Author Topic: (Solved) Desktop pc suddenly slow (Read 77241 times)

Lady · « **Reply #75 on:** March 04, 2016, 01:13:07 am »

The Dutch forum which is helping me is a member of UNITE. They give trainings. Might be interesting for you?

https://uniteagainstmalware.com/

Boggin · « **Reply #76 on:** March 04, 2016, 02:33:02 am »

A bit too long in the tooth now for learning new tricks, but thanks anyway.

UNITE in the UK is the name of a large lefty Union and is one of the main contributors to the Labour Party who are Her Majesty's official opposition to the gov. being the second largest political party in the UK.

Lady · « **Reply #77 on:** March 04, 2016, 04:27:03 am »

Boggin, a small question on the side, if you please.

I use a LAN cable for my laptop but it's a bit of a hassle and too short for every room. So I decided to install Wifi. But I googled a bit and saw that you can simply download software to hack your neighbour's Wifi. I assume you use Wifi. How secure is it? I plan to have my own username and password.

Boggin · « **Reply #78 on:** March 04, 2016, 05:22:46 am »

I haven't heard of that program but WPA2 PSK AES is pretty robust.

I've recently came across WiFi Guard which seems to scan for anyone trying it on, but as an alternative to WiFi you could use Home Plugs which route the signal through the mains electricity and then you can Ethernet connect to each Home Plug wherever you have them plugged in.

I don't really have any other users near me, but inSSIDer3 will show you where the strongest users are, but any 20 or more, greater that your RSSI won't pose a threat.

https://www.softperfect.com/products/wifiguard/

http://www.techspot.com/downloads/5936-inssider.html

Lady · « **Reply #79 on:** March 04, 2016, 06:37:34 am »

Thank you, that's very informative. But I have to return to the slowness issue........... Just returned to my pc, it has been on for 5.5 hours now and slowness has returned. I've asked the Dutch forum if they have any more ideas. Have you?

Boggin · « **Reply #80 on:** March 04, 2016, 06:40:48 am »

Not with an intermittent problem - I think we have covered all of the usual suspects.

Did the Dutch malware forum find anything on your computer ?

Is every thing slow or just browsing ?

Lady · « **Reply #81 on:** March 09, 2016, 04:26:08 am »

My helper on the Dutch site too turned the pc inside out. He now referred me to a hardware specialist on another Dutch forum as it isn't a malware issue. And according to him it's not a memory issue either as far as he can see.

Slowness is overall when it happens. Knock on wood, but the pc has been better the last two days. Yesterday after 6.5 hours no problem. Today, now 4.5 hours, still no problem. But I'm wary.

They did say that IOBit has a bad reputation and told me to uninstall the IOBitUninstaller. I must say, the program didn't feel good to me. Female intuition.

So I complied.

On these two websites they strongly recommend installing HitmanPro.Alert and they say they never had any problems with it. I'm hesitant, I already have MBAM Anti-Exploit. I know a very nice guy at MBAM, I'll ask what he thinks of it.

Can I ask you to take a look at the screenshots I made of CCleaner? I decided to return to CC because it has an uninstall feature and it feels better to me than WiseDiskCleaner.

But the settings are a bit of a question mark to me. Would you mind?

In Registry I have unchecked Active X and Class Issues. You taught me that.

And in Options > Monitoring I have unchecked everything. Not too many things should be running all the time, right?

Oh, and I found out that IE didn't open in my laptop either.

I thought it must be the same adware as my laptop is practically a copy of my desktop. I let them have a go at it, AdwCleaner didn't fix it, and just now I think I know what that was, as I finally got an EMET warning popup and closure of the programme. So after uninstalling EMET from the laptop, IE opened perfectly. Yayyyy! I hope the laptop is totally fine now. Phew. Not 2 PCs at the same time having problems, no thank you....

Hope you are okay.

I'm trying hard not to crash......

Boggin · « **Reply #82 on:** March 09, 2016, 05:42:46 am »

Here is a reasonable guide to using CCleaner, but I would uncheck the box for Memory dumps and like the author of the article, I very rarely use the registry cleaner.

http://www.howtogeek.com/113382/how-to-use-ccleaner-like-a-pro-9-tips-tricks/

Having a 3rd party uninstaller negates the need to use a registry cleaner to remove the residue which Windows uninstaller leaves.

I use IObit Uninstaller and haven't noticed any detriment.

There was a down on all IObit programs at one time and would seem to be carried over because of their alleged plagiarism of other security programs to develop their own.

I would leave HitmanPro.Alert as it can disable your Teredo Tunneling adapter by putting a yellow alert on it in Device Manager/View/Show hidden devices/Network adapters and I don't think it's a freebie either.

Lady · « **Reply #83 on:** April 04, 2016, 03:47:21 am »

Hi guys! I'm back!

Re HitmanPro:

I did install it after all, on the desktop and laptop. From all sides I was advised to do so. :S And I must say it found 22 (!) remnants of Visual Discovery (Lenovo's SuperFish) in the registry of my laptop. I was happy to get rid of those! HitmanPro version 3 is not freeware. Its scan feature works but for removal of the results you need to have a licence. But with the scan log we (better said: you) are still able to remove the malicious bits. The Dutch forum helped me with that. Version 2 is freeware but doesn't have the scan feature. It was confusing but I think this is right.

Re IOBit:

I read this:

https://forums.malwarebytes.org/topic/29681-iobit-steals-malwarebytes-intellectual-property/

Even if they changed their ways since then, from an ethical point of view I cannot use any IOBit program any longer. My female intuition was right after all. It knew it was fishy.

So I installed Wise Program Uninstaller instead. CCleaner has an uninstall feature but doesn't show it searches for deep cleansing after removal.

Re the slowness:

I monitored Process Explorer for a while and began to notice a pattern. There were 3 BullGuard values in PE. Every time there was a slow one of them had dropped dramatically or another got higher up. Or both. So with the confirmation of the Dutch IT forum I uninstalled BG and installed Avira temporarily. Since then I had no more slows! Yaaaaaaaayyyyyyy!!!! Repaired some things on my laptop too so that one is all fine now, and the desktop pc is working almost immaculately (I suppose Windows can never run totally immaculately, hahaha), so I took a well-deserved rest from working on it.

So the BG files either have become corrupted (because I have had BG for several years now and it never gave slows before) or there is another cause and I thought about the many tabs I have open and maybe BG becomes distressed by scanning so much all the time

but in that case I should have had slows all the time, shouldn't I? I haven't closed tabs in FF yet to keep the detective work simple.

Before I uninstalled BG and installed Avira I re-installed BG but with settings saved. The slows were still there so then I uninstalled BG altogether. Would you say that a complete uninstall is really different, so that when I will re-install BG in a few days, chances are high it will work properly again?

Thank you, Boggin, for introducing Process Explorer for that eventually showed the solution!

For now I'm SO enjoying a problem-free PC-experience.

Thank you, guys, for all your trouble and time!! I'm handing out karma points right this minute.

Boggin · « **Reply #84 on:** April 04, 2016, 05:39:56 am »

I've recently been sorting out problems of my own and after restoring with an image from Feb. even though I managed to get Norton Security up to date, it still didn't seem right.

I went to use Norton's Remove and Reinstall tool but that didn't recognise the install or the licence, so used Norton Uninstaller which has a follow up for you to log into your Norton account to reinstall and that sorted it.

I would think that fully uninstalling BG before its reinstall should resolve if my experience is anything to go by, but when any program becomes buggy, an uninstall/reinstall usually resolves.

I don't have any scruples about using IObit - as long as it does what it says on the tin, but what you read probably happened years ago - but look at the recent litigation between MS and Apple - they are all at it - are you going to stop using MS products ?

Lady · « **Reply #85 on:** April 04, 2016, 06:01:18 am »

Let's hope that a clean re-install of BG will solve it. I'll let you know.

Quote from: Boggin on April 04, 2016, 05:39:56 am

are you going to stop using MS products ?

If I could, I would, yes. And that goes for Apple too. And a lot of other companies.

Boggin · « **Reply #86 on:** May 07, 2016, 06:44:18 am »

Just posting in this to bring it up so that it easier to find.

I've just unchecked the Lock box and Save so will see if it stays unlocked.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - -

It looks okay now.

Lady · « **Reply #87 on:** May 08, 2016, 07:31:42 am »

I will post an update within a few days. Still testing something.

Lady · « **Reply #88 on:** May 11, 2016, 02:59:50 am »

Hi guys,

I'm back with some bad news. I re-installed BullGuard and at first it seemed kinda okay, there were still slows but not so bad and not so often. I also brought the number of tabs in FF down to about 30 but that doesn't seem to matter at all. And since yesterday the big slows have come back. I'm not happy.....

I really cannot see anything that might trigger them and we've done everything in the book now, haven't we, so it seems to me that the only option remaining is to contact BullGuard. My licence is still valid for more than a year.

Can you help me out by putting the right jargon on this issue? And by giving me suggestions on what to write to them? I enclose screenshots of Process Explorer which clearly show the difference in BG values but I have no clue how to name that. That it's too heavy on the system or something. During these screenshots I had open at the most: Outlook Mail, Explorer, FF, Word, Windows Energy Management, Process Explorer and Windows Picture Manager. That shouldn't be too much. The big slows start when BullGuardScanner.exe drops below 100,000 K in Working Set and get really bad when it gets down to 40,000 and lower (attachment 2). Or when the other two BG values increase, which I'm experiencing right now (attachment 3)

Thanks, guys, as always.

Boggin · « **Reply #89 on:** May 11, 2016, 08:18:26 am »

MBAM seems to be quite heavy on resources as well and it's possible there could be a conflict between Bullguard and MBAM as each could be scanning the other.

Just contact Bullguard and tell them it is slowing your machine to a crawl and that you will have to uninstall it and could you please have a refund for the remaining time on the licence.

Lady · « **Reply #90 on:** May 15, 2016, 06:14:51 am »

You will NOT believe it but the problem has been solved!!!

I contacted BullGuard Support Desk and the lady answered: put BullGuard and MBAM in the mutual exclusion lists (folders and exe files)......

So I did, and after a reboot the pc has been SUPERFINE! Very fast, no problems whatsoever.

The lady also checked a lot of things on the pc via remote control and solved some minor issues I had in the process. Amazing! I saw her at work and was very impressed. I tell you, I have nothing but compliments for BullGuard's Support Desk. They're very competent, always.

And check this out: she said: "You have a pretty neat computer. It's rare to see a clean computer like yours. But you used good tools."

Yoohoooooo!!!

Well guys, this means this problem finally, after THREE months, has been solved. No need to tell you how relieved I am. Thanks again for all your assistance!

You won't be seeing me for a long while! Hopefully.....

Boggin · « **Reply #91 on:** May 15, 2016, 08:33:44 am »

So it was a conflict between the two programs ?

Lady · « **Reply #92 on:** May 15, 2016, 10:45:32 am »

Yes, apparently they were checking each other and that caused the slows. I suppose that's nothing new, but I find her exclusion solution super.

Lady · « **Reply #93 on:** May 16, 2016, 09:09:11 am »

The thing was, I've had the combination BullGuard and MBAM for years and never had compatibility issues. But I informed MBAM about it. I gathered they want to know of compatibility issues so they can solve it with the AV program concerned.

I can keep you posted if you're interested in what MBAM has to say.

Boggin · « **Reply #94 on:** May 16, 2016, 09:53:56 am »

What normally causes it is either an upgrade of MBAM or Definitions update on an AV program.

I think it was a couple of years ago now that there was an actual conflict between Norton 360 and MBAM and Symantec had to come up with a workaround so that both could run alongside of each other.

It may have been around the time that MBAM had a version upgrade, but not sure now.

On checking my Programs and Features, MBAM is showing as v2.2.1.1043 with an install date of 8th April this year - would that tally with when you started getting problems with Bullguard or was it before ?

Google tells me that MBAM Premium had an upgrade on 18th March this year - not sure though if that would also apply to the freebie.

Lady · « **Reply #95 on:** May 16, 2016, 10:12:16 am »

I have MBAM Premium.

When the slowness started, after a few days I turned to you, as you can see in my first post. That was February 19, so it started a few days earlier.

My v2.2.1.1043 was installed on March 24. Odd that you got that later. BullGuard version 16.0 was installed on April 28.

So the slowness started before those upgrades. MBAM has definitions updates too, hasn't it? That's almost or always daily I suppose.

It's SUCH a great experience to just USE the pc without problems! It's SO fast and doing so well. Great! At least the pc became SQUEAKY clean in the process! And I learned a lot again. I'm SMILING!