Avast 'Emergency' Update

Question

Well, Avast pushed another 'emergency' update this morning. Originally, the concept of emergency update was supposed to allow avast to 'easily fix' any major glitches that inadvertently happened to manifest themselves, without having to update the entire program, nor cause undue hardship to its many users.   It was rarely ever needed. At some point late last year, apparently they decided to use 'emergency' updates more frequently, for NON-emergency tasks.   Users (myself included) have been inquiring about the nature of an abundance of so-called 'emergency' updates, without ever getting an adequate explanation.   I believe some of these updates were considered 'stepping-stones', in preparing the path for avast8 users to upgrade to avast2014.   And several of these updates were offered repeatedly, perhaps to make sure that no one inadvertently 'escaped' from updating. Depending on the nature of the update, it's to be expected that, upon (required) rebooting, there may be a SMALL lag as some of avast's system files are updated/replaced.   But this morning was very different:   My Win7 (primary) system, after I typed-in the password, booted to a black screen, with only a white cursor showing.   The cursor was 'alive' (=movable/responsive), but there was no background/Desktop (Explorer).   I could see the hard disk chugging-away, so I figured I'd wait a bit for the update to do its job.   But it kept going, and going.   After waiting a few minutes, I decided it was finally time to hit CTRL-ALT-DEL, to see if I could access Task Manager... and fortunately, I could.   While I could see the avast emergency update listed among the still-active tasks, it seemed to be using no CPU.   MBAM's Service was the most active, and so I have to assume it was responsible for all the disk activity I was seeing.   I waited another few minutes, till that seemed done.   At which point (still having a black background aside from Task Scheduler and the cursor), I deemed it was time to restart the system.   Fortunately, upon this second reboot, all appeared to be normal:   I had my usual/full desktop appear. Since the avast forum is still down, I'm unable to ask them about it... nor see if other people suffered the same nerve-racking experience.   Perhaps it was just a fluke on my system???   I haven't tried updating my second computer yet, to see what happens there. For what it's worth, I've looked into avast's program folders... and I see at least two modules that were updated:   the main User Interface was updated to sub-build 397 (9.0.2014.397), and the Browser Cleanup Tool was updated to sub-build 224 (9.0.0.224).   Why either one of these had to be updated under the guise of a forced 'emergency' update [rather than an optional program update with documentation/change-log] is beyond me.   But no, despite all this, I'm not ready to dump avast in favor of something else.

ky331 · Answer

Back now, after the avast emergency update on my secondary (WinXP) system... nothing unusual whatsoever.   It rebooted normally. And people wonder why XP is still so popular!  :emotion-4:

iroc9555 · Answer

Back now, after the avast emergency update on my secondary (WinXP) system... nothing unusual whatsoever. It rebooted normally.

And people wonder why XP is still so popular! :emotion-4:

Not that fast my friend.

My Win7 (primary) system, after I typed-in the password, booted to a black screen, with only a white cursor showing. The cursor was "alive" (=movable/responsive), but there was no background/Desktop (Explorer). I could see the hard disk chugging-away, so I figured I'd wait a bit for the update to do its job. But it kept going, and going. After waiting a few minutes, I decided it was finally time to hit CTRL-ALT-DEL, to see if I could access Task Manager... and fortunately, I could. While I could see the avast emergency update listed among the still-active tasks, it seemed to be using no CPU. MBAM's Service was the most active, and so I have to assume it was responsible for all the disk activity I was seeing. I waited another few minutes, till that seemed done. At which point (still having a black background aside from Task Scheduler and the cursor), I deemed it was time to restart the system. Fortunately, upon this second reboot, all appeared to be normal: I had my usual/full desktop appear.
Since the avast forum is still down, I'm unable to ask them about it... nor see if other people suffered the same nerve-racking experience. Perhaps it was just a fluke on my system???

It has been reported in all system David. From exactly what happenned to you to just 5-10 mins delay reboots after the EmUpdates. Now it does not occur often otherwise the Forums would be full of complains.

When one of the Emergency Updates has been pushed, BTW I have had a total of 5 since I reinstalled my XP with all Microsoft updates and my avast! 9 back in April,

I have had delays when rebooting and a couple of nerve recking just my desktop with a working mouse ( cursor ) and all my icons and task bar missing. Like you, invoking the Task Manager, I could see the avast! EmUpdate execute file there and completely inactive. A second reboot would fix things, but this did not happen in avast! 8 or the first version of avast! 9.

Avast! only words in the matter is that it is spected some delay after the fact, and nothing else. I guess there have been not enough complains for them to research that odd behaviour deeply.

I can not imagine a no so savvy computer user with a black screen or just a desktop and only the mouse working. I suppose they would hard shut down the PC. Something not recommended.

Like you this will not change my mind about running avast! since it has protected me for years.

ky331 · Answer

Just to clarify, I was able to do a 'soft' (software-controlled) shutdown, by accessing CTRL-ALT-DEL.Had that not been available, I would have had no choice but to hard shut-down, which, as you noted, is not recommended (and as such, should only be done as a last resort). Avast is like a good friend:   friends have their differences, and may occasionally get into a fight.   But if they have enough invested in their friendship, they're not gonna break up --- unless the matter really gets serious.   I don't want to minimize the occurrence a black screen with only a cursor.   It was unnerving to me... and I can only imagine how other people may have felt.   But I still appreciate the overall protection avast offers me, and personally intend to stick with it... On the other hand, I have no qualms about being critical of avast... I believe they've been pushing/forcing the growth (read:  BULK) of the product.   I would love to see them focus on just the anti-virus (and related: e.g., WebRep) components, without delving into things like browser cleanup, software updater, 'grime fighter', safe-price &etc.   So while I may continue to use avast myself, I have major qualms about recommending it to others... particularly computer 'newbies'.

iroc9555 · Answer

Another EmUpdate. This time my icons and Task bar appeared 8 minutes after rebooting:emotion-12:

Bugbatter · Answer

I have no qualms about being critical of avast... I believe they've been pushing/forcing the growth (read: BULK) of the product. I would love to see them focus on just the anti-virus (and related: e.g., WebRep) components, without delving into things like browser cleanup, software updater, "grime fighter", safe-price &etc.

Ditto.

I don't use Avast. I will no longer be recommending it.

ky331 · Answer

Hernan, Like you, I received another 'emergency' update today.   After reading your issues here, I was tempted to disable it (via WinPatrol).   But curiosity won out... and so I rebooted... and prayed... Fortunately, my Win7 system started up normally (or with but minimal delay)... my background and icons were all there.  (breathing a sigh of relief) Checking the main avast folder, I see there's a new aavm4h.dll  [avast asynchronous virus monitor] (v 9.0.2018.340) and htmlayout.dll  [embeddable HTML rendering and layout component] (v 3.3.3.19).   There may be other new files in its various subdirectories, but I didn't check any further. ==================================== EDIT:   I then updated my WinXP system.   It was somewhat slower to startup, but nothing dramatic to the extent that you noticed.   The only problem I had was that MBAM's resident protection was disabled... I rebooted again, and this time, all was well (including MBAM).   I'm assuming that avast's updating was somehow responsible for MBAM's problem on the first reboot.

iroc9555 · Answer

Thank you for sharing. .... and htmlayout.dll  [embeddable HTML rendering and layout component] (v 3.3.3.19). That make sence since there were a few problems installing avast! and the htmlayout.dll  file.

Virus & Spyware

Avast "Emergency" Update

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