Hello avast! forum

[Justin2223]

Just wanted to say hi!, My names Justin I used to be a "regular" on this forum a few years back I reached the rank of "Evangelist" some of you might remember me (atleast I hope)  but then had to move and had to sell all of my equipment, My wife and I just recently about a week and a half ago got the cash saved up to buy a computer  and now that I have one im back to using good old avast! 

Random: if anyone would like to know my config so you could critique it it here it is:

Computer- Compaq Presario CQ57, 2Gb RAM, Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
Real Time- Avast 7 Free (all settings maxed out), Comodo Firewall with sandbox/Defense+
On Demand- MBAM free, Hitman Pro, Comodo Cleaning essentials, Emsisoft antimalware
Browsing- Firefox 14.0.1 (Adblock plus, WebRep, WOT, Bitdefender Trafficlight)

[DavidR]

Welcome to the forums Justin.

Personally I would get rid of hitmanpro as one of our malware removal specialists feels that it can flag/delete important files. I would say MBAM is fine but do you need Emisoft antimalware too. When you spend a lot of time keeping security applications up to date, you become their slave rather than them being your servant.

Browser wise, with the avast Web & Network Shields and WebRep and WOT, I would say the Bitdefender Trafficlight is too much. Considering in ADBlock Plus you can get a malicious sites list and firefox also has its safe browsing protection.

[Justin2223]

Thank you DavidR I've personally never had a problem with Hitman when cleaning family member/friends/neighbors computers but you guys are more experienced then I am so I'll take that into account. I get what you mean by becoming their slave though, I dont update CCE and EAM everyday but on a every other day basis but it can become grueling haha. I do like Trafficlight but it can be a bit to much, lately firefox memory usage has been through the roof, I left firefox open for a hour and half and I checked on it and it was using 950,000k I don't know if that's because of a memory leak or because of all the ad-ons. On the subject of ad-ons is no-script still a good one? I was using it before with all my previous set ups but it would be a big problem with my wife now 

[DavidR]

I have MBAM Pro so that is auto updating, I also have SAS Pro, but it isn't resident, I only run this once a week and update it just before I run the scan.

I would say NoScript is/should be a mandatory add-on, personally I would like to see that incorporated into firefox if Mr Malone would allow it
I also use RequestPolicy add-on, but that can be too much for most people.

[Justin2223]

Haha there's a few ad-ons that should be mandatory in FF, the only thing I wish right now is that they would fix the ram issue, I mean with two tabs open running at 950,000k? that's atrocious IMO. Oh I forgot for my On Demand I have a SARDU rescue disk made to go into my toolkit.

[DavidR]

I have 16 tabs open and memory is only 353,732K but I have seen it higher around 500,000K. But it doesn't seem to be an issue and I only have 2GB of RAM on this XP Pro system.

I have 7 pinned tabs that open on boot and they are open all of the time, the others then are general browsing and the avast forums.

[Justin2223]

Then do you think this problem would be only on my system? because I've tried different things to lower the memory usage and none of it works, the only thing that does is shutting it down and restarting FF but it always works all the way back up. I've actually considered switching to Chrome of god awful IE, and I love FF.

[CharleyO]

***

Welcome back, Justin!

Like David, I think you have too many security programs many of which are doing duplicate work.
On my own computers and the 20 some others I support, I only use Avast and MBAM and no one has had any infection problem for the last 5 years. My own computers haven't been infected in 10 years.


***

[DavidR]

Then do you think this problem would be only on my system? because I've tried different things to lower the memory usage and none of it works, the only thing that does is shutting it down and restarting FF but it always works all the way back up. I've actually considered switching to Chrome of god awful IE, and I love FF.

I have no idea of the memory differences given that I'm using XP Pro uses less system resources, so more remains for other use. Your using win7 64bit and there are some that say 2GB minimum for win7 and possibly more for 64bit to leave more for other applications without suffering low RAM issues.

So given what I have said above about your myriad of security applications even those on-demand ones may well have a background service running. I would be very judicious of what I kept and browser add-ons too would contribute to over RAM use (but that would probably be in the plugin-container.exe process of task manager.

[bob3160]

Welcome back Justin,
Your security paranoia, appears to be, your Ram destroyer.
This may be a rhyme but consider it your stitch in time.
Get rid of all that excess protection you don't need,
It's choking you like a weed.
Almost all of your protection is handled by avast!
It's a product you know you can trust. 

[Justin2223]

I guess I could do without a few...but what can I say! I am paranoid about security  Can you blame me though?

[jadinolf]

Welcome aboard Justin.

I am just wondering how you do with Windows 7 and just 2G of RAM because I have 3 computers where 2G are maximum.

Have fun here with this wonderful group of people.

[true indian]

Welcome too the forum justin
...I would suggest you to only Avast with COMODO D+ and FW....and keep emsisoft emergency kit as a on demand scanner alongside with MBAM/MBAM pro

[Justin2223]

Thanks for all of the replies!  as for how the computer runs? its runs pretty fast, the only time I ever notice a slowdown is when avast/mbam ect. are running scans and the time I spoke of before when Firefox was basically eating the RAM of this thing alive. But I removed a uneeded ad-on and since I have the levels have returned to pretty regular sizes (150,000-300,000). And thank you true indian I have "slimmed" my anti-malware toolkit down a bit 

[DavidR]

You're welcome.
I would certainly invest in some more RAM another 2GB (it is relatively cheap now) as 2GB I would say is probably a bare minimum for win7 64bit, I believe you would notice an overall improvement in performance.

If your system is low on RAM, it has to constantly swap data in RAM to the swapfile (pagefile.sys) on the hard drive, this is what slows things and gives your hard drive a real workout.

Whilst updating a Laptop RAM might be more difficult than on a desktop, some aren't so difficult if you are a reasonable DIYer and you find a How To video on line and use http://www.crucial.com/index.aspx to find what RAM is required. http://www.crucial.com/search/searchresults.aspx?keywords=Compaq%20Presario%20CQ57

Or if you aren't feeling confident a local computer repair/store, probably wouldn't charge much if you happen to be buying the upgrade RAM from them (they would also know what RAM is required).