Uninstalling, running Avastclear, and installing the latest version was the recommended solution, or upgrading to Windows 10. I tried updating other computers that were still crashing but they were already on the latest version.
HOW TO UNINSTALL AVAST ANTIVIRUS FROM WINDOWS 8.1 UPDATE
It seemed Avast had pushed out an update that finally fixed the problem. One computer that you could see from the minidumps had crashed at least once a day everyday since January 19th suddenly stopped crashing on March 18th. Rolling back Windows Updates did not solve the problem and I found nothing matching the systems when searching online. For a system-wide impact, it would have to be a Windows Update or an automatic update to another piece of software. The minidump from the blue screen simply pointed at ntoskrnl.exe as the process/driver loaded when the crash occurred. I verified the Registry entries that I deployed with Group Policy Preferences were applied as I configured and that they matched the documentation from Microsoft. Upon removing the Registry keys, the blue screening continued, so I had ruled out that setting as the cause and put it back in place.Īfter barking up the first tree by assuming the most recent system-wide change was the culprit, I found minimal other clues indicating what the problem could be. This happened shortly after I had put in place the Registry settings to control the Windows 10 upgrade prompts and Get Windows 10 (GWX) system tray icon. I first became aware of the issue after a client that uses Avast complained of nearly daily BSoDs on most computers. In late December 2015, an update to the Avast antivirus began causing daily blue screens of death on Windows 8.1 computer.