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I'm currently using Malwarebytes Pro but want to have Windows Defender on as well since MAMB isn't really an antivirus. They're supposed to be compatible but for some reason I can't turn on Windows Defender; I see the message "Your PC isn't being monitored because the app's service stopped. You should restart it now." When I visit the process list, I see that WinDefend is in the "Stopped" state, and when I turn it on it flashed on for less than a second before going back to "Stopped".

I've uninstalled Malwarebytes and removed anything related to it I can find (ProgramData, registry entries, etc.) but I still can't turn on Defender and get a timeout error any time I try to enable it. I've never tried to install any other antivirus so it's not possible that any remnants are conflicting. Additionally, Windows Update fails to install any Defender-related updates.

What can I do? I know I could just get a different AV but I'd like to get this working.

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  • Your inability to launch Windows Defender has nothing to do with Malwarebytes. This sounds like system corruption use DISM and sfc to confirm.
    – Ramhound
    Oct 7, 2014 at 17:30

1 Answer 1

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You should probably run System File Checker:

sfc /scannow

This will go through and make sure your Windows install is good, including Defender. If this doesn't resolve the issue, please check back with details regarding any errors reported in the system logs.

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  • Should've thought of that; it found corrupted files and managed to fix some of them, Defender now works.
    – Matt
    Oct 7, 2014 at 18:47
  • Cool. I'm happy it worked for you. Oct 7, 2014 at 19:25

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