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Windows Vista Firewall stopped working?

D

dguy6789

Diamond Member
Greetings.

Long story short, I mistakenly installed an AV program on my system that does not support vista. It royally screwed up a ton of things. I have managed to fix most of the problems that it has caused except for one. The Windows Vista Firewall will not work. If I try to turn the firewall on, it tells me that it cannot turn it on because the firewall service is not on, and then it asks me if I want to turn the firewall service on. I click yes. It then gives me an error message saying that Windows cannot start the firewall service, and the only option it gives me is okay.

I have done some research on the subject and have found that the Windows Firewall service requires the Base Filtering Engine service to be started for it to be able to work. I go and look in the services section and lo and behold, the Base Filtering Engine is not enabled. I try and start the service and get the following error message: Windows could not start the Base Filtering Engine on Local Computer. Error 2: The system cannot find the file specified.

My best guess right now is that if I can somehow get the Base Filtering Engine service to function normally again, then everything will be back to normal? Can anyone help me out? I would greatly appreciate being able to use the Windows Firewall again without having to format. Thanks in advance.
 
Sounds like the service entry got screwed up or the install actually removed system files (probably unlikely). Can you post the HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\BFE tree from your regsitry? Specifically want to initially see the ImagePath and under Parameters the ServiceDLL entry...

 
I am not very familiar with the registry terms.

Image Path - %systemroot%\system32\svchost.exe -k LocalServiceNoNetwork

Parameters - ServiceDLL - %SystemRoot%\System32\bfe.dll


Stuff under HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\BFE:


Default - REG_SZ - (value not set)
DependOnService - REG_MULTI_SZ - RpcSs
Description - REG_SZ - @%SystemRoot%\system32\bfe.dll,-1002
DisplayName - REG_SZ - @%SystemRoot%\system32\bfe.dll,-1001
ErrorControl - REG_DWORD - 0x00000001 (1)
FailureActions - REG_BINARY - 80 51 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 03 00 00 00 14 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 c0 d4 01 00 01 00 00 00 e0 93 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
Group - REG_SZ - NetworkProvider
ImagePath - REG_EXPAND_SZ - %systemroot%\system32\svchost.exe -k LocalServiceNoNetwork
ObjectName - REG_SZ - NT AUTHORITY\LocalService
RequiredPrivileges - REG_MULTI_SZ - SeAuditPrivilege SeImpersonatePrivilege
ServiceSidType - REG_DWORD - 0x00000003 (3)
Start - REG_DWORD - 0x00000002 (2)
Type - REG_DWORD - 0x00000020 (32)


Hope this helps.
 
Two thoughts, the quick one, does the bfe.dll exist in your system32 directory? Its possible that was accidently deleted.

Also, can you just system restore back to before installing the firewall, that should fix everything...
 
bfe.dll is indeed in the system32 folder. I don't have system restore enabled, so that is not an option. Any other ideas?
 
Originally posted by: dguy6789
bfe.dll is indeed in the system32 folder. I don't have system restore enabled, so that is not an option. Any other ideas?
Click to expand...

a) Why is system restore disabled? This is exactly why it's there
b) If that is there I suspect some bindings deep in the registry are hosed (probably a layered module).

Having not run into this before, I don't have much more to offer than suggesting a reinstall on top (so you wont lose settings/data) but that should hopefully fix this (oh, and turn on SR!)

Bill

 
I don't know why I disabled system restore. I just never used it nor had reason to use it before. How would I go about reinstalling on top with Windows Vista? Will all of my programs and all of my data remain exactly as it is? Will all of my settings and such still be the same?

I will turn on system restore the instant I get everything back to normal.
 
Will all of my programs and all of my data remain exactly as it is? Will all of my settings and such still be the same?
Click to expand...

Yes, you just do an upgrade install (not a clean install). Put the Vista disk in and run setup, it should walk you thru it.

 
Originally posted by: dguy6789
I don't know why I disabled system restore. I just never used it nor had reason to use it before. How would I go about reinstalling on top with Windows Vista? Will all of my programs and all of my data remain exactly as it is? Will all of my settings and such still be the same?

I will turn on system restore the instant I get everything back to normal.
Click to expand...

You probably turned it off after reading some crappy tweak guide on the web. That's a semi popular "tweak" that makes no sense to me. Hard drive space could hardly get any cheaper, so space concerns are a non issue. I hardly ever use SR either, but there's been a couple of times where it saved me a ton of hassle. Losing a little hd space is a small price to pay for the convenience. I bet you could have bought a 500gb hd with the time you spent trying to get your computer sorted out (at whatever the hourly rate is at your job).

I'm not trying to pick on you or anything, it's just that those kind of "tweaks" really irritate me. They do nothing for performance, but can cause users great hassles that would otherwise be easily avoided 🙂
 
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