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Consumer Products => Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security (legacy Pro Antivirus, Internet Security, Premier) => Topic started by: suszterpatt on October 25, 2005, 10:17:21 PM
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Running the latest version of Avast! Home on a fairly fresh (week or two old) WinXP Pro install.
Even when the computer is completely idle, every couple of seconds it will freeze for a tiny bit. We're talking about full-out freezes with a complete blackout of input/output, but never longer than the fraction of a second. This gets especially irritating while gaming or watching movies. Interestingly enough, it doesn't affect Winamp, but disrupts other sound sources (games, etc).
I've been observing this phenomenon through the WinXP performance monitor (the one that draws the graph of CPU usage over time), and every time there is a spike (CPU usage jumping up to 15-30% and coming back to 0-1% right after), the Avast! tray icon turns once.
I have an AMD 3000+ CPU with 1GB of RAM, so I think we can rule out insufficient hardware resources. Also, I don't recall having this error on my previous Win2k install, on which I was running the same version of Avast!.
I have no other antivirus software installed, though most of Avast!'s On-Access protection features are enabled. The Windows firewall and most real-time security options are disabled, as is hard disk indexing and other features that would use notable resources.
The system seems to be clean of any malicious software (I used Avast!, Spybot SnD, Hijack This! and AdAware to scan).
Anyone have an idea as to what the problem is and how to solve it?
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Hi suszterpatt, and welcome to the Forum. :)
I'd say you have a problem with your WinXP Pro install causing "hiccups" rather than Avast! .
Obviously if you've run Avast! on : " previous Win2k install, on which I was running the same version of Avast! . "
you should be aware that typically Avast! wouldn't cause such problems.
The obvious Microsoft critical/optional Updates ; SP2 , are required , if not already installed.
A full check up of your system seems to be more in order than Avast! robbing you of system resources .
As you say:
I have an AMD 3000+ CPU with 1GB of RAM, so I think we can rule out insufficient hardware resources.
You can easily go to Add/Remove programs( online ) and select Avast! > Repair.
Then you've eliminated Avast! as a problem and can move along to checking your operating system .
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Thanks for the advice. My Windows is up to date, and I just did a repair of Avast!, but to no avail. I may try a repair of WinXP (if my CD allows such) and see if that fixes anything. I just can't imagine it tricking Avast! into taking resources away from other applications to scan something.
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You are going to see a pick up in CPU activity whilst the avast icon is rotating as it is scanning something. The scans are done at a high priority so it can be done quickly and return priority back to other programs equaly as quickly. This is resident on-access scanning, when a program opens a file first avast scans it.
What you need to do is identify what program is causing avast to scan a file or files.
If your gaming is off-line and watching moves, there is nothing to stop you pausing (or terminating) the Standard Shield provider.
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Holy... I think I just found the source of the problem. Trillian. Every time I recieve a message in IRC, there's a spike and the tray icon turns. At first I thought it was scanning the log files, but adding their directory to the ignored folders didn't help.
So I guess the question now is: what would be the risks in not using Avast! to protect Trillian (or IRC at least)? Are there any serious threats that could get me through IRC?
God, why didn't I think of this before? :-X
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I don't use IRC, but there are lots of threats to using IRC, so I wouldn't advise terminating the avast cover for Trillian. I would have thought that the best solution would be to pause/terminate Trillian whilst gaming or watching movies. Even if avast were not to check the Trillian traffic, Trillian would still use CPU resources.
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Actualy yes most viruses of kind Rbot is based on IRC protocol.
And here is a little help from irchelp site:
http://www.irchelp.org/irchelp/security/trojan.html
Do not forget to update you software, trillian windows becouse most of new/old viruses is using bugs to get into your computer.
//try to change in settings to lower scan type
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I don't use IRC, but there are lots of threats to using IRC, so I wouldn't advise terminating the avast cover for Trillian. I would have thought that the best solution would be to pause/terminate Trillian whilst gaming or watching movies. Even if avast were not to check the Trillian traffic, Trillian would still use CPU resources.
Turning Trillian off is not a very desirable option as I like (and soon will need) to be contacted anytime, and IRC is a convenient medium for that. However, I just turned off on-access protection for a couple of minutes and there was absolutely no lag when recieving messages. So whatever Avast! is doing when I get a new IRC message is lagging the system.
Would setting the scanner program to a lower priority in the Windows task manager be a good idea?
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when you said adding files to exclude list maybe you added to the wrong place
first pic is for on access scanner (standard sheild)and second is for Avast! main scanning engine.
the one you obviously need is the first.
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I used the method in the first pic.
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I don't use IRC, but there are lots of threats to using IRC, so I wouldn't advise terminating the avast cover for Trillian. I would have thought that the best solution would be to pause/terminate Trillian whilst gaming or watching movies. Even if avast were not to check the Trillian traffic, Trillian would still use CPU resources.
Turning Trillian off is not a very desirable option as I like (and soon will need) to be contacted anytime, and IRC is a convenient medium for that. However, I just turned off on-access protection for a couple of minutes and there was absolutely no lag when recieving messages. So whatever Avast! is doing when I get a new IRC message is lagging the system.
Would setting the scanner program to a lower priority in the Windows task manager be a good idea?
Life is about choices, security Vs performance. That decision has to be yours, personally I wouldn't reduce my security for a temporary blip in movies or gaming to allow IMs/IRC, etc. to pass without being scanned.
If this is truly important to you (highlighted in Red) "Turning Trillian off is not a very desirable option as I like (and soon will need) to be contacted anytime, and IRC is a convenient medium for that." How would you feel if you lost the use of your system to IRC malware due to the lowering of your security and you weren't able to be contacted by any on-line means?
Life is a compromise.
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And I'm hoping to find a compromise between being unprotected and sacrificing system performance for protection.
I don't want to completely turn off protection, just looking for a way to make it more application-friendly, if you take my meaning.
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There's a few options. Firstly we don't know what Firewall your using ? You may be able to delegate some of the protection for Trillion via other programs, I know that for MSN messenger ( hate that thing :P ) ZoneLabs have a little program designed to encode your communications. If you look into this further there may be other ways to divert Trillion's " protection" , away from Avast!.
Personally if it was me I'd buy a T.V. and a gaming console for when you need to be using your comp. for communication. Sorry, not trying to be glib, but being unprotected online is so dangerous ...
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I'm behind a D-Link DI 604 router that also serves as a firewall, other than that there's Avast! and Spybot in the software department.
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Not much more to say except that even though your system is very powerful, if you need to run all these processes and applications your going to have to increase your system's memory and processor capacity to do it. ;)
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I seriously doubt that a watered down version of WinXP (as in most extra features are turned off) would be so much more demanding compared to Win2k that running Avast! makes that big of a difference.