I have this very determined software that will not go away. Avast4 which is Alwil software. It is driving me crazy. A family member thought I might like it but it has caused nothing but problems. CCleaner transfers it to clean up but never deletes and it keeps coming up when I analyise the system. Please help.

Hi Simone,
Welcome to the forums !
You bring up a very important point for many users of Avast4. I am also a user of Avast4.
Avast4 is a very good anti-virus program. As such it prevents "Bad Guy" programs from deleting it's files.
This is a good thing.
If you do not want to see those files reported then you can untick that option at Cleaner > Applications tab > Utilities list > *Avast Antivirus
davey
P.S. Every now and then you can tick it to clean the buildup of other non-important files and turn it back off.

I thought you were using AVG Davey?

Both AVG 7.5 sometimes real-time and mostly Avast.
Love them both plus Malwarebytes Free. for quick update and scan.
davey

Nothing can clean anything out of the Avast installation folder, only Avast itself can clean the logs now since they introduced the self-protection - so trying to clean it with CCleaner or any other tool whilst self-protection is turned on will fail. You can turn off self-protection, but I just can't recommend doing that unless you specifically want to remove Avast.

Note: Alwil also has Avast Uninstall Utility if it won't uninstall:
http://www.avast.com/eng/avast-uninstall-utility.html

So you have three systsm installed? Thats a bit dodgy. If you read any reports on virus checkers you only need one installed else they are supposed to conflict with each other.

AVG 7.5 is still supported this month, I've just installed the update today. The must have postponed it again until more users start with v8.0.

Yup, I'm still using it till it's no longer supported (though thank god they dumped the "Update to AVG 8" nag screens).

Though I have been tempted to dump it this week having had two false positives in the space of a week (after not had a simgle fp from it in the years I've been using it)

Add SUPERAntispyware Free Edition,SpywareBlaster, and WinPatrol to that list.
Nothing dodgy at all.
I only have one Real-time active at any one time. The others used at different times and kept current. Never know when you might need them, so it is important to have them already installed and up-to-date. None of the scanners have had any conflicts with any activated real-time scanning. That is either Avast or AVG 7.5 . No problems with AVG Rootkit scanning either.

Malwarebytes (MBAM) scan has no problem running while Avast is active. For me at least. Update and Quick Scan takes approximately 7-8 minutes daily.

Have no problems running MBAM scan with Real-time Symantec either on another PC. All others installed on that PC also. Encountered no problems yet other than MBAM finds things that Symantec doesn't or ignores I quess. I do not have Avast installed on that PC yet.

CCleaner cleans them all also. Whenever I want them cleaned, I tick them and untick after. Security logs are of special value to me.
davey

I am happy I switched to Avast! Free after the "Update to AVG 8" nag episode and the people on their forum are very nice compared to the abusive people in the AVG forum.

I like Avast but only without the skins.

I have exactly the same problem,but avast in not listed in applications-utilities ?

My sis's computer was acting up so I drove over and took a looksee. After I installed & ran MBAM and got rid of 2 trojans and a rootkit it worked fine. But she had Symantec AV. I told her about Avast and got rid of Symantec, installed Avast Home free, registered her, turned off the sounds, disabled that VRDB or whatever it is. So now she's doing okay. Yes, I ran CCleaner and got rid of 150 MB of junk.

Hi brickie10,
Welcome to the forums. We love new members.
In order to get Avast and many other Applications listed on your Applications tab , you will need to put a copy of a file called winapp2.ini into your C:\Program Files\CCleaner folder.
This file contains cleaning entries for many Applications that have been submitted by other members just like you. Many users also use this file.
You can get that file at this link. http://forum.piriform.com/index.php?showtopic=1110
At the bottom of the first post you be able to download a copy of winapp2.ini .
Once you put that file inside your CCleaner folder then you just run CCleaner and you will see new Applications listed on your Applications tab. Then you can turn off the option for Avast cleaning.
Any problems come back here.
davey

Bet you sure surprised your Sis !!!
Good work,sis.
davey

VBDB ("Virus Database Recovery") should be left on! It's needed to restore files to an un-infected state should they become infected. If you review the built-in Avast help file it clearly states what I've mentioned, and is a critical part of Avast.

Hmmm, maybe it is, but i have disabled it.

Simone, has your original question been answered?
Avast is a very good antivirus; it should not be irritating or giving you problems, and if it is, perhaps a better first step would be to find out why (which then proposes the question: what are these problems), rather than trying to use CCleaner to "delete" it.
If you truly want Avast gone the correct procedure is to uninstall it. To do that it would be best to disable the self protection in the settings, exit the application, then run its own uninstaller, and maybe finish up by running the Avast uninstall utility.
Of course, if you do that you will still need an antivirus of some description to replace it with.

What are you trying to achieve, and exactly why?

Why?

It is not a large file and provides recovery protection.

I just turned on VDBD now and the Task Manager shows it's using between 40 to 70% of my ram. That's why I turned it off.

And if you let the VRDB finish building its database, how much RAM does it use afterwards?
When it first builds, it gets fairly busy. Subsequently, not so much.
Following some MS updates, it rebuilds if the files involved have changed, I think. These activity "spikes" are normal, though I haven't seen that much RAM usage before, myself.

I also use avast and love it. I have VRDB doing its thing when the screen saver comes on.

The following is a copy of how avast describes the principke and settings of VRDB:

VRDB PRINCIPLE

avast! creates an integrity database, i.e. it stores information about the actual state of the files, doing it three versions back for each file. The database creation/maintenance is performed either when the computer is idle, or when the screen-saver is running (any screen-saver, not only the avast! one). This database, once it is created, is updated each three weeks (this value may be changed by editing avast4.ini).
If a file is infected by a virus, it may be possible to repair it using the information stored in VRDB, i.e. turn it to its original state. If there are multiple versions of the file in the database, you can choose which version you want to restore.

SETTINGS

The settings of VRDB can be changed by clicking on the icon in the system tray with the right mouse button. There are three options:

Generate VRDB when computer is idle. avast! will create its database only when the computer is idle, i.e. when it is not being used.
Generate VRDB only when screen-saver is running. avast! will create its database during the time screen-saver is running. It may be any screen-saver, not only the one included in avast!
Disable VRDB generation. avast! will neither create, nor update the database. If you select this option, it will not be possible to repair virus infected files in the future!

Yeah, it's not grinding away anymore so I turned off "Generate VRDB Now" and turned on "Generate when computer is idle". So I'll leave it as is.

How may ways can we spell 12^@ before it crawls back into home?
http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/bong.htm

Yo!

Kenny!

Are you saying my response was stoned?

They must have heard me, just had an update AVG NAG SCREEN. Quite amusing though as it said:

"The deadline is almost here. After august 25th 2008 AVG 7.5 will no longer be updated"