Help me to uninstall Bitdefender

Neil_M16

Hello. I have the free version of Bitdefender installed on my WIndows 10 PC. It hasn't been working properly for some time and I want to uninstall and then reinstall it again. The version I'm using is 1.0.21.1109.

To briefling explain the issue: clicking on any Bitfender icon on my computer, doesn't open Bitfender. Nothing happens. The only way I can get anywhere is to run the file "gziface.exe" from Windows Explorer as an administator. That produces a Bitdefender menu where there seems to be options, but all the text is invisible. Here's an image of what that looks like:

Bitdefender Menu.png

Hence my desire to cut my losses, uninstall and start again from scratch. But that isn't proving very easy either.

I've looked at the instructions here: https://www.bitdefender.com/consumer/support/answer/2791/, but they don't work properly for me. When I click "Uninstall" (point 3) I don't get any other options, I just jump to the "Programs and Features" sub-menu of the Windows 10 control panel. I can try to uninstall it from there, but although the option appears, generally nothing happens.

Ocassionally when I try this I get a message saying the program may not have uninstalled correctly, and Windows offers to uninstall it in compatibility mode. If I agree to this then nothing at all happens.

All the files are sitting in C://Program Files/Bitdefender/

I can't manually delete anything in that folder even with administrator permission

The service is still showing as running in the Windows Task Manager and I can't stop it.

So I'm at a bit of a loss. I've seen the products on this page https://www.bitdefender.com/site/view/uninstall_consumer_paid.html, but they all seem to refer to the paid edition of Bitdefender and not the free version.

Does anyone have any thoughts? I'd appreciate any help in getting this fixed.

Flexx

https://community.bitdefender.com/en/discussion/84599/help-me-to-uninstall-bitdefender

Kindly perform below steps & see if this helps you in anyway.

1. Kindly always first uninstall the product with add/ remove programs option in windows. The bitdefender uninstaller are only designed to uninstall paid version and not free version.

2. Restart PC in safe mode (https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/start-your-pc-in-safe-mode-in-windows-10-92c27cff-db89-8644-1ce4-b3e5e56fe234)

3. As soon as desktop opens, assuming your windows drive is C, open below things in run (windows icon + R) command one by one :

C:\Program Files (delete any folder with name bitdefender)

C:\Program Files (x86) (delete any folder with name bitdefender)

C:\ProgramData (delete any folder with name bitdefender)

C:\Users\{your pc name}\AppData\Local (delete any folder with name bitdefender)

4. Open run command again and run below command one by one :

temp ,delete all the files in the folder

%temp% ,delete all the files in folder

prefetch ,delete all the files in folder

5. Open registry editor through run command (windows icon + R) and then type regedit. Once registry editor opens, click on edit -> find, make sure to tick mark match whole strings only. Type bitdefender in search box and click find next. If any file or folder under name of bitdefender is found, delete it. Continue searching the registry and deleting until the search will report no registry keys found.

6. Restart your PC in general mode by unticking the option that you selected to run the system in safe mode and then click apply.

7. Try reinstalling bitdefender free.

If issue persists, kindly contact bitdefender support at bitsy@bitdefender.com .They will reply back asap.

Regards

Flex

(Bitdefender beta tester 2019/ 2020)

Neil_M16

Many thanks for your quick response.

I can't do all those steps right now, but I'll run through this over the weekend and let you know how I get on.

Kind regards,

Neil.

Flexx

https://community.bitdefender.com/en/discussion/comment/301331#Comment_301331

Well, what you can do at present is try and use bitdefender free uninstaller (https://www.bitdefender.com/files/KnowledgeBase/file/BD_Free_Uninstall_Tool.exe)

Note that this uninstaller is only meant for free version. If the issue persists, you will have to follow the steps provided in previous comment.

Regards

Flex