Hey. I have tried a few times to get Ad-Aware 2007 Free working on Vista home premium 64, every time I tried to run a scan, it would get to the part where it inspects the registry and just hang there, displaying "Preparing GUID scanning" but doing nothing for hours on end. I did a quick search and there is a thread exactly describing the problem I have HERE in your "Resolved/Inactive General Support Issues" section. In this case, they simply said "Ad-Aware doesn't support vista yet, it will later"

Well now is later, there is a nice shiny "works with Vista" plaque on the download page but I get the exact same problem as the original poster of the thread I linked.
Any ideas why this is or how I can get it working properly??

Thanks.

Hi hayaku.

At this moment Ad-Aware is not 64bit compatible.

This looks like an issue with Microsoft's solution to the registry in 64bit windows.

Microsoft have created two HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE entries one for 32bit and one for 64bit.

The scan engine is not designed to handle two HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE entries so hangs.

Hi hayaku,

This work-around might enable you to get Vista64 to work until official support is released:

Start Menu -> All Programs -> Accessories -> Right Click on Command Prompt -> Run As Administrator.
Type cd C:\Windows\SysWOW64 then hit Enter
Type regsvr32 vbscript.dll then hit Enter

(If you don't do Run as Administrator, the regsvr32 will fail. Also, be careful to run the command in SysWOW64, not System32! System32 on a 64-bit system actually contains the 64-bit system libraries. The 32-bit versions are in SysWOW64.)

Another issue is the Data Execution Protection in Windows Vista.

1. From the Windows Vista default Start menu, right-click Computer, and then click Properties.
2. Click Advanced system settings.
3. In the User Account Control dialog box, click Continue.
4. In the Advanced window, in the Performance section, click Settings.
5. In the Performance Options window, click the Data Execution Protection tab.

If DEP is turned on for all programs, add Ad-Aware2007.exe and LSUpdateManager.exe to the exception list (and, if you are a paying customer, Ad-Watch, Host File Editor and Process Watch).

Sorry, I can't guarantee that this will work, but there have been reports that in some cases the workaround helps.

Regards,

Spike