Spyware, viruses, & security : Anyone Have Any Problems with V2 of CounterSpy

by jlippincott - 2/6/07 7:57 PM

Total posts: 20

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Post 16 of 20

High CPU utilization with AMD X2 4200+

by jrbales - 8/19/07 5:02 AM In reply to: Anyone Have Any Problems with V2 of CounterSpy by jlippincott

I'd recently installed a gadget on Windows VISTA that shows CPU and memory usage. I was suprised to see BOTH CORES of my AMD X2 4200+ system averaging 50% or more use. I had noticed software loads and runs slow and was blaming VISTA. I checked software and services running in background and finally found the culprit to be Counter Spy V2. Once I'd shut down Counter Spy completely, CPU usage on both cores dropped to under 5% idle. Even Office 2007 loads fast now with Counter Spy turned off.

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Post 17 of 20

CPU Utilization in V2 of CounterSpy

by MoosieAZ - 8/19/07 8:29 AM In reply to: High CPU utilization with AMD X2 4200+ by jrbales

You have discovered the dirty little secret of Active Protection in V2. The high CPU utilization and slow application load times are directly related to the Active Protection feature. I contacted Sunbelt a few months ago and their response was that they were aware of the problem and were working on a solution. Since then there have been several updates but the severe overhead remains.

My solution was to completely disable the Active Protection feature. Not elegant but effective. Unfortunately it renders CounterSpy almost useless, except of course for the daily scan I allow it to complete.

SpySweeper was no better, in fact the overhead was the reason I moved to CounterSpy.

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Post 18 of 20

We're on it...

by alexeck - 2/11/08 6:22 AM In reply to: CPU Utilization in V2 of CounterSpy by MoosieAZ

Folks, I'm a little appalled to see these reports of high CPU usage. We've always prided ourselves on having a very low memory and CPU footprint. We'll get on this asap. Note that a major new revision of CounterSpy is coming out in March (version 3). Nevertheless, if you're having CPU spikes, don't hesitate to contact our support department (877-673-1153 or support(at)sunbelt-software.com.

Also make sure you're running the latest version, which is currently 2.5.1043.

Alex Eckelberry
CEO, Sunbelt Software

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Post 19 of 20

(NT) Nice to see you here Alex. :)

by roddy32

- 2/11/08 7:14 AM In reply to: We're on it... by alexeck

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Post 20 of 20

Support Response

by Jamie Hudson - 2/11/08 7:16 AM In reply to: We're on it... by alexeck

Hello everyone,

Support will look into this but we need your help. If you send the answers to the below questions and email us the logs for your CounterSpy install, we can have our support department look into this. Please email this response to support@sunbelt-software.com with the name Jason Layman is the subject line.

What version of Windows are you running, and which Service Pack?
(2000, XP, Vista)

What version of CounterSpy are you running (please format it like this: x.x.xxxx)? you can find this information here: Click on CounterSpy dropdown menu / About CounterSpy.

The following utility will gather the required logs and information from your installation of CounterSpy. If you get any security warnings about a script running or FTP trying to take place be sure to allow it as this will prevent the information being sent to us.

First you will need to open CounterSpy and go to Help, About CounterSpy, click the diagnostics button, then click ok twice and close out of CounterSpy.

Then click on the following link, save the file to your desktop.

http://www.sunbelt-software.com/ihs/csc2info.exe

Once it is saved double click on the file, it will ask you to enter your Ticket ID number (please enter in a random number with this format 001-00-xxxxxx). It will next ask you if you want to automatically submit the information, choose no. A file will be created on your desktop containing the information, reply to this email and attach the file that was created on your desktop.

Thank you!

Jamie Hudson
Director of Support
Sunbelt Software