McAfee slows everything to a crawl.

  • Thread starter Thread starter Charles Manoras
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Charles Manoras

My Norton subscription having run out I have taken advantage of an offer
from Comcast (my ISP) to install McAfee for free.

McAfee asked me to remove Norton and the free firewall from Zone Alarm.

Which I did.

Now everything has slowed to an absolute crawl.

The CPU always run at 100%.

Scans take forever and cannot be even be completed overnight.

I have removed what I actually don't need with no effect.

Is this normal?

I run under Windows XP SP2.

I experienced none of this with Norton which I thought was already gobbling
up a
lot of resources.

Thanks.
 
My Norton subscription having run out I have taken advantage of an offer
from Comcast (my ISP) to install McAfee for free.

McAfee asked me to remove Norton and the free firewall from Zone Alarm.

Which I did.

Now everything has slowed to an absolute crawl.

The CPU always run at 100%.

Scans take forever and cannot be even be completed overnight.

I have removed what I actually don't need with no effect.

Is this normal?

I run under Windows XP SP2.

I experienced none of this with Norton which I thought was already gobbling
up a
lot of resources.

Thanks.
Click to expand...

Sounds like it's working about right.
For McAfee.

MM
 
in message
My Norton subscription having run out I have taken advantage of an
offer
from Comcast (my ISP) to install McAfee for free.
McAfee asked me to remove Norton and the free firewall from Zone
Alarm.
Which I did.
Now everything has slowed to an absolute crawl.
The CPU always run at 100%.
Scans take forever and cannot be even be completed overnight.
I have removed what I actually don't need with no effect.
Is this normal?
I run under Windows XP SP2.
I experienced none of this with Norton which I thought was already
gobbling up a
lot of resources.
Click to expand...


Is there also a lot of disk activity during the 100% CPU usage? I
don't remember the security product but it conflicted with VirusScan.
The other product would update a log file that VirusScan saw got
updated so it checked but because VirusScan touched the file then the
other security program checked it again and the two kept battling over
checking this file with something around 2900 accesses on the same
file every minute. Check what other security software you have
installed, and try disabling it to see if the host settles down.
 
VanguardLH said:
in message



Is there also a lot of disk activity during the 100% CPU usage? I don't
remember the security product but it conflicted with VirusScan. The other
product would update a log file that VirusScan saw got updated so it
checked but because VirusScan touched the file then the other security
program checked it again and the two kept battling over checking this file
with something around 2900 accesses on the same file every minute. Check
what other security software you have installed, and try disabling it to
see if the host settles down.
Click to expand...

Thanks.
Yes there was a lot of disk activity I think.
At this time I have disabled everything except the firewall.
And things have quieted down considerably.
But that's no way to run a "Security Center"! :-)
The only other security software which I have is whatever
XP provides plus Adaware and Spybot.

Adaware and Spybot should not in principle interfere with McAfee.
 
go to mcafee.com and download the MCRP2 program . Uninstall McAfee through
control panel and reboot. THen run the MCRP2 program and when it finishes
reboot again, then reinstall mcafee.

you should be okay after that.
 
in message
...

Thanks.
Yes there was a lot of disk activity I think.
At this time I have disabled everything except the firewall.
And things have quieted down considerably.
But that's no way to run a "Security Center"! :-)
The only other security software which I have is whatever
XP provides plus Adaware and Spybot.

Adaware and Spybot should not in principle interfere with McAfee.
Click to expand...

I have Ad-Aware installed but I do NOT have it running all the time;
i.e., its on-access scanner is not running. I have several
anti-malware programs installed. Every process, especially that have
to interrogate the effects of other processes, will impact the
responsiveness of a host. So I install those other anti-malware
programs but I disable their on-access (real-time) scanning and only
use them as on-demand scanners. Personally, Spybot's TeaTimer is so
antiquated that you should find something better if you want real HIPS
protection - but I do still keep it in my suite of anti-malware apps
for on-demand scanning. HIPS that monitors memory ends up prompting
you as to what can load into memory (and some will monitor and prompt
as to what parent process can call what child process). HIPS in a
firewall regulates who can call what to make a connection. Spyware is
an area where all those products have poor coverage (when, for
example, compared to anti-virus products) so you really need layered
detection using multiple anti-malware products - but that doesn't mean
you need active layered protection. It depends on your expertise and
your habits when using the computer as to how susceptible it is.

I have yet to see any software that can guarantee it is compatible
with all other software. You could use SysInternal's FileMon and use
its filtering to narrow down what files are getting the most accesses
while the CPU is busy and to determine what process/es is/are doing
all those accesses. That would help to determine which product/s
is/are mucking up your host.
 
Charles Manoras said:
My Norton subscription having run out I have taken advantage of an offer
from Comcast (my ISP) to install McAfee for free.

McAfee asked me to remove Norton and the free firewall from Zone Alarm.

Which I did.

Now everything has slowed to an absolute crawl.

The CPU always run at 100%.

Scans take forever and cannot be even be completed overnight.

I have removed what I actually don't need with no effect.

Is this normal?

I run under Windows XP SP2.

I experienced none of this with Norton which I thought was already
gobbling up a
lot of resources.

Thanks.
Click to expand...



I did the same thing for the same reason but what comes to mind is you get
what you pay for and McAfee drove me nuts with all the interruptions and
questions that seemed to be popping up every other minute, that I sometimes
didn't even understand enough to make the right choice and as a result wound
up having to reformat my PC. I went back to Norton A/V and things couldn't
run any smoother than they are now (knock wood).... As for the firewall....
I am getting along fine with the one that came with my Windows XP SP2...
again, no problems.. The simpler, the better for someone with my limited PC
knowledge...
 
When you removed Norton did you use their removal tool if not bits norton
will still remain to react with mcafee.
Just a thought
Tony
 
addy999 said:
mcafee and are not the best
they are best only in the marketing via which they fool many number of
users
they are difficult to operate though i would recommend avast and nod32

as they are easy to operate and their virus definitions are very easy
to update as well comparing to that of mcafee
Click to expand...

I use Nod32, which is fine. I visited my sister-in-law this weekend, and she
was having huge problems with her 3 year old Dell desktop (McAfee
installed). After 30 minutes of use, the hard drive started thrashing, and
everything slowed to a crawl. It turned out that there was 30GB of log files
in the MSC sub folder of the application data folder. I assume that the
program was working its way through its own log files (some of which were
over 200 MB in size), and that was the cause of the problem. Deleting all
except the last day's log files put everything right. (But not until I'd
spent a frustrating few hours looking for non-existent malware).

Avoid McAfee - there are a lot better options out there.

John
 
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