In regards to my previous post about the web shield i have another problem. I have now turned on the web shield. But i have a fairly slow internet connection (slow cable), and it seems that the web shield only slows the website loading time even further. So i was wondering if there is a way for me to possibly change the web shield’s settings so i can browse the internet faster. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
What level do you have the Webshield set at? Normal should be just fine.
Can you explain a slow cable connection - what rate is that?
I have it set on normal mode, and my connection is 256k, which is slow for downloading files and such, but it should be just fine for simply browsing web pages.
The scanning of web traffic by avast is, for most users, so fast compared with network speed, as to be almost imperceptible, even at dial-up speeds.
What is your impression of the difference with the Webshield active for a given website and with it inactive. Can you advise of the website so we can compare?
Can you also give us some further information on your system please? Operating system, memory, CPU speed?
Well i have msn.com set as my homepage, and i have timed how long it takes to load the page with and without the web shield active.
When the web shield is active, the load time for my homepage is about 8 and 1/2 seconds.
When the web shield is inactive, the load time for my homepage is about 3 seconds, so there is a difference in the loading times.
My system specs are as follows:
WinXP Media Center Edition 2005
Service Pack 2
1.60GHz Intel Centrino Processor
504 MB of RAM
So my notebook isn’t exactly top notch, but it certainly isn’t completely obsolete either, (excluding the RAM maybe)
The nearest I can come to that is my old Dell system (vintage 2000).
Windows XP Pro SP2
1Ghz P3 processor
512Mb memory
The loading of the msn.com homepage in IE7 on that machine (even on my broadband connection) is varying between 4 & 7 seconds with avast turned off and 3 and 8 seconds with avast turned on. I wanted to try with my backup dialup connection (50kbps) but it will not connect tonight.
However, the amount of data to be scanned by avast when the msn.com homepage is loaded is the same whether it is delivered at 50 kbps or 50Mbps. avast will take the same amount of time and CPU to scan that data inside your system - of course avast will take a little longer to scan that data on a slower CPU - but we are talking milliseconds of CPU time for most pages. Almost every page is composed of multiple threads retrieving data from multiple sources that paint the page - what matters most in these cases is how long the slowest thread takes to get the data data from the server. I notice tonight that (even on the faster system where I am posting this) the main advertisment (middle right) is taking a couple of seconds to appear after the rest of the page (whether avast is on or off). These components of the page also change in different geographical regions and probably require access to different servers … making true comparisons even more difficult.
It would be worth checking the task manager to see if you notice any particular processes with high CPU utilization as you are loading the msn.com homepage.
If you had a very fast broadband connection there may be a slight decrease in page loading as theoretically data would be being downloaded much more quickly so there might be a queue of files being scanned by the web shield. However, with a slower connection there is theoretically more time to do the scan and as Alan mentioned with Dial-up (my connection method), there is zero perceptible difference in page loading.
Whilst as Alan said, the time web shield takes to scan the downloaded data may be the same no matter what the delivery speed, there may be a noticeable difference in page loading, but the download speed shouldn’t really be effected.
Did you clear your browser cache before running the test for without the web shield enabled as that might also skew any timings ?
I did a test with msn.com with my super fast dial-up connection racing along at 50.6 Kbps. First with the Web Shield Terminated (not just paused) and it took 45 seconds to get the Done notification in the status bar. Second with the Web Shield enabled and a forced page load without the Browser cache and that took 44 seconds. So pretty close all things considered and I was a little sloppy getting my stopwatch started on the first non-web shield test.
I think that clearing my browser’s cache is the problem. Because i have a habit of running CCleaner everytime i am done surfing the internet. So like you pointed out, clearing it everytime can result in some longer load times. But as far as CPU usage goes, the programs taking up the most memory are as follows:
firefox: 32 MB
explorer:23MB
svchost:23MB
avast! Web Shield: 18MB
avast! Standard Shield: 10MB
But since firefox has the tabbed browsing feature, i sometimes use three to four tabs at a time to load different pages, which could result in a slower load time because of the web shield having to scan each website at once.
Tabbbed browsing could be slow while WebScan is doing its job.
Other possibility of increasing browsing time is uninstalling some firefox extensions that you’re not using, specially non-security related ones.
What you posted isn’t CPU usage but Memory usage a different thing, the one which is using most of the CPU cycles (%) could be slowing other things down, so if you can list the CPU usage whilst browsing and see what they are for avast processes, they begin with ash or asw, see image. You can click the CPU column heading and that will sort the order by CPU usage, you might need to click it twice for the highest first. Ignore the System Idle Process entry, that is the amount left (not in use).