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Error: "Symantec Service Framework has encountered a problem and needs to close..." after you install the latest updates for a Norton 2009 product or Norton 360 Version 3.0
The accompanying error, also displayed...
ccSvcHst.exe - Application Error
Download the fix tool from this page [symantec.com].
Basically, this has kept me tied up on and off for days of my time over the past few weeks, this week almost entirely. I'll have to calm down and catch up on some sleep before I can be rational about the problem and about how Symantec responded to it. It took them much too long to catch on. I spent something like 7 hours online with their tech support on Friday.
I've been telling them it's been their problem all week, and they've been telling me I need to take that up with vendors of much of my software. I gather now that the problem was another patch that was originally intended to resolve a conflict in Windows 7, which created many conflict problems in XP.
In all fairness to Symantec, in the course of muddling through this, they put in a lot of time trying to help me, and in doing so they cleaned an awful lot of garbage out of my start menu (even as they try to add more themselves. Everybody is trying to force automatic updates and toolbars onto us).
I don't know whether everything's fixed yet, but the increase in speed of my system is amazing.
[edited by: bill at 12:56 am (utc) on Aug. 28, 2009]
[edit reason] fixed typo on request [/edit]
It took 2 attempts on one machine however it seems to have solved the problem.
It was very annoying as the link to a support page was blank.
On my machine, Norton support remotely uninstalled, cleaned out other Norton programs, made some registry changes, and then reinstalled. This is the classic Norton fix. In my case, everything seemed to work for as short as 15-min or as long as a day, but ultimately the problem came back. I'm still worried about some of the registry changes.
It was my contention from the beginning that NIS2009 had a bug. It turns out that it did. In my case, the problem was intermittently completely disabling my machine. I was afraid to open programs with critical data for fear that they would crash. CPU usage could hit 100%. One of my optical drives didn't recognize DVDs and I'd spent some time looking for a replacement.
So, I'd suggest you go ahead and run the Fix Tool anyway. My guess is that they've tested this one pretty thoroughly. It's an .exe file that you download and save to your Desktop. Running it and restarting patches the bug, which Norton finally came around to admitting they had.
Symantec ccSvcHst.exe Application Error problems, in one form or another, are frequently cited on the web, though not often well described. Most surprisingly, considering the frequency of references elsewhere, ccSvcHst.exe is poorly documented by Symantec, and, up until this problem, you could scarcely find any reference to either the file or the errors on the Symantec site.
Systemically, btw, I don't think this is simply a Symantec problem. There is a proliferation of auto-updaters out there. While you can stall off some Windows updates or browser updates for a week or two, until everyone else has beta tested them, that's neither easy nor wise to do with antivirus and anti-malware updates.
I thought WebmasterWorld users were smart!
It does seem application-related. Thanks for the alert.
Is the patch applicable for other Norton 360 subscribers who have not faced this problem yet?
Cheers!
My guess is that they've tested this one pretty thoroughly.
Probably as well as they tested the product itself. As in, not at all. It's a wonder how any of the anti-virus vendors survive when they regularly bork machines on updates. It seems that they are in the grip of that wonderful theory "extreme programming".
Symantec has been in a downward spiral since the late 90's. They used to have good products, but all of them have morphed into incredible pieces of trashware.
I cannot believe people are still using norton internet security in 2009. Go with NOD or kaspersky, hell even AVG just not NIS. Dont you see the difference in speed before/after NIS installation?
