Cow. Chicken. Bell.

We have a few Dell Laptops in circulation. On both Dell D420s and D620s running Windows XP SP2 we had problems installing and/or updating the signatures in McAfee Virus Scan Enterprise 8.0i.

The main symptom is Error fffff95B @ 2 in the McAfee Common Framework when trying to update the virus signatures and a "Failed to connect to computer '.'." error when trying to access the Virus Scan Console on the affected machine. Also, the McAfee Common Framework Service is not listed as an installed service in services.msc.

The error messages.

After more or less successful googling and trial and error, I have come up with the following fix.

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First log on to the affected machine with a user that has administrative privileges. Uninstall McAfee Virus Scan by going to Start > Control Panel > Add or Remove Programs, tracking down the McAfee Virus Scan entry, clicking Remove and following the prompts to uninstall the software completely.

Next, browse to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Network Associates\ and delete the Virus Scan directory. Of course, if your system resides on a different drive, or you have moved the Documents and Settings folder, replace C: with the applicable drive letter.

Now that we have McAfee out of the way, we need to remove the Document Manager component of Dell's EMBASSY Trust Suite by Wave Systems in order to get McAfee to work correctly. Here's how:

Go to Start > Control Panel > Add or Remove Programs, and locate the EMBASSY Trust Suite by Wave Systems entry. Click Change/Remove:

The EMBASSY Trust Suite by Wave Systems InstallShield Wizard dialog appears. Leave all options as is and click Next:

At the Wave Installer - Dell Embassy Trust Suite by Wave Systems select "Individually configure my applications for repair or removal" with removal being the magic word, and click Next:

Now highlight the Document Manager Lite component by clicking on it. "Action Buttons" appear allowing you to select either Repair or Uninstall. Choose Uninstall. Now place a checkmark next to the Document Manager Lite component. Click Next. Follow all the prompts to uninstall Document Manager Lite.

After the uninstallation completed you are prompted to reboot. Reboot the computer.

After the reboot, log back in with an administrative user. Install McAfee Virus Scan. The installation should go through without a hitch, as should the update.

I hope this information helps some of you folks out. Sorry for the crappy image of the error messages, I'll see if I can come up with a higher res version.