Is anyone successfully running Ad-Aware 2008 Free w/ XP Home? I, too, have encountered most of the errors and issues that others have posted in the Lavasoft forums.

I’ve been using a time-consuming workaround. Using Windows Task Manager, I monitor the CPU & memory usage for the aawservice process (up to 99% CPU on my system). I don't open Ad-Aware or try doing anything in Ad-Aware until the high usage settles down (about 3 minutes on my system). Even clicking ok to the inevitable 1814 service login error before it settles will cause a 6100 lost connection error, followed by termination. When the CPU & memory usage settle down, then everything works more or less okay, including the update button. The apparent scan freeze clears itself and runs to completion after aawservice stops hoarding CPU & memory (about 6 minutes on my system before the scan actually starts). I manually run AAWTray.exe to get the missing icon back in my System Tray, and this also enables Tracksweep to work without error. The tray icon does nothing but say a scheduled scan is in progress, even though it isn't.

My environment:
XP Home Edition SP2
x86 Intel Celeron Processor, 1300 MHz
512 MB RAM (2 GB virtual memory), 1.29GHz
Two user accounts, both with Admin rights (no networks or groups set up)
Windows Firewall
AVG Free 8.5
Ad-Aware 2008 Free
Windows Services – default settings, except my Remote Procedure Call Logon is Network Service (default is Local System, according to Help button in Services)
Lavasoft Ad-Aware Service – settings per LS. All updates current through 6/17/09 (definitions version 0148:0053).
Windows updates – all important ones recommended by Microsoft, except Microsoft .NET Framework (which I removed in mid May at the suggestion of Microsoft Support). I was concerned with the absence of that, but from what I've read in these forums, .NET won't help.

If anyone is running error-free with a configuration similar to mine, I'd like to figure out what settings or what components you have that I don’t.