Avast and Mail in El Capitan...

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Level 1

41 points

Avast and Mail in El Capitan...

For anybody having problems with Mail in El Cap... another potential fix...

I was agonizing over Mail's massive log files and getting stuck on "Downloading 1 message..." etc. too. I deleted the log files, reset my iCloud account, reset Mail, had to wait a day or three for all my emails to re-sync, etc. I also spent periods with Apple trying to find a solution. No luck.

And then I looked at the Console logs while opening mail... and saw an error message about IMAP from a virus-checker I was running, "Avast."

I stopped Avast from filtering mail.

And every problem I was having suddenly stopped. Frankly, I went ahead and deleted Avast from the computer, just to be sure. Since then, no problems whatsoever. I know that might not be the source of everybody's issues with the program. But it's made such a huge difference for me, I wanted to pass it along.

Can't imagine why that would be the issue, but there you have it.

Hope it helps someone!

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X El Capitan (10.11.1)

Posted on Nov 24, 2015 12:29 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

Bilbo Bowman

Level 1

18 points

Jun 28, 2017 3:10 AM in response to JTF

I just logged in to post about the Avast Mail Scanner potentially causing Mail to be very unreliable and unstable thinking that I might spare others the headaches that I have been going through. Before posting, I thought that I'd search for "Avast" first just in case someone else has already found this problem. Your post came up James. Man, I wish that I saw this earlier!

Mail appeared to work fine in clean user account so I figured that I had to be running something that was conflicting in my regular user account. I do use a variety of 3rd party utilities and apps like Default Folder X, PopClip, TextExpander, Hazel, Moom etc, and Mac app replacements like Fantastical and Busy Contacts. But none of those really have anything to do with Mail except possibly Busy Contacts as it tracks messages and mail for my contacts. I ruled that out because I was having Mail issues before installing Busy Contacts.

This morning an Avast alert popped up as they occasionally do, telling be that it blocked a threat in an email (nearly always a Win32 malware threat in a Spanish language email)

Then it hit me...Avast is scanning my incoming mail! Maybe, just maybe Avast was the culprit.

I turned off the Avast Mail Scanner and I've been good for the last 6 hours. I have been pulling my hair out for months with Mail being totally unreliable. I've logged in and out of iCloud, deleted accounts and made new ones, rebuilt mailboxes and the troubles would often resurface within 30 minutes. I'm feeling pretty confident that this has solved the problem!

Cheers!

Bill

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Answer 2

Barney-15E

Level 10

112,512 points

Nov 24, 2015 4:23 AM in response to JTF

The only purpose Anti-Virus software has on a Mac is to cause you problems.

There are no viruses for it to find and the OS already prevents all the known Malware.

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Answer 3

Jun 28, 2017 3:10 AM in response to JTF

Thank you JFT. I had similar problems with Mail after upgrading to El Capitan. When I uninstalled Avast everything worked perfectly.

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Answer 4

Nov 7, 2016 7:07 PM in response to JTF

Where you having issues where the email and subject line said it was coming from one person but the email is from someone else?

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Answer 5

Nov 8, 2016 6:04 AM in response to Carisa Hunn

No, not at all.

My problem was the Mail app would hang while trying to download messages. This was caused by the Avast software that was scanning the mail messages.

B

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Answer 6

Csound1

Level 9

59,973 points

Nov 8, 2016 6:06 AM in response to Carisa Hunn

Carisa Hunn wrote:

Where you having issues where the email and subject line said it was coming from one person but the email is from someone else?

More to the point, are you?

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Answer 7

JTF Author

Level 1

41 points

Jun 28, 2017 3:12 AM in response to Carisa Hunn

Apologies for not replying sooner Carisa... I was bowled over by the US Election results (and still am) 😉 But no, I wasn't and haven't had that problem. It sounds like you're getting a spam email.

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