Okay, I’m about to demonstrate my vast ignorance of computer science by asking this, but please humor me: I just got a pop up window from AVAST warning me that my “computer is running slow”, and that they have identified 14 things slowing it down. Of course, the offer to “speed things up” requires that I upgrade my account in order that this problem be addressed. Right now, I’m using their free anti-virus software, and it’s been working great (or so I thought). A virus scan shows there to be no malware or viruses. Nevertheless, shockwave keeps crashing lately when I’m on certain sites, regardless as to whether I’m using Firefox or Chrome. And just a few minutes ago, when trying to comment on a Youtube, video the text box stopped responding to my typing actions. It simply wouldn’t show any more keystrokes, so I had to quit in the middle of typing a thought. Here on CC also, there sometimes occurs a lag between keystrokes, and their appearance in the text box. The longer I try to type, the more the lag increases. It’s happening right this moment, in fact.
So what’s going on? Right or wrong, I’ll admit to having a suspicious mind on this. Could AVAST have access to slowing my computer, throwing glitches into the works in order to make me pay them to “clean things up” and “speed things up” for me? I’ve read a few times that anti-virus software companies are the biggest creators of viruses, all in the interest of keeping their revenue streams active. I’m not saying that Norton, AVAST, et al have no right to make money. They are businesses after all. But, using fraud in doing so is just all kinds of wrong. If I’m completely out in left field, I apologize. But, I’d appreciate it if someone with knowledge in this area could answer these questions. 8-|
It’s not likely that there is an intentional bug in the software intended to slow your computer, but many (and maybe all) AV programs can cause performance issues. The program is using some of your computer’s processing power to run, and depending on your settings, may also be performing unnecessary tasks.
If you have a Windows PC running version 8 or higher, you can do without commercial AV programs (free or not) --the built in Windows firewall & Windows Defender provide adequate AV protection. This is not true of previous versions of Windows, however.
Don’t buy software you don’t think you want because of a nag screen.
While I agree antivirus programs do slow machines down due to running constantly in the background and reduce performance, I don’t agree Windows Defender even in Win 8/8.1 provides adequate AV protection.
At best, it’s barebones and fine for someone who is scrupulously careful about surfing and downloading habits and lucky to not happen upon a legit website which happened to be infected when he/she happened to be surfing it. That doesn’t apply to most of the computer using public…especially home users.
As for firewalls, the best and primary one should be one provided by a properly set up router. A software firewall including Windows’ own can easily be disabled and undermined by virus/malware/trojan infections.
I found Avast’s constant pop-ups about the need to update whatever so annoying on one computer that I was using, that I un-installed it and replaced it with AVG.
Agree with Happymom - there are plenty of good, free antivirus programs that don’t nag. I have used AVG and Microsoft Secure Essentials. Windows computers often get glitchy with age - often a fresh installation of Windows fixes things, but it is time-consuming and doesn’t always help. You could try downloading ccleaner from piriform.com and running the cleaning tool - this clears out the browser cache and cookies, which might help. PM me if you have questions about how to use it. Btw, the best place to download AVG or secure Essentials is from a site called ninite.com. It allows you to select from a number of free and useful programs, downloads and installs them in 1step, and saves you from wading through company web sites or cnet trying to figure out how to get to the free version. The site is especially invaluable if you ever have to set up a computer from scratch.
I do research for Google and have to go to all kinds of questionable places on the net to evaluate the sites. I swear by ccleaner for cleaning up the junk I pick up along the way and allowing me to pick and choose which programs open automatically, run at start up, etc. I also use malwarebytes.
I have Avast but have been able to turn off most of the annoying stuff via ccleaner and the Avast settings. I agree with CIEE that downloading free things via cnet is tricky as they have increasingly added advertisement content that mimic free downloads.
Gee, deega, I wish you could tell me why Google is so off, lately, in search results.
There are lots of programs that run some legit sub-operation in the background, without our realizing, that can slow things down. I had issues with one Kaspersy updating task that made everything else crawl, could see it via Task Manager. The fix was too complicated and I couldn’t evaluate the risk to the rest of what I do (I found the K documentation lousy.) No issue since I didn’t renew K.
Also like Malware bytes. The thing about older computers is sometimes how the software is loaded, the layering. Over time, one program can step in front of another, so to say. (Don’t laugh at that clumsy phrasing.)
Also, computers don’t read all software or store info linearly (in sequence.) The longer you go, the more the needed info is scattered, here and there. Seems ccleaner is a defragger?
I use malwarebytes, too (also available on ninite.com – no idea why ccleaner isn’t) – and I use Web of Trust to screen web sites. One more piece of my privacy gone by the wayside!
ETA - ccleaner is not a defragger, and in fact starting with Win 7, there is a weekly scheduled defrag, not sure if that would be an issue. I do think that the growing number of updates released over time increases the risk of software errors, which probably causes some of the slowdown (I’m no expert, though). Windows 10 is being distributed free to users of Win 7 and 8, and I will try installing it before deciding to replace my 5-year-old sluggish laptop.
My DH uses a computer guy to help him with his business computers. The guy told me that often programs end up being run at startup that don’t need to be and only slow down your computer. But how would a non techie like me know which programs are essential at start up and which are not?
ccleaner checks for obsolete and orphaned registry entries in the windows registry and deletes them if user selects the option.
And speaking of defragging, here’s a good time to do a PSA. Defragging was designed and meant for regular mechanical hard drives.
It isn’t designed or necessary for computers using Solid State Drives which use flash memory cells.
Not only would running defrag on an SSD be a waste of time, it will also accelerate premature wear and tear on the SSD as flash memory has a limited number of rewrite cycles before one can no longer rewrite to them. While the number of rewrite cycles has improved to the point they’re almost like mechanical drives in normal usage, using defrag will only shorten the lifespan of the SSD with no benefit.
Especially considering SSD drives own firmware and more modern operating systems(7 and up) have background utilities like TRIM to handle SSD drives.
Be advised, however, those utilities are only going to be activated by default if one does a fresh windows install on an SSD based machine. If one cloned a system image from a mechanical drive on another computer, the user/tech will need to manually activate those utilities and DISABLE automatic defragging if it had been selected on the older system.
@nrdsb4 - CCleaner will show you your start up menu. You can Google the program name and there are sites that will tell you if the program is essential. For instance, itunes loads itself on my start menu. I rarely use it so I turn it off. If I want it to load, I just click the icon. When in doubt about a program, just leave it alone.
The shockwave thing may not be anything to do with your machine, I ran into problems where shockwave was crashing, and it had to do with there being two different handlers, one google (I was using Chrome), one windows…google had information on their website about shockwave crashing, bet if you look into it you will find that you have the same problem.
In terms of slowness, it could be the AV program, if you have real time monitoring on and such. I would shut down the AV software, and then see if you are seeing the same problems. If the program has a firewall, disable it, and see what happens.
Other problems could be the disk is fragmented, you also could have a lot of junk programs hogging memory as well.