NIS 2010 freezes my laptop during background scan

Norton Security | Norton Internet Security
41

Hi pinman:

 

Here's my personal rant abouts the background Norton Insight task.

 

Unplugging my laptop and running off battery power is the only way I've discovered to temporarily disable the background Norton Insight task, which isn't even an option for users with desktop PCs.  By default, all the background tasks listed in Performance | Norton Tasks are temporarily suspended when laptops run on battery power (as indicated by the green power plug icons in the Status column).

 

I am confused as to why Symantec has designed the Norton Insight task to run automatically and attempt to make a connection to the Symantec servers to retrieve updated trusts levels for executable files even when a computer is not connected to the Internet.  I have a dial-up connection and if the Norton Insight task is triggered while I'm disconnected from the Internet, the Symantec Service Framework (ccSvcHst.exe) still fires up and continues to churn away for 3 to 5 minutes, causing my CPU usage to suddenly increase (and hence intermittently freeze my computer).

 

I also don't understand why Symantec prevents users from permanenetly disabling the background Norton Insight task in their settings when they have the option of running the Norton Insight task (Performance | Application Ratings) manually.  If I can disable the background automatic idle full system scan and run a full scan at the time of my choosing then surely it would be far less dangerous to disable the background Norton Insight task.  The worst case scenario (I hope) is that Insight might block an executable from downloading and/or running until I manually updated my Application Ratings and fixed the trust rating.

 

Two other pet peeves.  Why is it that Norton Performance Monitor sends out performance alerts every time non-Norton software causes a peak in my CPU usage (e.g., during full system scans with Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware or hard disk defrags with Windows Disk Defragmenter or Piriform Defraggler),  but it never issues a single performance alert when CPU usage by ccSvcHst.exe approaches 100%?  And why does that @*%?!! background Norton Community Watch (NCW) task run daily (hence causing another jump in my CPU usage), albeit for a short period of time, even though I've disabled NCW in my settings?

 

I've been trying to figure out just how Norton Insight works for months now, and Symantec employee royf sent an excellent reply about the difference between Norton Insight server queries and NCW submissions in the post Norton Insight Submission Runs When I'm Disconnected From the Internet.  Be sure to read his post if you find the information on Norton Insight in the Norton Help files as confusing as I did.

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MS Windows Vista Home Premium 32-bit SP2 * NIS 2011 v. 18.1.0.37 * NU v. 14.5 * IE 8
HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo CPU T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3.0 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS

42

Hi pinman:

 

Just another thought.  The following suggestion helped (but did not solve) my problem with computer freezes.  It might not make any difference on your machine since you have a broadband Internet connection and I have dial-up, but you may want to try the FileHippo Update Checker anyway if it sounds like something you might like to use.

 

Go to the FileHippo download website and look for any free third-party software that you have on your PC (e.g., iTunes, Java, Adobe Reader, Adobe Flash, Foxit Reader, Defraggler, CCleaner, Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware, FireFox, etc.).  This download site also has updates for a few Microsoft products like Internet Explorer and Process Explorer.  Then:

 

1. Install the FileHippo Update Checker (available at http://www.filehippo.com/updatechecker/)
2. Disable the automatic update feature in any third-party or Microsoft software on your PC that can be downloaded from FileHippo
3. Run Update Checker daily

 

Update Checker only takes a few seconds to run and it will compile a list of links to all the updates required for most of your third-party software.  You can then follow the links to download the updates from FileHippo (or run the updates manually through the apps via Help | Check for Updates if you prefer).  If you install Update Checker I would recommend disabling the "check for beta versions" option unless you're interested in testing beta versions released by the manufacturers.

 

I've found that the frequency of my computer freezes can be decreased this way, and I assume it's because I've prevented some of these automatic updaters from launching at the same time as the Norton background tasks and competing with the the Symantec Service Framework (ccSvcHst.exe) for CPU and memory.

 

Update Checker will not check for missing Windows updates so you would still have to run Windows Update on a regular basis.

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MS Windows Vista Home Premium 32-bit SP2 * NIS 2011 v. 18.1.0.37 * NU v. 14.5 * IE 8
HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo CPU T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3.0 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS