The major disadvantage with the task scheduler trick of using ashquick.exe is, it will scan every file of the hdd, partition, folder or file that you set it to scan; even those files not considered a potential threat, this can take a long time. It is possible to add certain folders to the exclusions list for say your media files, etc. This could leave you vulnerable if that folder got infected as it wouldn’t be scanned by the on-demand scanner as you have excluded it.
The Pro version gives a lot more flexibility and the scan would follow the settings and exclusions, etc. of the regular scan.
With the different levels of protection of and the fall back of the Standard Shield, I find the need for daily scheduled scans lessened. I prefer to do a manual scan with my regular weekly maintenance tasks.
I’m afraid the Armadillo unpacker won’t make it into this build. I’ve already received the source code from a developper, but I didn’t have time to integrate it into avast! yet (it won’t be exactly easy). But it seems that the number of Armadillo packed malware decreased in the last months; some new packers are getting used more frequently.
Regarding the new packers… some Chinese packers, pretty common these days, have been included. With the “Installer” packer, avast! unpacks Wise installers and also looks for embedded executables (common in various droppers). More to come, hopefully (and I’ll also do my best to include Armadillo finally).
Downloaded and installed without a hitch. Had to reboot my machine twice to complete, but then it worked fine. So far so good, no errors yet. Scan throughput seems good, negligible impact on system resources while performing other operations. Ashserv and Aswebserv look good in Wintop, very little CPU usage on a minimal test machine, P MMX@ 233Mhz, 144Mb RAM, 2.58G HDD, circa 1997!
Thanks ALWIL.
Everything fine but why don’t you guys add “Virus Chest” access to “a” ball right click menu? It’s so annyoing to have icon on desktop for it or to run simple interface first and then chest. This is the easiest thing to do compared to complex unpackers and decryptors and many of us would really like to see it. It has been requested many times and still nothing.
I would second that and pipe in for the Virus Database to be available without having to go through the simple user interface, I haven’t been able to find a way to create a desktop shortcut like you can for ashChest.exe.
One option that would be realy useful would be an addition on the context menu when you right click a file, like the “scan (and the name of the selected file)” exept that this would add the file to the chest.
It would make submitting file a lot easier
That’s really strange. The previous build of avast! was working without any problems?
Do you have any other low-level programs installed? (firewall, anti-spyware, …)
Scan throughput seems good, negligible impact on system resources while performing other operations. Ashserv and Aswebserv look good in Wintop, very little CPU usage on a minimal test machine, P MMX@ 233Mhz, 144Mb RAM, 2.58G HDD, circa 1997!