Avira Personal no updates - no notification!

Discussion in 'other anti-virus software' started by Mele20, Sep 4, 2007.

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  1. Mele20

    Mele20 Former Poster

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    I asked about this (nicely) over at Avira and got ignored. I got one reply from the not very helpful tech (who has been called rude here) and he didn't answer my question and I replied and asked again and have had no replies. So, maybe someone here can help me.

    I want to know how exactly does Avira alert you if there have been no updates after the time you set for notification to occur? I have Avira set to notify me if no updates take place after TWO DAYS (default setting is three days). I have the updater set to invisible so the only way I will know if something is wrong with updating is to periodically open the GUI and look at the date of the latest update or rely on the notification after 2 days of no updates. (I had to set the updater to invisible because I have it check every hour and it got to be irritating to get that popup box that sits itself on top of the minimize/restore/close buttons for my browser).

    Avira did not update for 5 DAYS and I got NO notification!!!! I even ran a rare full scan four days after the last update and didn't realize there had been no updates. I have never before used an AV that didn't scream and yell at me in ways in which I could not miss if updating stopped for a significant amount of time. I got no answer at Avira about what sort of notification does Avira do when updating stops for whatever reason. (In my case the updater was corrupted during an update). Avira has the setting for "invisible" updates so there obviously is some method of notification if updates stop. What is it? Should I have seen a big popup in the center of the screen? Should I have gotten a loud noise? Should the systray icon have changed in some way? What exactly did I not get?

    My trial of Avira Personal is up next month and I planned to buy it but I got ignored in Avira's support forum about something I think is important for any AV and it has raised some doubts in my mind. My suspicion is that possibly there was a popup and either the popup is designed poorly and does not remain on the screen until the user dismisses it (KAV was like that) so, if you are not at the computer when it pops up, you miss it and it doesn't pop up again because of poor design. Or, possibly, I have some setting, or ProcessGuard, or Proxo, etc. that somehow has blocked the notification. I asked if this might be the case in the Avira thread and was ignored. I don't know how to investigate the problem further because I don't know exactly what I was supposed to get as a notification. I also am wondering if the notification is dependent on the Guard being installed. I have been using Avira for the last three months as on demand only. So, in the systray I see a closed umbrella. Maybe the notification uses the Guardo_O

    I like Avira better than any other AV I have used but their support ...well there is one helpful tech in their forum and the other tech is uniformly rude and abrupt and frequently ignores users questions or answers only part of their questions (as happened to me). I specifically asked what sort of notification I was supposed to get and the reply was "You should get a notification". Really helpful. :( I don't think he read my post carefully and didn't bother to read my reply either. I want to know how to prevent this from happening in the future. Of course, if the problem is that Avira pops a notice on the screen and leaves it there only briefly and only the one time...well I can't fix that but I want to know if that is how it is and when Avira plans to fix it.
     
  2. DVD+R

    DVD+R Registered Member

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    Ok first off All Avia is run by German People in Germany, and no Offence to German People as I'm a German Person Myself, but the problem that some people are experiencing with technical support at Avira is that replies are sent out in German, and probably given priority over other Language seaking people. This in fact is emphasiized when I called Avira personally the other day, only to find there are yet no options to talk to them other than in German. So I greatly doubt you were being Ignored, I suspect your request was forwarded to the Appropriate language section. As you can imagine this can be delayed. :)
     
  3. noons

    noons Registered Member

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    Yes I agree they dont have many english speaking people in their team. I beleive they are trying to provide support using translation tools and relying on the limited english speaking employees there. I had also sent them a question a while back and got a cryptic response to say the least.
     
  4. mercurie

    mercurie A Friendly Creature

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    I use Avira and like it right much, but if they ever want to get in the major leagues. They better get English support and that includes. an English forum. ;)
     
  5. berng

    berng Registered Member

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    I don't see the problem. Their forum seems to be evenly split between German and English.
    http://forum.antivir-pe.de/index.php?langid=1
     
  6. Mele20

    Mele20 Former Poster

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    Yes, the forum is divided into a German section and an English section. The techs have a very good command of English as do the mods. Stephan Berka posts here some and I think everyone agrees his English is excellent. Only very occasionally is there a problem because the most useful posts on an issue are in the German section and those of us who can't read German can't benefit from those posts. Usually though someone will try to translate to English. Most of the time the language is not a problem and I didn't mean to imply that it was.

    I did get an answer specific to my question today from one of the mods. :) He posted a screenshot of how the slideup looks (the notice was in German but I didn't have to understand all the words to get the idea of what the slideup looks like). ;)

    Evidently, if I understand the answer correctly, the notification is a slideup from the avira icon in the systray when avgnt.exe is loaded. There's the problem. I never shut down my machines and I avoid rebooting like the plague. My machines run 24/7 as do my browsers which I also avoid shutting down (doing so only when the memory usage for Firefox reaches 500,000k). So, I reboot only when a Microsoft patch requires it (which I install individually from Microsoft download site) or an application installation or uninstall requires it. I shut down only for hardware repairs or when going on vacation. So, no wonder I didn't see a slide up as I didn't reboot during the five days I had no updates.

    The mod also said he wasn't sure if the Guard had to be active to get the slideup. I have been using Avira just as on demand scanner for the past several months. When we get the big upgrade coming any day now, I'll probably start using the Guard again so if having the Guard not installed was the problem that is easily fixed. If the problem was caused though by my not shutting down or rebooting frequently...well that I cannot change. Computers cannot be shut down in Hawaii in residences as there is usually no airconditioning and they need to be on all the time or corrosion is much faster and the life the of the computer is much less. Besides, why would I shut down ever or reboot? I want my computers on 24/7 as I am on cablemodem and want instant access to the internet.

    Also, in regards to the English section of the Avira forum we do see tabs in German instead of English and descriptions for smilies, etc. is in German. I think those issues will be fixed with the overhaul of the forum software due by the end of this year. There are other issues with the forum software that affect both German and English sections and are irritating so an overhaul will be most welcome.
     
  7. argus tuft

    argus tuft Registered Member

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    Mele20, Provided the notifications are working correctly, avira will notify you with a small popup box that says something like " your protection is out of date. Your computer may not be fully protected", and it gives you two options, update, and ok.

    Whether your updates are set to invisible or not should make no difference, as it doesn't seem to be the updater that is resposible for the notification.
     
  8. Diver

    Diver Registered Member

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    I had been away for 4 days and found it difficult to update Avira on Vista installed in a VM. It would go several minutes and then quit without an update. On the fourth try, or so, it went through.
     
  9. Leo2005

    Leo2005 Registered Member

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    oh sorry, i did not had the english version installed when making the screenshot. it means that the last update is older than 3 days

    it seems not to be connected. but you can test it if you want. kill the avgnt.exe via taskmanager and restart it.
    could you tell us which parts are still in german for english Users? i found the smilies but nothing more. o_O
     
    Last edited: Sep 5, 2007
  10. Mele20

    Mele20 Former Poster

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    Hi Leo,
    I didn't mind that the screenshot was in German...I didn't have to know exactly what it said....just seeing what it looked like was enough and I could guess what it said.

    Radu has replied and you can read my reply. I'm not happy at all.

    For those here reading who don't want to traipse over to Avira forum to read the thread, Radu said that the notification is tied to booting so that is why I didn't see it because I never shut down my computers (except when on vacation or to do hardware work on them) nor do I reboot except when absolutely necessary so I may not reboot for weeks and may shut down only a few times a year.

    Radu said that tying the notification to booting was on purpose because almost everyone shuts their computer down at night. I seriously question that as anytime I have seen a discussion in a forum (and I have seen many on this topic) regarding do you shut your computer down or run 24/7 that the answers are split 50-50. He also mentioned saving electricity...well that is included in my rent so it doesn't save me any money although I try to act responsibly and not leave lights on in rooms when I am not there and my condo has moved to use only the new kind of lightbulbs in the common areas and in the individual apartments. However, no one would say you should turn off your computer to save electricity.

    The main issue for me is that turning off my computers shortens the lifespan considerably because I am in Hawaii with no airconditioning and the windows open to salt air 24/7. As for rebooting frequently so I would pick up the Avira message ....gee....one of the few things I like about XP is that I don't need to reboot every day like I did with 98SE and the resource issue on FAT32 computers. I go several weeks without rebooting. I hate rebooting and I won't do it for an AV. I'll find another AV if necessary. Sadly, I will not be recommending Avira to Hawaii users, or actually to anyone, because I firmly believe that it is in the best interest of the hardware to never shut the computer down no matter where you live and in Hawaii it is especially important to never shut down. Those who have taken my advice here have been amazed at how much longer their computers survive and have thanked me for my advice.

    In my case, I can either take the updater out of silent mode and have it irritate me every hour, change it to update less often so be less irritating, leave it in silent mode and try to remember every day to open the GUI and check there to see when the last update was...can't see at a glance though..as no big red letters warning about no updates, or I can take my chances that nothing will happen again to cause updates to stop or if they do I won't get infected because I don't realize they have stopped, or I can look for another AV since Avira says I'm in a tiny minority and they think their tying the notifications to booting is super duper great and they won't even consider changing it.

    As for the parts of the Avira support forum that are still in German, you are right! I learned which button did what when they were labeled in German and I was new there and so I never looked really to see what they say ...I just know which to click on for what I want...but I went and looked after I read your comment and to my surprise...the buttons are in English now...that's nice for newcomers! :) I did notice recently though when O wanted to use a smilie that they were in German and I wasn't sure about the one I wanted to choose...didn't want to choose the "mad" one when I wasn't mad but maybe just confused so I didn't choose any.
     
  11. mercurie

    mercurie A Friendly Creature

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  12. berng

    berng Registered Member

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    No need to be sorry. We all make mistakes. :)
     
  13. fredra

    fredra Registered Member

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    Mele seems to be the lucky one... at least she got positive responses to her concerns.
    I have been trying for the past 3 days, on their forum, to get a problem resolved, to no avail.
    If this is the way that you get support from AVIRA, then I may just forget using the AV.
    The people who like it can keep using it, to each his own. IMHO customer supprt for AVIRA is below standard. :mad: :mad: :mad:
    Cheers :)
     
  14. berng

    berng Registered Member

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    That's so unusual because the two times I posted were responded to very quickly.
    Can you post the links to your forum requests?
     
  15. trjam

    trjam Registered Member

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    Avira has an excellent support forum. Just give them a little time.
     
  16. Mele20

    Mele20 Former Poster

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    fredra, are you the one over there with the nVidia/AMD BSOD problem? I too like berng would like to know which thread is yours.

    I just came from Avira forum and they have WAY more posts than usual to deal with right now. This is partly due to the important upgrade earlier this week and minor problems and bugs folks have because of that. However, there was a BIG bug with Vista and evidently XP also for those with nVidia boards and nForce drivers. I have a nVidia board and nForce drivers and XP and was unaffected probably because I have never been able to use the rootkit detector and don't have it installed and it was involved in the nVidia problem. Avira fixed this BSOD very fast. They had a workaround posted after the first alert came in and between last night and today when I got on the computer they had fixed the problem completely and my Avira got the new driver while I was sleeping. I'd say that is VERY FAST solving the problem. Kaspersky likely would be denying there is a problem and other vendors would still be scratching their heads about fixing it. :D Nah...that is probably an exaggeration about Kaspersky but after reading their pitiful "solution" to the chkdsk problem I can't resist making comments like this. :(

    I don't think we should be too harsh on Avira support when there has just been a big upgrade and they have more than normal support issues. My question got addressed BEFORE the onslaught of posts after the big update. (So for once I had good timing when having a problem). ;) I am gratified to see Leo in this forum as usually I have only seen Stefan post here. I hope Leo can find the time to post here more frequently.

    I did have a very satisfactory conclusion to my problem in that I had several exchanges at Avira forum with one of the support techs (Radu) and although he was skeptical at first, he listened carefully (unlike the first tech who I think was in hurry and didn't read closely and who tends to be a bit too cryptic sometimes in his replies) and thought about what I was saying and then reversed his position on the matter and agreed to submit my request as a possible enhancement. I couldn't expect more than that (especially since Radu felt my situation was rather unique and there were workarounds). :)
     
  17. Antarctica

    Antarctica Registered Member

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    This is strange because I have WinXP Pro with nVidia board and nForce driver. I also have the Rootkit detector install and enable and but never had any BSOD or any other problem since I am using Antivir.
     
  18. Mele20

    Mele20 Former Poster

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    It depended on the specific drivers you have for nForce. Heise Security said this:

    "According to Avira's Thomas Salomon, the problem can occur if a computer has an Nvidia chipset and Nforce drivers from July or later. On Windows XP and Vista, the computer may then crash with a blue screen if Data Execution Prevention (DEP) is activated. "
    http://www.heise-security.co.uk/news/95672/from/atom10

    But Avira forum announcement (and the main thread on this) said something different and told folks to install the latest nVidia drivers from Microsoft which also didn't make any sense.

    "Together with the crash data and other collected information I sent Avira they seem to have done a superb job and squashed this irritating bug!
    They sent me an updated test version of avirapbb.sys and this did the trick: no more BSOD and a perfectly booting OS.

    The problem had to do with the following reason: "The mentioned misbehaviour seems to occur under Windows Vista 32 Bit with nForce chipsets together with the original Nvidia drivers installed (not the ones from Microsoft)."
    http://forum.avira.de/thread.php?threadid=26405 (dennis333 post)

    So, I am not sure if this did, in fact, affect XP users. I find it hard to believe Heise got it totally wrong...so I honestly don't know if this was just a Vista/nVidia problem or also affected XP if you had nVidia and had the rootkit detection installed. I also have not the vaguest idea what Avira means by be sure to install the nVidia drivers from Microsoft. I think they meant install the Microsoft drivers and not use the nVidia ones until a fix was produced but the instructions were not clear and then I read the Heise article which quotes Avira employee...and...well..I really don't know what the correct details are. :doubt:
     
  19. 031

    031 Registered Member

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    i had the update problem , was unable to update for 4 days .........
    went to avira's forum and found tons of posts about this. their servers are too much busy with the new upgrade . well this morning my antivir updated n the new version looks rock solid . it is impossible to terminate avguard . well the GUI didn't change , same old umbrella . whatever it updated n i am happy again ;) ;)
     
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