Don Schlesinger: Need Norton Anti-Virus help

[Don Schlesinger]

I have Norton Anti-Virus 2004, and it has worked perfectly for a couple of years. This morning, when I booted up my computer, a dialog box came up announcing that my Auto-Protect driver could not be installed, and my computer was no longer protected against viruses.

Nonetheless, a check of the Norton site showed that all my virus protection was up to date (all green checks everywhere) and that my Auto-Protect was enabled. Everything on the site looked perfect. I actually ran a Live Update and my virus protection updated to today's date.

I followed every Help suggestion listed by Norton (other than uninstalling and reinstalling the sytem), but all the things that they suggested could be wrong were not, and following their suggestions didn't help. Every time I restart the computer, I get the message.

Now, here's the kicker: My son has a laptop, completely independent in every way from my desktop. When he got to work today, he got the exact same message! Our Norton icons at the bottom of the screen have a big red X through them, as if they aren't functional. But, if you go to the site, it says we're fine.

Does anyone have a clue as to what's going on??

Thanks.

Don

[Magician]

> Now, here's the kicker: My son has a laptop,
> completely independent in every way from my desktop.
> When he got to work today, he got the exact same
> message! Our Norton icons at the bottom of the screen
> have a big red X through them, as if they aren't
> functional. But, if you go to the site, it says we're
> fine.

I wouldn't count on it. The big red X is there for a reason.

> Does anyone have a clue as to what's going on??

My first guess would be that some sort of time limit on something has expired. Double-click on the clock in the bottom-right of the screen and set the year back to 2004, then restart your system. If the same thing happens then I was probably wrong and you can set your clock back to 2005. If it no longer happens, then you've found a clue.

Was the software installed on these two machines at approximately the same time? How long ago was that? Anything else you and your son might have both installed recently? Can you post the exact text of the error message?

[Saboteur]

...you may want to check out this website for info about the latest Sober worm going around. It sounds as if it would only be a problem for you if actually opened the bogus e-mail's attachment. I'm pretty sure your son would've had to open a similar e-mail on his computer.

The article says the Sober worm began to multiply in full force on Monday.

Bogus e-mails from "FBI" and "CIA" carry latest Sober worm

[Don Schlesinger]

> ...you may want to check out this website for info
> about the latest Sober worm going around. It sounds as
> if it would only be a problem for you if actually
> opened the bogus e-mail's attachment. I'm pretty sure
> your son would've had to open a similar e-mail on his
> computer.

> The article says the Sober worm began to multiply in
> full force on Monday.

Thank you, but, no, we didn't receive or open that.

Don

[Don Schlesinger]

> I wouldn't count on it. The big red X is there for a
> reason.

Damn! Meanwhile, yesterday, the live update updated (most recent virus protection updated), the Auto-Protect button is On, and is checked green, and everything in the control panel says that it is working 100%. Still, there's the red X and the message (see below).

> My first guess would be that some sort of time limit
> on something has expired. Double-click on the clock in
> the bottom-right of the screen and set the year back
> to 2004, then restart your system.

I also have Norton GoBack, and the system won't start with the clock wrong. It makes me set the date correctly, in order to start.

> If the same thing
> happens then I was probably wrong and you can set your
> clock back to 2005. If it no longer happens, then
> you've found a clue.

Couldn't do it; didn't want to risk going back a year on my system! Of course, I could change it only a couple of days.

> Was the software installed on these two machines at
> approximately the same time?

No, mine goes back several years, while my son's laptop was bought this year. However, we renewed Norton (both of them) at the start of May 2005, within one day of each other, so new things (updates?) may have been installed on both of our machines at that time.

How long ago was that?

May 1-2, 2005.

> Anything else you and your son might have both
> installed recently?

No.

> Can you post the exact text of the
> error message?

"The Norton Anti-Virus Auto-Protect Driver could not be loaded. Your system is not protected from viruses. Please restart your computer."

Restarting, of course, does nothing. Nor did updating the VeriSignRoot certificate or registering Wintrust.dII -- both things they suggested, along with checking the accuracy of the system calendar and date.

Thanks.

Don

[rwp]

Hi Don -

Just this morning there was a news item about popular programs, such as anti-virus programs, being "attacked". You may want to peruse the following link:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/pcworld/2005...pcworld/123651

Sorry, I don't know how to make it so that you only need to click on it.

rwp

[Don Schlesinger]

Computers are completely absurd. You simply HAVE to hate them!

Norton has a feature called "Live Update." Its meaning is obvious, and I have it checked off and activated. It's got a big green check-mark and "On" marked next to it.

In the upper-left corner of the main page, there is, nonetheless, a "Live Update" button. So, you can manually force a live update at any time, despite its being automated. So, I did one, just for fun. All sorts of scroll bars, apparently new activations, etc. came on, including one saying that my Common Client Base, or some such nonsense, was outdated and was being updated.

Computer restarts and everything is once again perfect.

Now, I ask you, is that not completely asinine?!

The only thing more unbelievable is that I actually figured this out and fixed it myself!! :-)

Don

[bfbagain]

> Computers are completely absurd. You simply HAVE to
> hate them!

You also have to hate over-priced, over-rated, over-bloated, and generally over-sold software, that is very much following the M$ model.

The next time you contemplate paying for an anti-virus application, you may want to try this:

http://free.grisoft.com/softw/70free...ee_362a652.exe

Between AVG, spybot, cleanup, and a few extra clicks weekly, you're system will be a lot healthier, especially if it's a windows system. :-)

cheers
bfb

[Don Schlesinger]

Will investigate it.

Don

[Parker]

> Computers are completely absurd. You simply HAVE to
> hate them!

> Norton has a feature called "Live Update."
> Its meaning is obvious, and I have it checked off and
> activated. It's got a big green check-mark and
> "On" marked next to it.

> In the upper-left corner of the main page, there is,
> nonetheless, a "Live Update" button. So, you
> can manually force a live update at any time, despite
> its being automated. So, I did one, just for fun. All
> sorts of scroll bars, apparently new activations, etc.
> came on, including one saying that my Common Client
> Base, or some such nonsense, was outdated and was
> being updated.

> Computer restarts and everything is once again
> perfect.

> Now, I ask you, is that not completely asinine?!

I'm not really familiar with Norton AV, since I use AVG on my own Windows systems, and recommend it to all my clients using Windows. It's free (for personal use), it works, and it uses less system resources than Norton.

However, my guess is that the "Live Update" feature only keeps the virus database up-to-date in the background. It needed to update something else that, Windows being Windows, required a reboot. So, the update had to be done manually.

When this happens with AVG, you get a helpful little message along the lines of "There is an update available for AVG that cannot be installed with the updater. Would you like to install the update?" You click "yes" and are then taken to the AVG website to download and install the update. It sounds like Norton may be a little less intuitive.

> The only thing more unbelievable is that I actually
> figured this out and fixed it myself!! :-)

We'll make a computer geek out of you yet! :-)

[Saboteur]

Suppose the Automatic Live Update feature is only going to work when everything is just as it should be. At the slightest sign of trouble, Norton has set up the feature to be inoperative, strictly for the sake of your own computer's security. That's a good thing, seems to me, since no one at Norton is actually monitoring each and every computer owned by their customers and few of us really know all the changes that are taking place on our computers when NAV performs an update.

Now, suppose you (a human, not a software package incapable of analyzing every potential problem on every make and model of computer) examine your computer and can see no reason why a Live Update should be prevented/avoided. The "manual" Live Update button (which you used to fix the problem) is your "human override" feature. It's a technique you can use to bypass the most basic (and "dumb") features of the Automatic Live Update protection mechanism. The manual update feature probably differs from the automatic feature in that it essentially tells the NAV site "Regardless of the errors or inconsistencies the Automatic Live Update routine might find on my computer, I hereby request that you ignore those errors and perform an update now".

So, in addition to being an option for those users unwilling to expose their computers to the uncertainties of an Automatic Live Update, it looks like the existence of a manual-update feature might also be a well thought-out "fallback" process intentionally designed into NAV's software. The availability of manually-forced routines that closely parallel automatic ones aren't that uncommon in today's software, I'd imagine. Norm could probably confirm that.

The biggest problem you faced is that the fix isn't necessarily intuitive. You'd think that the first thing the NAV people (and/or their website) would suggest would be to attempt to run a "forced" manual update yourself. I think a lot of these "Help" people automatically assume that the problem is with the user, not their software, since millions of their customers are happily zipping along just fine without encountering a similar problem at the same time you did. I wouldn't be surprised if the "fix" actually appears somewhere within their labyrinth of help-files, user manuals and FAQs, but it's a royal pain trying to figure out where-in-the-hell the solution is probably documented.

I, too, have NAV and have the Automatic Update feature enabled. If I ever encounter a similar problem I'll be able to remember how you resolved it. So, thanks for sharing the solution with us.

[Gus]

I had exactly the same problem and fixed it exactly the same way............interesting note: while the auto-protect was disabled there were numerous pages on web sites that I couldn't open. Obviously, Norton shuts down your ability to view what it considers to be potentially dangerous sites when the auto-protect is disabled. I had gone to my IP help site because of this problem and they could provide no explanation. Then I updated Norton and VOILA........everything is working again.

[Don Schlesinger]

> I had exactly the same problem and fixed it exactly
> the same way............interesting note: while the
> auto-protect was disabled there were numerous pages on
> web sites that I couldn't open. Obviously, Norton
> shuts down your ability to view what it considers to
> be potentially dangerous sites when the auto-protect
> is disabled. I had gone to my IP help site because of
> this problem and they could provide no explanation.
> Then I updated Norton and VOILA........everything is
> working again.

Norton e-mailed me a questionnaire, a day or two after I used their online help (to no avail, of course), asking what I thought of their service. You can imagine what my reply looked like! :-)

I never heard back from the f**ks.

Don