AVG Releases Fix for Machines Bricked by Update

[chickenhoagie]

[citation][nom]AVG Technologies[/nom]We’re very sorry for the inconvenience. Over the past 24 hours, AVG has had two update issues. The problems affected Windows 7 users on 64-bit products. As soon as we were first notified about these issues, we immediately began fixing the problems. AVG is taking swift action on this matter. We remain committed to our customers, and, as such, we are taking the following actions:1-Updates have been issued for both of these issues and are currently being propagated to the broad AVG user base.2-For the next 48 hours, we are offering free technical support to our entire user base; anyone who has been affected by either of these issues. PAID CUSTOMERS: Support for System crash after the recent AVG 2011 update 3292 (BSOD)If you have encountered the above mentioned issue with the latest AVG update and FAQ 4079 didn’t help you, please contact our English support team by dialing the following numbers:1-Home and Free customers: 24/7 support +1-877-367-99332-Business customers: 9:30am-6:30pm EST +1-828-459-5436 or skype:avg-ncYou can also email us at updateissuehelp@avg.com.FREE CUSTOMERS: Support for System crash after the recent AVG 2011 update 3292 (BSOD)1-If you have encountered the above mentioned issue with the latest AVG update and FAQ 4080 didn’t help you, please contact our English support team by dialing the following number:2-24/7 support: +1-877-367-9933You can also email us at updateissuehelp@avg.comAVG sincerely regrets any inconvenience this issue has caused and we are ready to help you resolve this as quickly as possible.[/citation]
wow very nice to see that they're all over on this issue. i had no clue that they were even aware lol. I'm glad they've solved the problem, but my computer easily repairs itself from the issue as it just goes into repair mode and restores to an earlier date. However i'm sad to say i uninstalled and moved to Microsoft essentials. But no doubt, if it happens to fail me at any time i'll be puttin AVG back on my system. AVG is a good quality FREE antivirus and in my eyes is way better than most, so problems happen.

 

[Wolfshadw]

Happened to me, but fortunately, my system (Win-7 Ultimate 64-bit) did not "brick". Found a viable solution on the AVG Free forums and was back up and protected within a couple of hours (sooner if I could have found a Windows 7 DVD).

 

[Guest]

fyi: I had 2 comps affected by this. They were running vista 64bit.

 

[shoelessinsight]

My brother's XP x64 machine fell to this as well. Accidentally ran the automatic repair from the Windows disk instead of the Recovery Console to repair it manually.

The automatic repair managed to make it worse, so we finally installed another copy of Windows on the hard drive so he could boot long enough to back up all his files before formatting.

A lot of trouble over one little "Oops" from AVG. Normally I'd be a little more forgiving about it, but AVG should have learned from McAfee's mistake a few months back. My brother will be using Avast from now on (amusingly, Microsoft Security Essentials doesn't seem compatible with XP x64).

 

[dndhatcher]

I let Win7 repair to a previous restore point then uninstalled AVG. Im giving Avast a try now. I still have AVG running on 2 other PCs and because of their good response to the problem wont bother changing them.

 

[tsnorquist]

[citation][nom]tpi2007[/nom]At the end of the day, it all boils down to two very important things nowadays: 1. it is a good idea to have a second computer at home in case this happens;2. Never use the same anti-virus in ALL computers in your home. Leave at least one out of that. If the problem happens to all others you'll have that one still running; if it happens to that one, you still have all the others.As they say, don't put your egss all in the same basket.[/citation]

That or keep a bootable linux image handy which you can burn any "fixes" on the fly. I think that's a better option (albeit more technical).

 

[digitalrazoe]

hmmm ... I may have dodged a bullet .. I had to install software that required my Anti virus to be shut down .. that was December 1st...

 

[christop]

I never used avg anyways Avast me hardeeesss!!!!

 

[lsylvain]

I'm a software engineer with 25 years experience who was burned by this and here is how I see it.

The free-versus-paid question is a moot point. This issue affected both the free and priced products from AVG.

The issue is QA. One of the greatest challenges I have from day-to-day is watching out for cowboy programmers who slip in changes that "shouldn't effect anything" and don't test them before releasing updates. These are usually inexperienced developers who have not been burned and have not had to shoulder responsibility for when things go wrong. In short, their rear end has never really been on the line. So they do not appreciate how taking *any* risk - no matter how small it may seem to be - can cost millions or even billions of dollars and loss of personal data that most people consider priceless.

The only way to guard against such risk is a rigid QA process for releases. Everything must be put through clearly defined tests in the various supported platforms and operating systems before it is released. This is especially important in the anti-virus business because such software is implicitly trusted to guard against damage. At a bank the guard can not be crooked, and on a computer untested security software can never be used. People rely on companies in this business to do their job so they are not part of the problem they are supposed to be a solution to.

So AVG needs to review their processes. That being said, I will say that AVG has tried to be responsive, although even the software fixes failed on my computer (I believe because I did not install their product to the default location).

 

[lsylvain]

One final thought on what AVG needs to take a look at is phone support contingency planning for a crisis. They were overwhelmed with support calls. Instead of contracting qualified techs (such as Geek Squad) to roll over phone calls to they called in sales people and stuck them on tech support with zero training. They weren't even familiar with the video explaining how to use the USB boot recovery (which did not work for me). I know. I waited over an hour on hold last night before one worked with me.

While on hold listening to statically bad musich that seemed much to peppy for the situtation I kept hearing recorded voice-overs saying how important my patiences was to AVG. I wondered how important my *anxiety* was to them... Actions speak louder than words, and they did not have sufficient telephone support for this crisis. The best the sales guy that finally answered could do was take notes and pass them along to a tech this morning. How a company responds when doomsday comes determines if people trust that the company will properly handle things when they go wrong.

AVG is not the first company to have this sort of thing happen and they won't be the last, but this is a club no software company wants to be a member of. For some reason I have decided to give them a chance - at least on my laptop. I have removed them from my wife's laptop and have moved her to Mickey soft's free anti virus, and based on past experience the thought of relying on Microsoft does not provide me much comfort.

Another issue I have is with Microsoft. Windows used to provide a step-by-step driver load boot sequence that would allow one to step over a problem driver. They removed it after Windows 98. Nowadays "Safe Mode" aint so safe because of the number of drivers that get loaded. Shame on Microsoft for not providing a way to get out of such situations.

Fortunately I discovered the absolutely awesome Hiren's Boot CD (http://www.hiren.info/pages/bootcd)! It was much easier to use than the recovery applications provided by AVG (which did not work for me) or the various GNU/Linux boot CD alternatives. All I needed to know was the files that had to be renamed, then I booted from the Hiren's Boot CD and ran mini XP, and used the explorer to rename the necessary files. Hiren's Boot CD is chock full of great recovery goodies! Thank God!

In the final analysis I still think AVG is a fine product. I am giving one more try on my laptop (not my wife's, though). But I will not be able to recommend it to anyone until my trust is regained, and that could take years. It frightens me to think that I just recommended AVG to my 80 year-old aunt down in Florida. Fortunately the man who set up her new computer used an alternative product or I would have had a long-distance support situation on my hands.

So I am trying a re-install of AVG as I write this. Hope it works out...

 

[mattimeo005]

It bricked my machine, but I ran the disk repair and was able to roll back to a restore point a week before. Lost some of my configurations, but nothing I couldn't fix. I was pretty worried for about 20min, and suspected that the update had done something, so it's good to see that my suspicions are confirmed.

 

[cliffro]

I used AVG for about a month or 2 after having issues with Kaspersky, until several incidents caused me to switch. 1st was a false positive issue with it labeling completely innocent and totally safe game exe's as infected. 2nd issue was also game related. Project Torque a F2P MMO Racing game, when trying to start the game the "Resident Shield" would spazz out on me crashing then restarting repeatedly till I closed the game or turned off RS, a friend I played the game with who also used AVG had the same issue. I did some quick research and found Avast(he did shortly after as well).

I shouldn't have to deal with that many issues in such a short span of time. Which is also the reason I dumped Kaspersky twice! (and the second copy was free from a Win7 Launch party.)

Needless to say, AVG isn't exactly doing a good job of winning back my trust.

 

[Maxor127]

Sucks. I used to use AVG but switched to Antivir. AVG became too bloated for me.

 

[Rab1d-BDGR]

I've has enough problems with patches and updates for both windows and linux software breaking things that I've made a new rule of thumb for myself - wait for a week after the patch has been released then look on the net to see if anyone has had problems before I do the updates. There are just too many potential problems that aren't caught by pre-release testing now.

 

[JimmiG]

Thanks to UAC, almost no software is granted access to operating system files or other protected system files without your permission. The big exception is anti-virus software, which is granted full access at all times. This is a huge risk and a wide open door for anyone who wants to get into your system.

 

[zoemayne]

[citation][nom]lsylvain[/nom]One final thought on what AVG needs to take a look at is phone support contingency planning for a crisis. They were overwhelmed with support calls. Instead of contracting qualified techs (such as Geek Squad) to roll over phone calls to they called in sales people and stuck them on tech support with zero training. They weren't even familiar with the video explaining how to use the USB boot recovery (which did not work for me). I know. I waited over an hour on hold last night before one worked with me.While on hold listening to statically bad musich that seemed much to peppy for the situtation I kept hearing recorded voice-overs saying how important my patiences was to AVG. I wondered how important my *anxiety* was to them... Actions speak louder than words, and they did not have sufficient telephone support for this crisis. The best the sales guy that finally answered could do was take notes and pass them along to a tech this morning. How a company responds when doomsday comes determines if people trust that the company will properly handle things when they go wrong.AVG is not the first company to have this sort of thing happen and they won't be the last, but this is a club no software company wants to be a member of. For some reason I have decided to give them a chance - at least on my laptop. I have removed them from my wife's laptop and have moved her to Mickey soft's free anti virus, and based on past experience the thought of relying on Microsoft does not provide me much comfort.Another issue I have is with Microsoft. Windows used to provide a step-by-step driver load boot sequence that would allow one to step over a problem driver. They removed it after Windows 98. Nowadays "Safe Mode" aint so safe because of the number of drivers that get loaded. Shame on Microsoft for not providing a way to get out of such situations.Fortunately I discovered the absolutely awesome Hiren's Boot CD (http://www.hiren.info/pages/bootcd)! It was much easier to use than the recovery applications provided by AVG (which did not work for me) or the various GNU/Linux boot CD alternatives. All I needed to know was the files that had to be renamed, then I booted from the Hiren's Boot CD and ran mini XP, and used the explorer to rename the necessary files. Hiren's Boot CD is chock full of great recovery goodies! Thank God!In the final analysis I still think AVG is a fine product. I am giving one more try on my laptop (not my wife's, though). But I will not be able to recommend it to anyone until my trust is regained, and that could take years. It frightens me to think that I just recommended AVG to my 80 year-old aunt down in Florida. Fortunately the man who set up her new computer used an alternative product or I would have had a long-distance support situation on my hands.So I am trying a re-install of AVG as I write this. Hope it works out...[/citation]


your suppose to be a s/w engineer and your spending an hour on hold w tech support????? I dont believe it.

 

[Villers]

[citation][nom]Villers[/nom]Who still uses AVG? thats soo 3 years ago lame.Security Essentials and Windows Defender work just fine.[/citation]

Awe did I make some AVG balllickers mad.

Reminds me of trying to convince my older sister to use google instead of retarded yahoo years ago..

 

[HolyCrusader]

Just because AVG is a free AV program doesn't mean it's more susceptible to coding errors than any of the paid variants. In fact, I know the paid versions have bricked computers on a few instances.

Although I've personally preferred Avast over AVG, they're both good programs and I have used one or the other for years.

 

[cookoy]

had a BSOD few days back from an AV update (not AVG). these things still happen so a proper, periodic backup of important personal data files is still a must. so Win7 is still not immune to such critical errors.

 

[jojesa]

[citation][nom]lsylvain[/nom]I'm a software engineer with 25 years experience who was burned by this and here is how I see it....instead of contracting qualified techs (such as Geek Squad).[/citation].
I think it was a software engineer with 25 years of experience who created the issue.
By any chance do you happen to work for AVG?.
And on top of that you used "qualified techs" and "Geek Squad" in the same sentence. Come on. LOL