avast and reinstall.
The only way I see that it can be uninstalled is by using the Add or Remove Programs and selecting the Uninstall option. The only problem is that when I press the Next button, the uninstall window disappears and nothing.
So I think I have bigger problems that the popup appearing. How do I Uninstall so that I can start from scratch?
Frank1
Download this program>>aswclear.exe and run it.This will completely uninstall avast. After that reinstall avast.
Thanks Rassel. I went to the website to download the file. The instructions state that first I need to reboot into Safe Mode.
I have another problem - I am unable to boot successfully into Safe Mode. Keeps reseting and rebooting before the boot is complete. There is popup in the window before each reset, but it’s there for too short a time for me to read what it says.
Should the aswclear.exe work in fully booted mode into admin mode?
If not, would it help to boot onto a CD I have (ReatoGo - Bart PE) which has access to the file system and operates as a slow Windows XP. Could I then launch the aswclear.exe and have it remove Avast?
Thanks
Frank1
I am unable to boot successfully into Safe Mode. Keeps reseting and rebooting before the boot is complete.What about start the window normally and run the program normally?
Had to disable the self-defense module, then went o/k.
Reinstalled Avast. Hope it will work now.
I’ll wait and see.
Thanks Rassel
Frank1
Welcome and good luck to you. Avast!
The aswClear.exe should tell you to disable the self-defence (which I would have though you and turned off for the removal of reboot.txt) otherwise it would stop aswClear cleaning up avast and the registry entries, etc.
Hopefully that should resolve it as the problem was likely to be in the registry, which would have been the next step since the removal of reboot.txt didn’t work. Unfortunately I was tucked up in bed when your reply came.
After reinstallation it has gone o.k overnight.
My Avast application is still 1169 and I won’t update it manually since I did that before and I think that was the cause of my problem with the popup to reboot. I’ll wait for it do it automatically.
Thanks Rassel and DavidR
Frank1
It won’t make difference if the update is manually or automatic started… imho.
I have had this problem possibly since downloading XP SR3 so I will be interested to know if the fix worked.
Where is the 1169 or 1170 appear as I don’t see it in About. I thought the problem might have been because the initial Avast upgrade tried to start in an user account rather than one of thr admin accounts on my XP Pro setup.
Thanks in advance.
Wuz
Wuz, I don’t know about SR3, I run XP SP2. If launch the About Avast from the Avast icon in the system tray, then click on the plus on the left of ‘avast! version 4.8 Home Edition’ it will expand to show the Build and other things.
You have a good idea. Maybe I had the problem because I tried to update manually in the limited user mode.
Tech, what do you thing about that? Should I try it out?
Frank1
Frank,
It’s 4.8.1201 and if you get it with SP2 it’s unlikely to be my SP3 so I will just click no to reboot until I have time to look at it later!
thanks,
Wuz
I have some real bad news.
I reinstalled Avast yesterday.
All went o/k.
Waited for program update.
A while ago got a popup from Avast to say that a new update is available.
I clicked on the popup to download. All went o/k. At the end asked for reboot.
I clicked on Yes and rebooted.
About a minute after reboot was finished, asked for another reboot.
I accepted again.
About a minute after reboot completed I got the reboot message again.
I checked the setup.log file. At that stage it was 262kb in size. Found a line containing ‘NeedReboot=true’ not far from the end.
I rebooted by accepting the Yes in the Avast popup again.
As it was booting up I launched windows explorer as quick as I could. The setup.log file was still 262Kb. waited for about a minute, and of course the popup arrived and straight away after that the setup.log file went to 294Kb.
This is what I found in the setup.log file. about 50 lines from the end:-
20:29:38 vrb/reg Set registry: Software\Alwil Software\Avast\4.0\Version=4.8
20:29:38 vrb/reg Set registry: Software\Alwil Software\Avast\4.0\VersionShort=4.8
20:29:38 vrb/reg Set registry: Software\Alwil Software\Avast\4.0\SetupVersion=1201
20:29:38 nrm/pkg Transferred: files 0, bytes 0, time 0 ms
20:29:38 nrm/pkg Retries: total 0, files 0, servers 0
20:29:38 vrb/fil NeedReboot=true
20:29:38 vrb/sys Delete on reboot(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\Setup\reboot.txt)
20:29:38 vrb/fil MoveFileEx(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\Setup\reboot.txt, NULL)
20:29:38 vrb/fil MoveFileEx(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\Aav5.tmp, D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\Aavm4h.dll)
20:29:38 vrb/fil MoveFileEx(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\Aav6.tmp, D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\AavmGuih.dll)
20:29:38 vrb/fil MoveFileEx(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\Aav7.tmp, D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\AavmRpch.dll)
followed by about another 40 MoveFiles and then:-
20:29:38 vrb/fil MoveFileEx(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\asw44.tmp, D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\aswCmnOS.dll)
20:29:38 vrb/fil MoveFileEx(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\asw45.tmp, D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\aswCmnS.dll)
20:29:38 vrb/fil MoveFileEx(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\asw46.tmp, D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\aswEngin.dll)
20:29:38 vrb/fil MoveFileEx(D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\asw47.tmp, D:\PROGRA~2\ALWILS~1\Avast4\aswScan.dll)
20:29:38 min/gen Return code: 0x20000000 [Something done]
20:29:38 min/gen Stopped: 17.05.2008, 20:29:38
The reboot.txt file also appears just after the restart popup.
These last 50 lines or so are the same as the last 50 lines after the previous boot.
During this installation and update process I was in admin mode - no question about the limited user mode. This update was for version 1201 which is what the About Avast states.
I hope someone can figure this out.
Frank1
To temporarily disable the avast self defense module:
- Right click the ‘a’ blue icon on system tray.
- Programs settings > Troubleshooting (tab)
- Disable self defense module
Then delete the reboot.txt file.
If it fails, let the self defense module disabled and try to repair your installation (Control Panel).
Removed reboot.txt and rebooted. After the minute it asks for reboot again.
I think that deleting reboot.txt doesn’t do anything because the boot process deletes it anyway. When it boots and I launch windows explorer, there is no reboot.txt. It is created at the time that the popup to reboot appears.
I did a repair from the control panel. It asked me to reboot a number of time now.
It didn’t fix it. I did this before I reinstalled Avast a few days ago. It didn’t do anything then either.
Frank1
As I said a few days ago it is likely to be in the registry so you might have been able to avoid a reinstall.
Try this.
You can also check this registry entry (right after computer restart):
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager, if it contains “PendingFileRenameOpertaions”.
Check its contents and if there’s only “reboot.txt” from avast4\setup folder, delete PendingFileRenameOperations, don’t delete any other key.
Back-up (export) the registry key before you edit/delete, just in case.
You should also delete the reboot.txt file if it exists before rebooting to see if this resolves the problem.