I have recently upgraded to NIS 2009 from a much older version of Norton AntiVirus(2005), using Norton Removal Tool I had no problems installing the new version. Everything works perfectly until I do a quick scan and then as soon as scanner reaches "tracking cookies" I get a windows exception box saying "error loading c:\documents" "the specified module could not be found." If I don't click on "OK" Norton just sits there but, on clicking, the scan continues and completes with no threats found and no mention of the problem from Norton. On a full scan, it also generates the error on the tracking cookies as well as on two other items: Bloodhound.cpl and Adware:Webwise, which also call rundll32 and then it tries to load cceraser.dll. If I click away the exception boxes the scan completes "successfully" again with no indication Norton is aware of the problem. I am running XP Pro SP3 with all live updates and my system has absolutely no indications of a virus or other abnormality. Having done a lot of programing my gut feeling is that the arguments to rundll32 are not being passed correctly. Pasted below is the actual command from Process Monitor that fails:
c:\windows\system32\rundll32.exe h:\documents and settings\all users\application data\norton\{0c55c096-0f1d-4f28-aaa2-85ef591126e7}\norton\definitions\virusdefs\20090509.003\cceraser.dll, DetectCache Global\{586D13A6-53AB-48BB-9CF8-4F7EFC0651BE}
the last argument pointing to the entry point(DetectCacheGlobal)is always different, of course.
My system had the ntfsdisable8dot3namecreation enabled(short file name creation turned OFF) so the 8dot3 filenames are not available to rundll32 which I believe it prefers. I also believe that the argument should have therefore had quotes beginning before "c:\documents and settings\...(and ending after)...cceraser.dll" Thus the error box's message "c:documents" not being found(loaded) as the space didn't work for rundll32. Having checked this community I saw that in November there were many folks experiencing exactly the same symptoms as myself as far as the exception box with rundll32 and cceraser, etc although no one mentioned my problem with the lack of short file names. In November the problem was fixed with a live update so I am of course wondering why the same thing is now happening to me??? The thread then was
http://community.norton.com/norton/board/message?board.id=nis_feedback&thread.id=21653 ( NIS 2009 crashes rundll32.exe process)
Is there anyone who might have an idea how to fix this? Like in the cases reported in November, if I turn off the tracking cookies option(set to "ignore") then quick scan completes perfectly. So the problem is totally related to these calls to rundll32.exe and cceraser.dll. And again my system runs perfectly and I'm totally happy with the new NIS except for this. I'd be grateful for any insight!
rob