Why does avast (free) scan about 200k files and Nortion 360 about 500k?

Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security
1

I thinking of switching to avast when my subscription runs out a a couple of months. I’m wondering why avast (free) only scans about 200k files and Norton 360 (with insight on–skipping safe files) about 500k?

Is Norton over scanning or avast not scanning enough on full scans?

Thanks for any help!

2

I’m not sure what this should mean… what size exactly are you refering to?

3

avast is only scanning 200,000 files on the HD, whereas Norton is scanning over 500,000 files. I hope I answered you question.

Thanks

4

The numbers are rather hard to compare. Most likely the difference is in archive unpacking (different settings of archive types to unpack, different unpacking, different counting of the result).

5

Set avast to scan the whole archive files, all types of them… The number will increase for sure.

6

Thanks for the suggestion. I’ve looked in the settings and see no such ability to do this in the free version. Is there another place to look for this setting? Would this be the packers in the custom scan?

One curious thing is that Norton seems to scan the greater number of files in the same time avast does for the smaller number of files. I’m not sure why that is. Nevertheless I’m really liking avast thus far.

Thank you

7

Dagrev, Yes you must do a “custom scan”, with all packers chosen, to be able to scan all archives.

8

Also Avast “learns” which files are safe and does not scan them again unless they have changed.

9

On access (resident), not on demand as far I remember.

10

it depends which scan u do, if u check the settings for the scans, some do check the cache, the full scan however only populates the cache and does not check it for scanning

11

Well me i did check all packers for all shields and scans but no for “Scan screensaver”

I did not have a problem.

Mr.Agent

12

Thanks for the suggestions!