Norton for Mac

[BobP1776]

It's been another couple of weeks, and still no repeats of this problem in my setup.

I've seen numerous cases where LiveUpdate has done a signature update after I boot the machine and before I open up NAV to check for the problem, so whatever's going on here is not as simple as just the automatic update on boot up.

I've also tried opening NAV while a manually requested signature update was in process, and NAV reports the automatic protection as live through that.  So it doesn't appear to be turning off protection during the update.

--Bob

[BobP1776]

This failure happened again this morning -- Automatic Virus Protection *AND* Idle Time Scan both found unexpectedly turned OFF when I started up NAV 12 for Mac after Restarting and logging in.

This time it was somewhat more severe in that I COULD NOT TURN THEM BACK ON!  I.e., after validating with an Administrator password, Automatic Virus Protection simply refused to turn on -- without any error message.

I also tried starting a System Scan and THAT produced the error message that there was a problem (not identified) with the Scan Engine and that I should update with Live Update.  Live Update of course says everything is fine.

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I logged out and logged back in as an Administrator and spent some quality time pouring through the Console messages and logs.  There was nothing useful in there.  No error messages, no relevant diagnostic reports.

I could see the Symantec Diagnostic Reporter starting up and saying it had 0 items to send.  I could see NAV getting Admin privileges when I tried to turn virus protection back on.  But no errror messages in Console indicating why that would not work.  And no crash reports.

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I restarted and logged back in as my normal account.  In the time that had passed a new Virus Definition update became available and that loaded.  And AFTER that, NAV 12 was functioning normally again -- Automatic Virus Protection and Idle Scan both ON.  Note that I did not have to turn them ON; they came back ON by themselves.

I restarted another time and NAV 12 was still good to go.  I've got a full system scan running now, but don't expect it to find any problems.

Now the last thing that happened prior to NAV 12 going pear shaped was the 28038 Virus Definition Update which loaded in the wee hours last night.  The Virus Definition Update which just loaded was 29002.  Both of those are reported as loading without error.

So either 28038 screwed up the Scan Engine or there is some sort of race condition at boot up which occassionally keeps the Scan Engine from starting.

Either way, this is NASTY as there is no indication anything is wrong unless you think to start up NAV manually and check to see if the protections are live.

--Bob

[BobP1776]

As expected, the Full System Scan found no problems.  NAV 12 still loads up properly after a subsequent Restart.

--Bob

[mathewlewis]

I too have experienced this issue on several occasions. It seems to occur after an automatic update of the Vulnerability signature. The logs do not indicate any issue.

Most notably it happened when automatically updating to 12.1. I mentioned it in a prior post on December 20th.

It is very concerning that protection is disabled while connecting to the Internet, especially without knowing it is disabled.

[ckovacs]

I've experienced the same problem. Today under Automatic Protection, Virus Protection and Idle-Time Scan were both turned off. The Idle-Time Scan enabled again with an administrator password but the Virus Protection refused to turn on. I restarted a couple of times and then all turned back on again. This apparently happened after an automatic liveupdate during the weekend. I'm using NAV for Mac 12.1.

[BobP1776]

I've been checking pretty frequently, and have *NOT* had a problem after any of the recent virus definition updates.  (No repeat instances since my prior post above.)

I've still got no clue just what triggers this problem, nor what makes it go away -- apparently all by itself -- afterwards.

--Bob

[BobP1776]

I noticed some new behavior today that may be related to this issue.  Twice today, after Restarting the Mac, my initial check of the NAV 12 status showed both automatic antivirus protection and idle time scan were OFF.  In both cases, while I watched, their status changed to ON without me doing anything.

Evidently something had either slowed down the initiation of these services, or an earlier attempt to start them had failed and a subsequent attempt worked.  As before, there was no indication I could find in Console indicating what might have happened.

I presume it is normal for there to be SOME delay as these services start up.  But NORMALLY, by the time the Quick Menu icon appears in the menu bar the antivirus services are live.  So this somewhat longer delay is not something I'm used to seeing.

Whatever is delaying things here may be related to the other cases, detailed in posts above, where the services did NOT start up, regardless of how long you waited.

--Bob

[Paul1970]

Sometimes I have this problem too.

Automatic antivirus protection is off and NAV 12 notify me "Scan engine can't load, please run Live Update".

I use MacOS X 10.7.2 here.

Remove this bug, please.

[BobP1776]

Some possibly related behavior to report:

I had previously installed the OS X 10.7.3 Delta update via Software Update.  That worked without problems.  I wasn't having any problems with it, but due to the severe problems reported by other folks Apple retracted the Delta update and instructed people to use the Combo update instead.

So I just downloaded and installed the Combo update on top of my previous install.

After downloading it, I Restarted the Mac prior to doing the install.  When I logged in, Antivirus Protection and Idle Time Scan had come alive normally -- no problems.

I then began the 10.7.3 install.  About 2/3 of the way through the "Writing Files" phase, an error pop-up appeared saying that Norton Antivirus could not start the Scan Engine (and suggesting I do Live Update).  Indeed, checking the menu text from Norton Quickmenu showed that Antivirus was no longer Enabled.

I dismissed the pop-up error message, and just let the install of 10.7.3 continue.

I checked Norton Quickmenu again towards the end of the install, just before the required Restart, and discovered the Antivirus protection was live again -- without my doing anything.

And it is also still good in Restarts after the install.

I'm going to conjecture here that what happened is that the attempt to start the Scan Engine failed because the Scan Engine didn't come alive fast enough due to the load on the system from the install in progress.  The "Writing Files" phase should not have overwritten anything that the Scan Engine needs because the files aren't moved into position until a later phase of the install.

If I'm right, then the problems with these services not starting after a Restart/Log-in may be due to whatever background load is happening due to other system actions, which of course varies from Restart to Restart.  I'm using a 2.53Ghz Core I5 laptop.

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By the way, I've had no further instances of these services failing to start, or starting unusually slowly, since my last report above.

--Bob

[jselbin]

Exact same problem.  This a fundamental failure of the product's essential feature.  Where are the Symantec techs to address this?