Just installed my first copy of MSSE on a new build I'm doing for the kids' computer/htpc. Figured I'd let it do its thing. Then I said "Hmm... wonder how it stacks up against Antivir for memory usage".
Well, full scan. MSSE is fluctuating between 59-65MB, Antivir is pretty much rock solid at 62MB. CPU usage is interesting though. MSSE is picking up around 20% while Antivir is happy with less than 3%. Granted, apples to oranges as I'm comparing an i3 to an i7, so double Antivir's number.
Now the BIG number. Idle usage. When idle, Antivir has 4 processes visible totalling about 17MB. MSSE on the other hand has one main process which sits pat at 62MB. Note, I'm not entirely certain whether or not Antivir may be using svchost for additional processes. If so, this could substantially increase resident memory usage.
Note, this testing was done with Antivir 9. I have not had the chance to see what Antivir 10 is doing under the hood.
Updated Antivir 10 results:
It appears that Antivir 10's scan results take a little bit more memory than Antivir 9's. On the same system the the test was run, the On-Demand scanner is taking just shy of 70MB of ram. Curiously, it actually spawns TWO processes for the On-Demand scan. The first happens to be only about 1.7MB, while the second clocks in at 69.8MB.
Something of note however, Antivir 10 seems to trade off this ever-so-slightly larger memory footprint for an even more efficient scanning engine. Taskmanager registers the scanning engine barely using any CPU time whatsoever. It is spending most of its time hovering between 0% and 1% CPU usage! Talk about efficient!
I also opted to install the Rootkit detection tool, as well as the shadow copy service. I'm not entirely certain what the purpose of the shadow copy service is - I have a feeling it probably creates a backup of critical Antivir files via the Windows Volume Shadow Copy service, effectively providing a safe backup of the antivirus software in the event a virus manages to infect or otherwise cripple Antivir itself.
In total, while not scanning, Antivir 10 sits idle again with 4 resident processes totaling approximately 19MB. Again, I am not certain if anything additional is hiding under svchost, however looking over the service linkage from the process list, it does not appear so. I would venture this also would be the same for Antivir 9, which was in question as well.
In total, it looks as if Antivir 10 is using slightly more memory than Antivir 9 and MSSE are. However the notable improvement is in Antivir 10's CPU usage. This thing is absolutely impressive, barely touching the CPU during a full scan.
All that remains to be tested are the detection rates. I'll leave that up to the pro's.
Update 2:
Okay, I was slightly wrong about CPU usage. Antivir 10 appears to have something called a "Hidden Object Scanner" which may possibly be part of its rootkit detection component. The actual file scan portion, which is a second pass in the scan process appears to be hovering around 1%-2% CPU time and 72MB working RAM usage.
Well, full scan. MSSE is fluctuating between 59-65MB, Antivir is pretty much rock solid at 62MB. CPU usage is interesting though. MSSE is picking up around 20% while Antivir is happy with less than 3%. Granted, apples to oranges as I'm comparing an i3 to an i7, so double Antivir's number.
Now the BIG number. Idle usage. When idle, Antivir has 4 processes visible totalling about 17MB. MSSE on the other hand has one main process which sits pat at 62MB. Note, I'm not entirely certain whether or not Antivir may be using svchost for additional processes. If so, this could substantially increase resident memory usage.
Note, this testing was done with Antivir 9. I have not had the chance to see what Antivir 10 is doing under the hood.
Updated Antivir 10 results:
It appears that Antivir 10's scan results take a little bit more memory than Antivir 9's. On the same system the the test was run, the On-Demand scanner is taking just shy of 70MB of ram. Curiously, it actually spawns TWO processes for the On-Demand scan. The first happens to be only about 1.7MB, while the second clocks in at 69.8MB.
Something of note however, Antivir 10 seems to trade off this ever-so-slightly larger memory footprint for an even more efficient scanning engine. Taskmanager registers the scanning engine barely using any CPU time whatsoever. It is spending most of its time hovering between 0% and 1% CPU usage! Talk about efficient!
I also opted to install the Rootkit detection tool, as well as the shadow copy service. I'm not entirely certain what the purpose of the shadow copy service is - I have a feeling it probably creates a backup of critical Antivir files via the Windows Volume Shadow Copy service, effectively providing a safe backup of the antivirus software in the event a virus manages to infect or otherwise cripple Antivir itself.
In total, while not scanning, Antivir 10 sits idle again with 4 resident processes totaling approximately 19MB. Again, I am not certain if anything additional is hiding under svchost, however looking over the service linkage from the process list, it does not appear so. I would venture this also would be the same for Antivir 9, which was in question as well.
In total, it looks as if Antivir 10 is using slightly more memory than Antivir 9 and MSSE are. However the notable improvement is in Antivir 10's CPU usage. This thing is absolutely impressive, barely touching the CPU during a full scan.
All that remains to be tested are the detection rates. I'll leave that up to the pro's.
Update 2:
Okay, I was slightly wrong about CPU usage. Antivir 10 appears to have something called a "Hidden Object Scanner" which may possibly be part of its rootkit detection component. The actual file scan portion, which is a second pass in the scan process appears to be hovering around 1%-2% CPU time and 72MB working RAM usage.
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