Subscribe now and choose from over 30 free gifts worth up to £49 - Plus get £25 to spend in our shop
Morning All
I have MSE on my laptop (running XP) however for the last two days when I switch the laptop on I get a little red Security Centre shield coming up in the system tray cheerfully telling me that MSE isnt switched. This shield just so happens to sit next the MSE icon in the system tray which when you click on it opens as normal and is quite happily updating.
Is this simply a case of windows having a funny 5 minutes or is the sign of something more sinister? FWIW I'm running a full scan now to be on the safe side.
Cheers All 🙂
This rings a bell re. something on my laptop a whie ago.
In my case the red shield thing was a viral program that had got onto the laptop and was masquerading as an anti-virus warning.
This might or might not be the same as you've got though.
I noticed that on my laptop. Shortly afterwards it turned out that someone had emptied my online banking account and hijacked my Facebook and Twitter accounts.
Just kidding.
...I don't have a Facebook account.
...I don't have a Facebook account
this statement alone gives me hope in mankind ... 😀
This happens when the Security Centre Service finishes starting before the Microsoft Antimalware Service. It's more indicative of your PC being a bit slow than any malware being present. I can't remember how it was set on XP but the Security centre service should is set to Automatic (Delayed Start) on 7 and 8 it's possible it was just set to Automatic on XP. You can change this from the services applet in Control Panel/Administrative tools.
Sounds plausible.
Pretty likely to be fine if you've not seen any other symptoms, but I'd run a scan anyway, just to be sure. Probably back it up with an [url= http://www.eset.co.uk/Antivirus-Utilities/Online-Scanner ]online scan[/url] just in case MSE has been nobbled.
Uninstall then reinstall it maybe?
Also run malwarebytes to see if it picks up anything.
Yeah, +1 for MBAM.
Have you tried switching it off and back on again?
BTW cougar, FYI, I was rebuilding an old thinkpad the other day for a friend, and as is my usual I put MSE on. And its started thrashing the nuts out of the CPU.
Normal online received wisdom is an anti virus software conflict but this was a new build so no competing software on there. A few other online threads pointed to a drive conflict which is quite possible as I may have tried to install the wrong driver version given I had to try and find some old drivers from off the lenovo site. Anyway never got to the root of the problem so pulled MSE off and just went with AVG free instead and all fine. Something to keep an eye out for though.
Really? Gosh. Was that during its 'first time scan' or when idle?
I'm not hugely surprised that MSE (or any AV) chugged a bit on older hardware; I am however massively shocked that AVG was lighter.
On really creaking hardware, I've had reasonable results with Avira.
Cheers for the info.
both before and after optimising scan.
EDIT: sorry, typo, DRIVER conflict not DRIVE conflict.
Even tried taking all the drivers off again, but still MSE thrashing.
However, since I used Think Vantage system updated to put all the correct drivers on, I could probably safely put MSE back on now, but Ive handed the laptop over so maybe next time something goes wrong on it (inevitable - you know some people cant help but shag up a pc....) I'll swap it over and see if the problem is still there.
curious.
anyway @ the OP, i have had this a few times with older XP systems. i think it's wha's been suggested above - IE win security centre finishes starting up before MSE kicks in properly. the alert usually goes away after a while IIRC, or after going through the security centre alert it clears itself, one or the other IME.
Have you tried switching it off and back on again?
You have to watch this, I tried it on my Grandma's life support machine when it was beeping and got in no end of trouble