After updating to 4.8.1335 surfing and downloading are significantly slower. When I turn off on-access protection internet works normal. Does anybody have the same problem? I will reinstall avast! later to see if it can help.
I see no such slowdown, but I’m on dial-up so I have varying degrees of slow already.
No problems here. Vista x64 and 4096/1024 connection.
What browser are you using?
Firefox 3.0.6
Download is decreased from 180 Kb/s to 30-40 Kb/s.
Reinstalling was not of help.
Try stopping the Web Shield. Does that make any difference?
And what about the Network Shiekd?
When I stop the Web Shield surfing/downloading is normal. No problem with Network Shield.
What if you only pause the Web Shield, as opposed to stopping it?
After reading this topic I checked my download speed which was 4888kbps with the Web Shield running and 4936kbps with it paused (upload speed remained stable), whilst it may affect those with slower download speeds I feel its a small price to pay for the protection you would lose with the Web Shield turned off.
I do not see a reduction in speed with the update but then I do not have a software firewall installed other than the XP firewall.
I am sorry for the late response.
When I paused Web Shield the internet still was very slow. In the same time on my notebook I have avast! 4.8.1296 and there was no slowing.
Finally, the problem disappeared as it come and now everything looks OK. I will watch what will happen in the next fiew days.
Thanks for helping. Best regards.
Slightly (or perhaps more than slightly) O/T, but related …
I presume that the new malware-url database associated with Network Shield will grow as new sites are added to the defs. Is it possible that database-lookup contributes significantly to slowness when browsing?
Hardly. A lookup to the URL database is several orders of magnitude faster than the actual virus scan.
I’m on high speed cable internet (Cox), cable internet is unstable. I often get wide variations of speed from speed checks, I use Speakeasy to check the speed of my internet. Due to the unstable nature of cable the data I’m giving isn’t very credible.
With Web Shield disabled I get up to 25mbs download. With Web Shield running I get up to 18mbs. It doesn’t make any difference if it is paused or disabled.
Network Shield on or off makes no difference.
I have gotten 27+ mbs with Web Shield on, but it’s been quite a while. I believe it was with 4.8.1296. 
I have seen no difference on the three computer which I have. The main one is Vista and the other two run XP.
[quote author=rdmaloyjr link=topic=42371.msg355093#msg355093 date=1234035964]
I’m on high speed cable internet (Cox), cable internet is unstable. I often get wide variations of speed from speed checks, I use Speakeasy to check the speed of my internet.
So very true.Went to 3meg DSL and am much happier.
I agree about the variability of speed test results especially when they are affected by cable providers speed boosting where network capacity is available and more recently their newer congestion management.
However, for what it is worth, I just conducted back to back tests on Speakeasy using avast 4.8.1335:
With avast Webshield & Network Shield active download speed: 27Mbps
With avast Webshield & Network Shield terminated download speed: 27Mbps
My internet speed isn’t an issue, 12769/1119 per speakeasy, but Firefox just stops and freezes unless I disable the web shield on Avast’s latest update. I was using it with Online Armor and it doesn’t seem to matter whether that firewall’s web shield is on or off.
Decided to uninstall/reload, and surprised that download.com gave me 4.8.1296, but that’s fine. Back running with web shield enabled on boat Avast and Online armor.
On my desktop PC internet was decreased after updating to 4.8.1335 but after a while the issue dissapeared as it came. At this very moment everything is OK as on the desktop so on the notebook.
Compare to other antiviruses that I used Avast’s http scanning is superb.
I don’t see much difference myself. After reading this thread a couple of days ago, I held off updating as program update is set to manual for me. Today I ran a speed test using ‘speakeasy’ with 4.8.1296 version. With it on or off I got pretty much the same results. I have DSL and it measured as follows:
With Avast 4.8.1296 enabled:
Download = 3.131Mps; upload = 325K
With Avast 4.8.1296 disabled,
Download = 3.118MpS; upload = 326K.
After installing 4.8.1335 I ran the speed test again.
With Avast 4.8.1335 enabled:
Download = 3.128MPS; upload = 325K
With Avast 4.8.1335 disabled:
Download = 3.137MPS; upload = 313K
Not much appreciable difference. Of course everytime you run the speed test it can be a little different due to server traffic I think.