Crash due to antivirus link, ie7 slow, CPU useage high

[ras15]

Installed sd5 beta2 earlier today....

Clicking Antivirus not installed link causes computer system crash - blue dump screen:
On clicking the antivirus not installed link within the 'status>status: action required' window my computer crashed :( . On clicking the link the computer crashed.. a blue dump screen appeared momentarily for a second or so (not long enough to read the dump message!) and then the computer proceeded to restart automatically.

I tried recreating the crash once more by clicking on the link but it did not crash - obviously not keen on attempting this again as its not good for the computer or my mood!

However, almost 100% certain the crash was caused by sd5beta2 as the crash occured instantaneously on clicking the 'antivirus not installed' link and also my computer has never crashed previously with the windows xp blue dump screen in the 10 or so months I have been using it.

ie7 still unacceptably slow responsiveness particulary in web page loading:
Incidently this second time i was able to link to pctools antivirus webpage and have since successfully installed the antivirus facility thorugh smart update. However, the onguard tools seems to slow down ie7 unacceptably so I have switched off various onguard tools and the antivirus factility. I appreciate that ie7 responsiveness has improved since beta1 but it is from what I am experiencing with ie7 in my opinion still unacceptabbly slow ... webpages take forever to load (my broadband line connection is 4Mb ..so its not the connection speed itself!) incomarison to withou sd5 beta2 and the ie7 interface becomes unresponsive. A typical webpage with sd5 beta2 takes about 15 to 20 seconds to load wheras without it it was instantaneous or at most 5 seconds.


cpu usage 100% for long duration of scans:
CPU usage by sd5 beta2 is 95-100% for long stretches when scans are running (including inteli scan). I would say cpu usage is approaching 100% for atleast 50% of the scan time - this makes the computer unresponsive or very sluggish. Hope fully this can be improved..


I know that I put up a lengthy list here but I do appreciate the improvements that have been made from the beta1 and hopefully the issues here can also be resolved.
Thanks

details of the system I am using incase its relevant... windows xp home edition, amd athlon64 3200+ ,outpost pro4 firewall, mcafee internet security (including virusscan), broadband internet connection

[AChen]

Hi ras15,

Clicking Antivirus not installed link causes computer system crash - blue dump screen
This issue has been escalated and tested, although we were unable to reproduce this problem. What we will need to do is replicate your environment, that is (Windows XP home edition, Outpost pro 4 Firewall, McAfee internet security (including virus scan)). We have had no further reports with this issue. Is there any other information you can provide that can assist us?

IE7 still unacceptably slow responsiveness particulary in web page loading
This issue is still currently being worked on at the moment. We are aware that opening IE7 takes a while to load (that is, opening IE from the icon). Could you please confirm if, downloading the contents on the page also takes a while to load once IE has started up?

CPU usage 100% for long duration of scans
Please note that the CPU usage will increase during scans. Can you please confirm if McAfee and the Outpost Firewall was active during the scan. Also can you disable these both applications to see if this increases the scan.
The CPU will spike to 100% CPU usage or close to this for only a split second and should return to around 30%-50% during a scan.

[ras15]

Hi,

Clicking Antivirus not installed link causes computer system crash - blue dump screen
My computer crashed again with the blue dump screen this morning shortly after i had reactivated pctools antivirus and process guard. It would seem that problem may possibly be something to do with pc tools antivirus and/or process guard conflicting with Outpost Pro4 (it may or may not be specifically linked with the antivirus install link) - as after rebooting from the crash a pop up window from outpost pro4 displayed on the computer starting up with an error message stating that the database in outpost pro logviewer had become corrupted and i should click the facility in outpost pro logviewer to repair the database.

IE7 still unacceptably slow responsiveness particulary in web page loading
Yes as you mentioned ie7 is very slow to initially startup. ie7 was both very slow to startup and also very slow to download webpages when I had process guard and pctools antivirus activated. I no longer have these 2 activated and ie7 seems much quicker (with all the other onguards activated - except email guard which I do not use as I have mcafee antispam installed already) although still a little slow for my liking - hopefully the final relase will have better performance. I am reluctant to test ie7 responsiveness with process guard and pctools antivirus activated as mentioned earlier it has resulted in my computer crashing with the blue dump screen.
CPU usage 100% for long duration of scans
I am reluctant to do scans with process guard or pctools antivirus activated due to reasons mentioned above. However, with process guard and pctools antivirus deactivated cpu usage during scans is better and acceptable although not great -with outpost pro4 also deactivated cpu usage during scans is very good only spiking at 100% on a few occasions.

[AChen]

Thanks for the detailed information.

We will be doing some further testing with the information provided. I have also added this problem to the reported issues page: http://www.pctools.com/forum/showthread.php?t=44951.

I will get back to you regarding this or you can visit the link above to check the status.

[medic1638]

Hi,

Clicking Antivirus not installed link causes computer system crash - blue dump screen
My computer crashed again with the blue dump screen this morning shortly after i had reactivated pctools antivirus and process guard. It would seem that problem may possibly be something to do with pc tools antivirus and/or process guard conflicting with Outpost Pro4 (it may or may not be specifically linked with the antivirus install link) - as after rebooting from the crash a pop up window from outpost pro4 displayed on the computer starting up with an error message stating that the database in outpost pro logviewer had become corrupted and i should click the facility in outpost pro logviewer to repair the database.

IE7 still unacceptably slow responsiveness particulary in web page loading
Yes as you mentioned ie7 is very slow to initially startup. ie7 was both very slow to startup and also very slow to download webpages when I had process guard and pctools antivirus activated. I no longer have these 2 activated and ie7 seems much quicker (with all the other onguards activated - except email guard which I do not use as I have mcafee antispam installed already) although still a little slow for my liking - hopefully the final relase will have better performance. I am reluctant to test ie7 responsiveness with process guard and pctools antivirus activated as mentioned earlier it has resulted in my computer crashing with the blue dump screen.
CPU usage 100% for long duration of scans
I am reluctant to do scans with process guard or pctools antivirus activated due to reasons mentioned above. However, with process guard and pctools antivirus deactivated cpu usage during scans is better and acceptable although not great -with outpost pro4 also deactivated cpu usage during scans is very good only spiking at 100% on a few occasions.

In order to keep that blue screen up in order to read what it says, do this:
(in case my file did not attach):
Right click on "My Computer". Go to "Properties", "Advanced". Near the bottom of the window look for Startup and Recovery and remove the tick mark from the box in front of Automatically restart.
That blue screen should stay up the next time you see it. When it does, you'll want to write down SOME, not all of the info that appears. For example: 0x0000000A IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL***. Then you can go here and read about it: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q314063
Note: I turn my computer off every night and had to wait until the next day before I could get the blue screen to come up again. Restarting it, or even shutting it off and then starting up again later that day, did not replicate the blue screen.

Good luck!

[ras15]

Hi medic1638,

Thank you for the info - should come in useful.

I have now completely disabled sd5 beta2 after a 3rd crash ...the computer being crashed repeatedly is not fun. Clearly there is some conflict between sd5 beta2 and one or more software on my system ..chances are the conflict is atleast in part with outpost pro4 as reading through outpost pro4 logviewer the following event is listed on several occasions ..
> Attempt to terminate Outpost Firewall Pro process is prevented. Application: Spyware Doctor Service, Path: C:\PROGRAM FILES\SPYWARE DOCTOR\SWDSVC.EXE <

hope this helps the pctools tech team.

I will wait to see what the full release of sd5 is like (especially how problem free it is) before using it again - as things stand there are too many problems with this beta going by the problems I have encountered and the threads on this forum and it is a long way from being a problem free product. Anyway hopefully all the issues will be ironed out by full release.

Just a personal impression of the Global Action List facility for what its worth:
I really like the concept but personally think its not been well presented and rather user unfriendly especially considering that it provides a very important functionality in the overall purpose of a 'antispyware program' - i.e allowing and blocking harmful or legitimate files and websites. My reasons for thinking this are:

>> Access to global action list it is not as quick/obvious as the onguard tools (especially considering its very important function) ...its necessary to navigate through the settings window/page. The settings window/page is not as well presented or userfriendly as the onguard tools window i.e. no icons next to links (wheras there is on the onguard window) the font for the links are unneccessarily small. I can see it being difficult for some people to see (wheras the onguard tools link/button are much larger and also in bold font). I think the Settings page should be layed out similar to and as nicely as the onguard page for it to be more userfirndly.

>> Also, currently its not immediately obvious to the user the functionality that is available with the global action list eg its necessary to right click on events in the history list to add sites to the global allow/block list ..the fact that you need to right click on the histroy event to perform this action is not mentioned anywhere on the history page/window ..I think having a button on the history page with 'add to global list' would be much more userfriendly and obvious to the user than the current right click method.

>> Similar situation on the global action list window/page no mention anywhere that it is possible to right click on records for more functionality and not obvious that files as well as sites can be added as when the popup window appears its not immediately evident that it is an option to add files (in addition to the highligted add sites option) ..again why not think of making this page more user friendly ..such as a button to add files and another button to add sites immediately available on the main global action list page rather than hidden away in a pop up window.

[AChen]

Thanks for the additional info & feedback regarding the Global Action List ras15.

I have passed on this information and it may be very useful to the developers.

You can always go back to SDv4 for the time being until these issues have been resolved. I will surely let you know once its been worked on.