Should I turn anything off when running games to make them run better? Trouble is, a lot my games now use Steam and so the PC is online when running them - I'm worried if I turn bits of NIS off then I might leave my PC open to a security issue.
SNy advice? I wish NIS had a "game mode " !
Hi,
Norton products have a so called Silent Mode. This is the best for games.
You can enable it this way:
1. Right click on the Norton icon by the clock
2. Click on Turn on Silent Mode
3. Set a time range, and click OK
4. Play the game
5. When finished playing turn off Silent Mode in the same place
Let us know the results.
And all the important security features will still be working. You just won't be disturbed by pop-ups while playing.
Bombastus wrote:And all the important security features will still be working. You just won't be disturbed by pop-ups while playing.
Hi, Bombastus. Not quite. NIS will also suspend its background tasks while Silent Mode is active. This will prevent things like Live Update or Insight or Community Watch from consuming CPU cycles in the background - and thus interfering with game performance.
The reason for the time limit on Silent Mode is to ensure that people don't forget - and leave Silent Mode active for long periods of time (more than a day). This ensures NIS's Liveupdate gets reactivated in sufficient time to prevent a security breach.
If a user has a powerful CPU - where the load from NIS is insignificant and thus gameplay is not slowed down - and the user can live with the popups - I recommend that the user not select Silent Mode unless they find that NIS is a factor in gameplay stutter.
However, the above can only be determined by experiment - since the amount of CPU Horsepower consumed by some games is so high that any other background task will cause the game to slow and/or popups to appear.
Another important factor to consider:
As NIS is improved, the percentage of available CPU horsepower consumed by NIS's background tasks will lessen. As a result - if a user needs Silent Mode today, they may not need Silent Mode at a later date if Live Update improves NIS's background-task efficiency.
Consequently, it is a good idea to check the forums for information on the release of Live Update patches that improve NIS's background-task-performance by lowering CPU load while background tasks are in operation..
Should such updates become available - the use of Silent Mode may be reviewed by the user and a new set of experiments performed to determine whether the user still needs to activate Silent Mode - or whether the improvements in NIS make the use of Silent Mode unnecessary.
Should the user elect to use Silent Mode - here are some things to do (or not) while Silent Mode is active:
1. Do not switch tasks and use your Internet Browser extensively while Silent Mode is active. The vast majority of today's attacks come through compromised websites and web downloads. Users want to ensure their NIS is as up-to-date as possible when browsing the net.
2. If the user has enabled Silent Mode for a duration of 6 hours - and they only game for 3 - manually disable Silent Mode once the user exits their Gaming session. This will ensure Live Update is quickly activated again - and thusly NIS is brought up to date promptly - so other activities (such as browsing) can be done with maximum safety.
3. If the user enables Quiet Mode (a special form of Silent Mode) - do NOT leave applications running in the background that are on the Quiet Mode's list for automatic activation of Silent Mode. Using Quiet mode trigger-applications will prevent NIS from being auto-updated until the programs in the Quiet Mode List are closed.
See the NIS Helpfiles for more info on Silent Mode and Quiet Mode operation and configuration.
twixt wrote:
Bombastus wrote:And all the important security features will still be working. You just won't be disturbed by pop-ups while playing.
Hi, Bombastus. Not quite. NIS will also suspend its background tasks while Silent Mode is active.
Yeah, that's why I said important. The important security features while gaming are autoprotect/sonar and the firewall.
Hi Twixt :)
Your post was extremely interesting :)
I am a big time gamer with a very powerful machine and have never noticed any NIS 12 (or 11) pop ups or slow downs.... but its a 6 core machine with 16 gb of ram....
The information about silent mode/quiet mode was very useful though....Kudo added :)
All the best Brett :)
Brett928S2 wrote:Hi Twixt :)
Your post was extremely interesting :)
I am a big time gamer with a very powerful machine and have never noticed any NIS 12 (or 11) pop ups or slow downs.... but its a 6 core machine with 16 gb of ram....
The information about silent mode/quiet mode was very useful though....Kudo added :)
All the best Brett :)
Hi, Brett. Thanks for the Kudo. If you have lots and lots of "grunt" in your CPU - the load imposed by NIS's background tasks is a trivial percentage of the CPU's capability. Thus, Silent Mode is unnecessary for 6-core 4GHz machines. 
It's the people who are barely able to game effectively with their machine who benefit from using Silent Mode. That's why I only recommend the use of Silent Mode if it is obvious that it is required in order to game without slowdown.
Eg: things like getting stutter just as you are about to capture the enemy's flag.
Murphy at work... 
Glad to know I helped your understanding.
Hello
Rather than putting on silent mode by itself, I leave that off. I enter the game's .exe and in your case Steam into the user-specified programs under quiet mode. I also have on full screen detection. I find the advantage of doing it this way, is that NIS automatically turns on the quiet mode when I go and play as well as the silent mode. I don't get any interruptions from NIS and can't tell it is on even. When I stop playing, then it automatically turns off both the silent mode and the quiet mode. This way you don't have to worry about turning it back on as it will automatically do it by itself. I am not bothered by the background tasks and I get no interruptions. When I am finished and get up for a minute, then the idle quick scan will kick in if one needs to be run then and the same with any updates. This can all be found under miscellaneous settings. Thanks.