Tech Tip of the Week: How to Disable Avira Antivir's Pop-up Advertisements

User Comments: 34

1. October 28, 2009 5:26 AM
   

   tw0rld said:

   In the past what I did to get around this problem, was to create a program that would automaticaly check for and delete both the avnotify.exe and avnotify.dll files. I worked well except for the error message I would get when Avira attempts to execute the files.

   Reply
2. October 28, 2009 5:58 AM
   kimsland, Ex-TechSpotter, said:

   Run RegEdit

   Navigate to [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersio
   \Run]

   In the right pane double-click avgnt and remove "Min" and replace with "NS"

   This will stop the Avira Splash screen from showing after you logon to Windows

   Credit to member Poppa Bear, who first posted this on the forum in 11-02-2008

   Reply
3. October 28, 2009 6:10 AM
   Staff
   

   Julio Franco, TechSpot Editor, said:

   Great addition Kim.

   In Windows 7 that registry key changes to:

   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\Cu
   rentVersion\Run

   Reply
4. October 28, 2009 7:05 AM
   

   Didou, Bowtie extraordinair!, said:

   A nagging pop-up will probably lead users to uninstall their product & move to something else, I doubt it really increases sales. When I used the paying edition of AVG, at the end of the subscription it would nag me all the time about renewing & all it managed to do was to get me to stop using AVG altogether. That & the fact that with each new update it only got slower.

   Reply
5. October 28, 2009 7:14 AM
   kimsland, Ex-TechSpotter, said:

   Not that I like AVG, but the removal of that Nag screen was posted here: [link]

   Reply
6. October 28, 2009 8:15 AM
   gadzooks64 said:

   I was using Avira for a short period of time but changed to Miscrosoft Essentials partly because of that annoying nag screen. Not sure if I would have stayed with it had I know how to turn it off. So far so good with the MS Essentials.

   Reply
7. October 28, 2009 9:33 AM
   alexandrionel said:

   That was the only thing that bothered me at avira. Now I have Premium for 90 days. It is great. I wish I would have found this when I had freeware version.

   Reply
8. October 28, 2009 9:37 AM
   Guest said:

   You skipped few steps for Vista & Win 7. Took me a min or two to figure out whats next after step 2.

   Either way, Thanks for the tip.

   Reply
9. October 28, 2009 11:32 AM
   lupinnktp said:

   This is awesome!!! i have been pissed off with Avira once in a while when it pops up and minimise my game window amid a battle or a gank.. gone are those days now.

   It's true that nagscreen is a big turn-off. Company should try to get more customers from the attraction of addons in paid products rather than by nagscreens. more often than not they pop up at the wrong time, creating the unfavorable emotional reactions

   Reply
10. October 28, 2009 12:30 PM
    Guest said:

    If you don't want pops-ups, buy the darn thing! Or get avast.

    Reply
11. October 28, 2009 1:05 PM
    

    tw0rld said:

    gadzooks64 said:

    I was using Avira for a short period of time but changed to Miscrosoft Essentials partly because of that annoying nag screen. Not sure if I would have stayed with it had I know how to turn it off. So far so good with the MS Essentials.

    I also have dumped Avira for WSE. So far it is great and very light on resources. I am about to test Its effectiveness in finding infection. I have an old pc that I purposely got infected just for this purpose. Mbam was able to find over 400 infections......now to see if WSE will find as much.

    Reply
12. October 28, 2009 1:07 PM
    

    poertner_1274, secroF laicepS topShceT, said:

    I just deal with it. However now that I see this workaround, I believe I will be implementing it!

    Reply
13. October 28, 2009 1:45 PM
    

    nathanskywalker said:

    I don't mean to be the "just get linux" person . . . but hey, it works. I just run windows in a virtual machine, and rarely use it, so I don't worry much about antivi software.

    Reply
14. October 28, 2009 7:50 PM
    TBolt said:

    Excellent! Thanks Julio!

    Reply
15. October 28, 2009 10:02 PM
    GACrabill said:

    Nice article ... thanks. I am bookmarking this article just in case someone really complains. I really like Avira for older, slower PCs and I convince folks that one nuisance ad per day is worth the free security. Now I have an option if needed.

    Reply
16. October 29, 2009 3:43 AM
    Guest said:

    i use my firewall (online armor) to block the program/file from running.

    Reply
17. October 29, 2009 3:47 AM
    kimsland, Ex-TechSpotter, said:

    Online Armor FREE does not include:

    * Antivirus and Antimalware

    * Rootkit Scanner

    Best to stick with free Avira (without Pop-ups )

    Edit:

    oops I missed you point

    Oh I see now. You are saying that your online armor is stopping avnotify.exe

    Reply
18. October 29, 2009 6:16 AM
    Rig said:

    I bet the get a mac fan boys are gloating over the fact we have to do this XD

    Reply
19. October 29, 2009 8:08 AM
    SoulSeeker said:

    Good move to make this a little bit more public.

    I always cringe, when I sit at someone elses computer and get all these nag-screens. And when you ask them, why they havent turned them off, they usually look bewildered, like it never occurred to them.

    My computer, my rules!

    Reply
20. October 29, 2009 1:45 PM
    jurrasstoil said:

    There is another method for Windows Vista and it can not be disabled by future avira updates, but it only works for Vista Ultimate iirc.

    Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Local Security Policy

    There you can add avnotify.exe and don't allow it to start ever.

    A better solution might be Microsoft Security Essentials, especially because it has less false-positives...

    Reply
21. October 29, 2009 11:26 PM
    Zenphic said:

    The pop-up is definitely the only drawback of Avira's free Antivir. With this little tweak though this makes Antivir the best free antivirus out there.

    Reply
22. October 30, 2009 6:08 AM
    

    ellulbrian said:

    Tks, it works like a charm. It was very annoying and if the PC was mine, I wouldn't even bother to install an AV but it is a PC which is shared at work

    Btw, the default path of avnotify.exe in Win Pro (x64) is:

    C:\Program Files (x86)\Avira\AntiVir Desktop\avnotify.exe

    Reply
23. October 30, 2009 2:23 PM
    temao said:

    Thank you for sharing this tip. I'm using Avira for some months now and these error messages were very annoying.

    Reply
24. October 30, 2009 6:05 PM
    Shalimar said:

    Once again a nice tip for those using this particular application. However I'm sure the coders and sales staff at Avira won't appreciate it much lol.

    Reply
25. October 30, 2009 6:29 PM
    AntiMoronic said:

    thanks, sure this will help a lot of people.

    Reply

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