I have used AVG and F-Secure on my desktop and laptop for the last few years, and after switching both over to Avast a few months ago, I’ve noticed that programs take a lot longer to load than they did before. This happens for web browsers, MS Office programs, pretty much anything that I try to run. I can see the A-ball in the system tray spinning, so I’m assuming that it is scanning the program to see if it is malware or not. This is a good idea in theory, but I’m wondering if there isn’t a more efficient way to do this, as this never seemed to be a problem before. I’m assumign that these other av programs either didn’t scan these other programs, or did it much more quickly. Is there something I can safely do, to mimimize the startup time–please note that I am not talking about Windows startup, but the startup of pretty much any program on the computer. I’m noticing it on both, so I don’t think its just one setting on one computer that is causing this.
Did you remove AVG & F-secure from your compiter?
If so, how did you remove them?
Yes I removed them both. I believe it was through Control Panel for F-Secure, most likely for AVG as well.
On a related note, how does one shut off program scanning.
I don’t really need it and it is an imposition.
Thanks,
Kilia
Kilia
avast is not designed to be an on demand scanner - so the simplest way is to uninstall avast and find an on-demand scanner better suited to your needs.
Alternatively you can look at the options provided in “Customize” option of the Standard Shield and de-select the recommended option to “Scan executed programs”.
prr
In an attempt to see the problem you are reporting I just uninstalled avast on my system (Win XP SP3). Were we experiencing the same issue with avast I would expect to see a noticeable improvement in the start of programs on my system.
I must be honest and say that I do notice a very slight improvement in the start time of programs but it that is really is only just about discernible - it is very far from anything dramatic. If your situation demonstrates a significant difference, as your post suggests, then I think another contributor may well be in play.
Which us why I asked how he removed the other av’s.
Most likely, there are remains of the other 2 av’s that are causing interference.
Using the Control Panel Add/remove programs function is not enough.
AVG removal tool … http://www.avg.com/download-tools
F-secure removal tool … http://support.f-secure.com/enu/corporate/downloads/removeav.shtml
Use these tools and the post back to let us know the results.
alanrf,
I would expect start up time to increase slightly when any AV is monitoring file opening, because you can’t get something (in this case protection) for nothing, but I personally have never considered Avast to be at all slow in this regard. I have done some experiments using Process Monitor to see whether it could be quantatised at all. For the experiment I chose to monitor the start up of Notepad. It’s start up time on my particular PC with no AV present averaged over a number of tests was 143.3 milliseconds. With Avast present and it’s standard shield on Normal the average startup time increased to 168.0 milliseconds. OK, on paper this is around a 17% increase, but I would have a hard time noticing the difference of 24.7 milliseconds. Results will be affected by lots of factors and I guess if a platform is slow or memory starved in the first place it might become more noticable.
After you have totally removed AVG and F-Secure do you still notice program loading delays?
What is the operating system and Service pack level and have you done a defrag lately?
What are the CPU type, speed and RAM amounts?
Maybe this should become a sticky as this seems to be a common problem?
[i]Just my opinion; but I agree whole-heartedly with “YoKenny”; this would make an excellent subject for a ‘sticky’…
People need to know BEFORE they install Avast! that if they have another AV installed they’re most likely gonna have conflicts…
Whether they read it or not is another story but at least there’d be a place to refer new users… 8)[/i]
I am running XP SP3, with an AMD Turion 64 dual-core 1.6 GHz processor; a gig of RAM. I do monthly defrags with Contig.
For what its worth, this morning I logged out and logged back in, and noticed that all programs load up very quickly after logging in (at least they did today). After surfing for an hour, however, things were slow again after shutting these programs (Word, Firefox, and Foxit) down. When I tried to load FF again, I saw the A-ball rotate two or three times TWICE before the browser actually loaded–it took a good 10 seconds to open up, and a couple more (which Avast can’t be blamed for) to finish loading.
Anyways, I used the avg uninstaller and I’ll report back after rebooting.
I do appreciate the support here. The AVG support forums (not official support, I know) are worse than worthless…
Are you using avast now?
Well… there are a lot of ex-AVG users here (including myself) that share this opinion with you.
Now now…I’m not gonna be uninstalling my Avast!.
Carry on now…;D
What amount of RAM is FF gobbling up and what version of FF are you running?
I’m an AVG defector 
Uninstalling AVG entirely didn’t change anything. I’m still noticing the same delays. I’m wondering if this can be changed at all, as I really do like everything else about Avast…
[i]Don’t give up on Avast! the guru’s here will get things worked out for ya!
Funny thing, I’m running a older O/S and a slower processor and after I ‘abandoned’ AVG a few months back things got faster… Go figure!
Do you have any anti-spy software installed and if so, when was the last time you did a thorough scan… Could be something nasty lurking on your system… 
As for the AVG Forum, you comments are correct but additional comment; heaven forbid you get ‘rdsok’ answering your question… :([/i]
Without further info it will be difficult to follow what is causing the delays… :
Fair enough, but what info do you want me to provide? HJT log?
- Do you use a firewall? Which one?
- Did you use AVG uninstall tool to complete removing it?
- Any other security programs that could interfere?
- Any other program running in background that could slow the computer?
- Is there any useful information into Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Events, specially ‘Errors’?