Vocal Voices

With the help of Master O, we purchased a laptop at Xmas as a back up device for home use. Master O installed something called AVG Zen (which I think is just an umbrella programme) and the free AVG protection.

Rightly or wrongly, I decided to upgrade to AVG Pro so that the machine had fuller protection. I duly paid the requested dosh, opened an AVG MyAccount, downloaded and installed the software, and the AVG icon now purports to show that it's properly installed.

But it also shows that it's on a 30 day trial basis, with a countdown - and do I want to buy it?

The AVG MyAccount shows that I've got a year's product for renewal January 2017.

The AVG MyAccount also says "There is no license number for AVG Protection PRO.
To activate, simply open it and log in using your AVG MyAccount email and password."

Which I have done, but it still shows a 30 day trial, so have I activated it or not? Any ideas, folks?

Ossie, have a look at this for help.

I am assuming that everything AVG was got direct from AVG and not from third-party sites. Having said that I am not sure what else can be done apart from you contacting AVG for answers.

Workingman wrote:Ossie, have a look at this for help.

I am assuming that everything AVG was got direct from AVG and not from third-party sites. Yes. Having said that I am not sure what else can be done apart from you contacting AVG for answers.

Hi WM

The good news - that link was very helpful as the various email notifications AVG sent me said nothing about linking AVG Zen to the AVG MyAccount. I've followed the steps and done this.

The bad news - it's still saying I'm on a 30 day trial .....

Update.

I think I might have solved it. I logged out of AVG Zen (didn't realise I had to ...). It then told me I wasn't protected at all, then it re-initialised itself, and the 29 day trial notice seems to have disappeared!

[rant] Gawd, I hate computers with a passion. Sometimes it's like trying to climb the Eiger, backwards and blindfolded. Or playing a game of snakes and ladders where every ladder you climb automatically lands you on a snake that sends you back to square one. I've spent around three hours, on and off, looking at this. Now I just want to go and have a nice quiet lie down in a darkened room. Does anyone else ever feel that way over computers? [/rant]

Ah but this is not really about computers and computing per-se. This is about information of the lack of it. Master O didn't tell you he had subscribed the machine to a free account on AVG Zen and logged it in so you didn't know that it was logged in with that account.

So when you logged out of that account and in with the account you had paid for it worked.

In the final analysis, totally logical but a complete nightmare when you are missing that vital piece of information.... Us computer geeks tend to look at the current configuration first and then work from there. An inspection of the current configuration would have shown it as logged in with a different account.

It's part of those learning experiences. We have had to learn it so many times it has stuck. But it was just as painful as your experience the first 4 or 5 times and for every time after a few years of not solving it....

Suff wrote:Ah but this is not really about computers and computing per-se. This is about information or the lack of it ......

I wouldn't dispute that in any way, Suff. You are correct; when Master O set up the laptop, I asked him if he'd put AVG on it and he merely said "I've downloaded AVG Zen, and I hope that's the one that's appropriate ....". The AVG dashboard looked OK so I didn't think any deeper thoughts about it. So my assumption was that AVG Zen was merely a new name for AVG Free. That was Misdirection number 1 ......

When I went through the process of upgrading to AVG Paid, having downloaded it and installed it, the directions AVG included concerning activation were bland (if you're charitable) or severely lacking in clarity (if you're not). That was Lack of Information number 2.

Research showed that AVG Support provided helpful pictures of the activation process via the AVG Zen dashboard. Except that they didn't match the Zen dashboard I'd got. Misdirection number 3.

WM's link to a different Support page provided a more helpful understanding of what was needed. But the information given wasn't quite complete. And everything spoke of "connecting to a network" rather than "activation". Lack of Information number 4.

At the end of the day, I only achieved activation through trial and error and playing around with it. That's OK if you have a reasonable knowledge of what you're doing, but not if you're a dumbledore - which as I get older and (in retirement) further away from the daily grind and working knowledge of modern technology, increasingly I am ............

I know it's really annoying isn't it.

Now put yourself in the other position of the poor sap who has to write the documentation FAQ and help tips.

First they expect you to just upgrade the AVG from the dialog box you are logged in with using the account you are already logged in with.
Second they might expect that would buy the product then install it logging in with the account that you used to buy the product with.
Third they are being kind by ensuring that your product is always logged in. Norton does not and forces you to log in when you want to check subscriptions etc. For the self same reason that you are seeing.
Fourth they might expect that if someone else set the thing up then that other person may have done the upgrade for you.

It's very unusual for a person to have the nous to go to AVG and register, independently, for a product which they have already installed and logged in with a different account (you didn't but Master O did). So consider the guy/gal who is trying to write the help FAQ. It will never occur to him or her that you might actually need to log OUT of the software in order to log in again with the account details which you used to subscribe. Or that if you did need to log out that you would not know that.

It might be worth dropping a line to AVG and asking them to update their FAQ and even their information when you upgrade...

TheOstrich wrote:[
At the end of the day, I only achieved activation through trial and error and playing around with it. That's OK if you have a reasonable knowledge of what you're doing, but not if you're a dumbledore - which as I get older and (in retirement) further away from the daily grind and working knowledge of modern technology, increasingly I am ............

I know exactly how you feel, Ostrich. I am in the same boat as you.
The problem is that the smart guys who devise these computer websites are younger than us, and don't understand
that the brains of us older folk were programmed long before the digital age. If we could clear our inborn hard drives,
and start all over again, things might be easier for us.

I must say, though, that Frank and Suff here have been a great help to me, and try hard not to confuse me further with
too much technicality. If it hadn't been for them I would probably have thrown my computer on the tip long ago.

Fortunately I am the only one who uses this computer.
So any problems are of my ow making.
Like some others on here , I am a silver surfer and don't understand all the technical wizardry. But I have learnt a lot, some by trial and error, some with advice on here and some from friends.
I can remember being shown when I was at school, how to use a slide rule to do complicated calculations. Much quicker than using log tables if you got the decimal point in the correct place.
I agree with Aggers, instruction are not easy to understand for us older folk

I am of an age that straddles the old and new. I was brought up with £.s.d, lbs and ozs, inches, yards and miles, but also decimal and digital. I have seen the best, or is it the worst, of both worlds, so can think both ways.

When it comes to computing I am a bit torn. Thanks to something known as the ZX Spectrum I am semi self-taught. It is hard to explain, but back then there was a clique and things were done to exclude those who were not of the clique. A new language, with new words and new thought processes, evolved. This persists, to some extent, to this day.

The new has now become the old, and things are thought of in that way. When things are now done they are explained in the old, new way, and everybody understands...right?, except for those still working in the old, old way.

Don't worry, chaps, Suff and I hope to hang around for a while yet, to untangle the mess.