AVGAS 7.5.1.36 does not start if guard.exe disabled or stopped

In what way does guard.exe compromise system security in Windows XP? The only problem with it now seems to be the fact that yet another process is consuming precious RAM in the background

Also, I can imagine having sets of installers/applications supporting various Windows versions will only waste resources from developers.

 

I decided to give AVGAS another try for on demand scanning after Peter.Ewido posted a bat file (this thread; post #25) to start the guard.exe service, then start AVGAS, and then close guard.exe after AVGAS is closed. I thought I would let everyone know it works like a champ. No, it isn't quite as good as having it built into the program, but it does what I wanted and I don't notice much difference.

Just copy the bat file into the folder where avgas.exe is located. Make a shortcut to the bat file on your desktop, etc. and set it to open minimized. When you click the shortcut the only real difference you will notice when AVGAS starts is that you will have two taskbar buttons for AVGAS instead of only one. Best of all when you close AVGAS the guard.exe service will stop also.

 

EUS,
Does having "unneeded" services running compromise the security of XP?
Or does that comment more relate to the fact that users are uninstalling useful security programs because of it?
There's no "loading" in this question, I simply don't know.

 

There has been an interesting discussion continuing here re the "extra" services in Vista
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,18485477

@Firebytes: maybe developers should be putting your batch file in the tools?

 

Hi Longboard,

I agree that they should put something into AVGAS to work as the bat file does but I can't take credit for the bat file, it was peter.ewido that wrote it.

I am just happy that I can now run AVGAS as an on-demand scanner on XP without the service constantly running.

 

I had 7.5.1.36 and the manual update downloaded the new version and then prompt me to restart AVGAS. It does restart but without the guard service, so i closed AVGAS and ran the batch file. To my surprise, avgas or guard doesn't show up after running the batch file. I'm currently unable to reboot the computer due to certain programs running.

This is getting annoying. If this doesn't get fixed by the next version, it's time to say goodbye.

 

Perhaps you should try with a reboot, before complaining? After all considering the nature of application one would think a reboot after updating the actual program is necessary to make sure all new things are installed and running.

 

If a reboot is required to complete the installation, shouldn't AVGAS asked the user to do that? And it did start the program after finish installing so i don't think a reboot is necessary.

I rebooted my computer anyway and still unable to run the batch file, launching the avgas.exe prompts me to reinstall. This is a sad sight after being an Ewido user for years.

 

Lucy,

Do you have the guard.exe service stopped and set to manual? Did you copy the text for the bat file that peter.ewido wrote into notepad and then save it with a .bat extension instead of a .txt extension? You then have to save that file in the same folder where the executable for AVGAS is located. If you have done that you should be able to just double click on the bat file to check and see if it's working for you. If it is then you can create a shortcut to the bat file on the desktop if you wish and run it from there.

Just trying to make sure you have it set right as it works great here.

Also if you had the guard.exe service set to manual before the program update and then AVGAS asked to be restarted you needed to say no and then restart AVGAS yourself after manually restarting guard.exe or having allowed the bat file to have restarted it. If you had let AVGAS try to restart itself after the update it wouldn't have been able to restart the guard service itself if you had previously run the bat file and it had stopped the guard service after AVGAS shut itself down.

 

Yes, the batch file is valid and was working before the update.

Your last sentence is a bit confusing. Since i launched the program with the batch file, the guard service was running at the time when i allowed AVGAS to restart itself. AVGAS did restart without any problems but the guard service wasn't running when i checked Task Manager.

Since the guard service is needed to perform scan/clean/update etc, i shut down AVGAS and executed the batch file again. This time, neither avgas or guard.exe are launched since the DOS window doesn't even show up. So i set the guard service to auto and rebooted the pc and repeated the steps but it didn't work either. Executing avgas.exe by itself opens a prompt window, asking me to reinstall.

And there you have it.

 

Sorry if my previous post was confusing. Hope this one is better.

I think where things went wrong for you was allowing AVGAS to restart itself after the program update, instead of closing it manually and then restarting it with the bat file. Since guard.exe was set to manual AVGAS could not restart it when it restarted itself. AVGAS doesn't have that ability, that's why we need the bat file. Perhaps this chain of events somehow interfered with the installation of the update.

Have you already tried uninstalling AVGAS and reinstalling it? Maybe doing that and then updating again without allowing AVGAS to restart itself will fix the issue.

 

Nope, reinstalling didn't help so i've decided to purge AVGAS from my computer and use SuperAntiSpyware instead.

Thanks for trying to help. Guess this is the last time i'll be using a software from Grisoft.

 

Sorry you couldn't get AVGAS working Lucy. Maybe someone else will come up with the answer for your problem and you can reinstall it if you so choose.

As far as SuperAntispyware I use it myself and think it's an excellent application. I have never had one problem with it. It is definitely my first choice for on demand scans. I just like to have more than one scanner on my system for a second opinion. After all, no program is pefect.

 

After using Ewido 3.5, 4.0 for the last couple of years and now AVG Antispyware 7.5 free with the latest definition "update" (to which I had no choice but to accept) it updated to build 7.5.1.43.

I have now decided to remove this program for good on my XP Pro box. I dont need the guard.exe service continually running in the background consuming resources since AVG-AS is used as an on-demand scanner on my system. And I do not want to mess around with scripts playing with the service - thats too messy. Thumbs down to AVG.

 

I agree Rickster that AVGAS programmers should find a way to stop guard.exe from running in the background on XP when AVGAS is not running. I guess they are concentrating on Vista where it must run in the background all the time and figure the rest of us can either use it as it is, use a batch file to start and stop guard.exe, or as many have done...abandon it altogether. Oh well, good news for the other antispyware apps such as SAS that don't require a service running constantly in the background I guess .

 

Hello,

For those who like AVGAS, but don't like the current issues with the guard.exe program, the ewido command line program works very well and is an excellent alternative. http://downloads.ewido.net/ewidoscan.zip

I use it all the time.

 

Hello,
This is the most annoying feature. Absolute minus.
That's all I can say.
Mrk

 

Never tried it, but I use ewido micro from time to time which is also neat. http://downloads.ewido.net/ewido_micro.exe

 

I cant see what all the Fuss is about I mean its as simple as this, you either want to be protected, or you dont Therefore I dont find this AVGAS issue relevent to the complaints posted People need to understand how things work before they winge and moan

 

Exactly. Therefore, try to understand ...
Mrk

 

I had this problem and it was due to a file named "C:\program"
I renamed the file, and everything works fine

 

akhunter10, are you sure that the filename was "C:\program"?
Because : and \ are not allowed symbols for a Windows filename.

 

So exactly how should the .bat file be named. I apparently named it incorrectly. Thank You!