Slow Quick Scan

Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security
1

Quick Scan seems slow. Nothing else was open during scan.

28 minutes

53863/36836 file/folders

78.5 GB

It seems to stay on 9% for a long time and I’d say close to 20 minutes of the scan was devoted to only the first 20%.

I’ve got several gigs of Rar files if that’s an issue.

Speed Up scanning is ticked, Store Data is not in Settings.

Vista 64x

Thanks

2

have you changed any of the default scan settings?

like this

I've got several gigs of Rar files if that's an issue.
see screenshot #8 http://www.softpedia.com/progScreenshots/Avast-Home-Edition-Screenshot-6474.html
3

No default settings have been changed.

Scanned again and it took 22 minutes. About 2 minutes unitl 7% scanned, About 4 minutes at 9% but at points during 9% my cursor became somewhat unresponsive. Only at 8 minutes in did my scanning go to 60 mb per second and averaged about that much til the end. Closing the Avast! window after the scan was lagged and starting my browser was very lagged too.

4

Then the RAR’s (archives) shouldn’t be scanned.

When you talk of the:

Speed Up scanning is ticked, Store Data is not in Settings.

The Store data about scanned files in the persistent cache option is there, see image (click to expand).

This option is in the Quick Scan, Settings, Performance, was that where you were looking.

I have the Quick Scan priority set to High (I believe the default is Normal), to help speed also.

5

I have “Speed up scanning by using persistent cache” checked but not “Store data about scanned files in the persistent cache” like you do in the your attached image. So I should have both checked? I changed “Scan priority” to high now. I’ll scan again now and see if it’s faster.

6

Yep check both boxes, can do the same in the full scan settings too if you like.

7

With the priority set to high a new scan took 26 minutes, longer than the one before. Will check the Store data box and try again.

8

With both boxes checked, 28 minutes. However, at some point around the 52% mark, my mouse stopped responding, Avast window stopped responding, for at least 2 minutes, then, boom, all of the sudden the scan window say’s it finished. Also, during the 9% mark my mouse becomes almost completely unresponsive, the Avast window, while the timer moves, the tab buttons are not responsive and icons and such on my computer become unresponsive. So something is not right.

9

It certainly won’t be faster first time as it will be storing that information in the persistent cache, so it may actually take a little longer (perhaps not based on the High priority). After a few scans you should start to see the benefit of those changes.

10

Okay. Will try another scan at see.

11

28 minutes again.

13 minutes on 9% during which my mouse, taskbar, Avast window is unresponsive at times.

Maybe it’s my system, maybe Avast, but somethings not working properly.

12

What is your system spec, Operating System, CPU, RAM ?

Do you have any other security based software installed (firewall, anti-spyware, etc.) ?

13

  1. What is you computer’s processor? Please be as precise as possible

  2. What % of the CPU does avast use during the san?

  3. What % of the total CPU is used during the scan?

  4. Are you running any real-time anti-spy software like SAS

  5. How much RAM does your computer have?

  6. When was the last time your C: drive was defragged?

14

Dang you beat me too it. :slight_smile: I knew I should have checked when the message said a another post had been made etc

15

Vista Home Premium 64x
CPU Sempron LE-1300
Memory 2GB DDR SDRAM 800MHZ-2X1GB DIM M
Microsoft Firewall
Malwarebytes Free (scan ability only)
Last Defrag: today

CPU usage during scan fluctuates between 5 and 30 percent with infrequent quick spikes to 40-60, one to 80.

Memory usage is rather flat for most of scan at about 450-500MB. However, during 10 minutes or so at 9% scanned I saw at least a 30 second sustained spike of 1.73GB (during which the computer seemed to freeze/become unresponsive) and a few 5-10 second spikes of 1.3GB.

16

Given your system resources, I would say that this is a major contributory factor to the slow speed of the scan.

Vista is a bit of a resource hog and the 64bit version even more so. As a rule of thumb I use 2MB of RAM as a minimum for win7 32bit and that by all accounts is less of a resource hog than vista. So for the 64bit version of the OS I would recommend 4GB of RAM. With this I feel that you would see an overall improvement in system performance.

Your CPU is pretty old single core version, it is a bit of a restriction as the CPU Sempron LE-1300 isn’t very fast.
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+Sempron+LE-1300

So I believe you are hitting the limits of your system resources, upgrading RAM is a relatively easy and inexpensive option. Upgrading the CPU to a later faster one isn’t so easy A) you have to find one that fits and is compatible with your motherboard and B) then fit it, this isn’t so easy.

17

I suppose it could be my hardware.

Thanks for your help.

18

You’re welcome.

I don’t know how frequently you actually run an on-demand scan ?

  • With a resident on-access antivirus like avast, the need for frequent on-demand scans is much depreciated. For the most part the on-demand scan is going to be scanning files that would be otherwise be dormant or inert. If they were active files then the on-access file system shield would be scanning them before being created, modified, opened or executed.

I have avast set to do a scheduled weekly Quick scan, set at a time and day that I know the computer will be on. If for some reason my system wasn’t on, no big deal I will catch up on the next scheduled scan.

19

Yeah, I don’t scan much so its not a big deal. A 20 minute scan is also no problem. I just wondered whether it was functioning correctly.

Thanks again.

20

No problem, glad I could help.