I've spent the last 15 hours trying to understand why Norton 360 slows down my XP system. Not only is it slow, but just opening files takes takes an enormous amount of time. It takes 30 seconds to open an excel file or a word file. With Norton 360 installed my system memory is down to 39% remaining. Norton 360 makes my system so slow it is painful to work. ccsvchst.exe takes up to 84,000 kb of system memory. Thinking that the slowness of my system was due to something I did, I took the time to run every test or diagnosis available to me. The speed of my system didn't change. Then I started reading about Norton 360 and the complaints people were able to post. They mentioned slow systems and slow file access. I have the same exact problems. I''ve tried every "suggestion" available on Nortons site. I've turned off Auto-protect to save memory. I've switched the virus protection to "turn on when reboot". I've tried every "switch" option available. Nothing has worked. I'm convinced that Norton 360 is not made for XP systems. When I removed Norton 360 from my computer - it runs great again - and it is fast. I wish Norton would just admit they have a problem and stop wasting everyones time.
Hi, sailfast,
I remember, back in the early 90s, forcing Windows 3.1 to run on an 80286. Boy was it SLLOOOWWWWW! What a crappy operating system. Of course on my 386 at the office, with a decent amount of RAM and a faster hard drive, it ran like greased lightning. And there was a certain value to not having to cope with different operating systems depending on which computer I was using....
The fact is, as new versions of software come out, they take advantage of new capabilities of hardware. They have to, to stay competitive. And when the software is security software, they have to add new capabilities all the time too, or the nasties get out front. Sure, we can still run them on our old hardware and OS--and take advantage of all those new capabilities; the price we pay for doing so (and not having to shell out for the newer, faster computers they were designed for) is that they're going to slow us down.
I've got a creaking Pentium 4 in the other room as I type this, loaded down with Windows Vista and Norton 360 v.5. I feel your pain, I really do! But time marches on, and so must Norton to be effective; that's not really a "problem" with Norton. I'm just glad I can still run it on that old dinosaur, or I'd have to retire it lest it compromise my entire network!
Often there is a reason for this kind of slow-down. What security software was on the machine before N360? How was it removed? If a competitor's sofware, was its removal tool used?
Is there anything like Trusteer Rapport on the machine, or Spybot S&D?
Are all Windows updates and service packs done?