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Avira Antivir Personal is a neat anti virus software which you can download for free. Well, it’s not entirely free compared to AVG Free Anti-Virus because through daily update (by default)  it would pop-up a big nag screen asking you to purchase a full professional paid version of the software which is Avira AntiVir Premium. Therefore, some may call it a nagware. Like most anti-virus software, it scans disks for viruses and also runs as a background process, checking each opened and closed file. It can detect and possibly remove rootkits. Avira updated all their products to version 9.0 as of March 2009. Here’s a workaround to disable its nag screen.

Windows Vista Ultimate x86:

1. Open Local Security Policy through Start > type secpol.msc in Search box and hit Enter
2. Click on Software Restriction Policies > Action > create New Software Restriction Policies.
3. On left pane right-click on  Software Restriction Policies > Additional Rules > New Path Rule….
4. Click Browse and navigate to C:\Program Files\Avira\AntiVir Desktop\ and select avnotify.exe  and then click on OK.
5. Set Security level to Disallowed.
6. Click Apply and then click OK.
7. Voila, pop-up nag screen is history. Enjoy your free Avira Antivir

Note: For 64-bit version of Vista Ultimate, avnotify.exe is actually in C:\Program Files (x86)\Avira\AntiVir Desktop

Windows Vista Home Premium:

1. Go to C:\Program Files\Avira\AntiVir PersonalEdition Classic\avnotify.exe.
2. Right-click avnotify.exe and go to Properties > Security.
3. Under the group or username SYSTEM, click edit.
4. Put a checkmark under the DENY column for “read and execute”.