Hey all,

 

 

Long story short. I reinstalled FSX today after formatting my system. Upon running it, I was getting sound skipping and periodic freezing. I presumed FSX was being FSX and hugely temperamental. I then uninstalled:

 

FSX, UTX, GEX, REX, NGX, MTX and a load more...90gb a whole day of installing.......

 

In the hope that a fresh install would solve the issues (after a load of driver troubleshooting).

 

Then, just as I am about to go to bed in a strop....A little box appears at the bottom of my screen....

 

"Windows defender has protected you from the following file: Steam.exe"

 

Thanks windows defender. Thanks for protecting me against an extremely popular piece of software that millions of people voluntarily use.

 

Anyway, I said long story short and I'm rambling....

 

Windows defender real time protection was on - I used to run with it off all the time.

 

Have I just undone a whole day of installing as a result of not disabling Windows Defender?

 

................

No... You're fine.

I thought the world wasn't going to end today.

Not the first time something like that happened to me and I ended up reinstalling a wee bit more than 90GB.

Ouchhhh!

 

So far, I've had zero trouble from AV software installing anything... I use, and cant recommend highly enough, AVAST Pro... Its soooo totally the mutts nuts over ANYTHING.

 

I leave it enabled all the time, wouldn't run without it, yet spend a LOT of time fixing other peoples computers who were not running it, and once fixed, I send them on their way with it installed and haven't seen any of them ever again since, for the same problem.

 

Try it yourself on a test install...

Load up any AV you like, then go searching for serial numbers online, and see how quickly you get infected...

 

Then try it again with Avast, the difference is night/day, like running FSX Stock, or FSX Word Not Allowed style!

 

6+ Years I been with Avast, and 6+ years never had any viruses/malware, nothing at all, and I've had a LOT of infected computers plugged into my network, visited loads of infected websites (When my customers get hacked) and avast blocks the connection and tells you straight away.. Its also the only one that can do a boot time scan, "completely outside of Windows"

 

So much cheaper too than anything "Off the shelf"... Mine was £90, for 3PC's for 3 years (I have 3 PC's in my office)

 

Anyway, enough rambling, though I would throw that in because Windows Defender is only designed for light use (Granny ordering her groceries and emailing the grandkids kind of thing). Its seriously not intended to deal with the sort of thing us daily web nuts do, or the levels/types of software we throw at our systems..

 

Using defender, you must still be on Vista then... Even if you remove it and go with the free avast, you will be better off than you are now...

Using defender, you must still be on Vista then... Even if you remove it and go with the free avast, you will be better off than you are now...

 

Windows Defender is in Windows 7 as well. In Windows 8 it even includes Microsoft Security Essentials, which makes a 3rd party anti-virus redundant for 90% of the users. It will do fine for most 'web nuts' as well, but it will require a plugin called common sense .

 

And no offense, but you can replace Avast Pro with just about any other product in your story and find people with the same experiences. I've used McAfee for years without problems. After that, NOD32 for years without problems.

Remove the common sense, or "computer literacy", and no, I have found you cant rely on any of the others...

 

But I only repair an average of 90+ computers a month, and even the ones that don't come in for viruses get checked, and I regularly find viruses on them that even so called computer savvy folk didn't know where there. McAfee and Norton are the worst offenders for failing to detect infections at all..

 

MSE's detection capability is also really poor too. Lost count of the number of times I uninstalled McAfee/Norton/MSE and several others, and scanned the drive with avast only to pickup viruses and remove them successfully, that the owners never knew were there, and they too had the same "I've never had any problems with it" in terms of viruses, but then if it cant/wont detect it, then of course your not going to know there is a problem, and virus writers also don't want you to know there is a problem either, just look at how the ZEUS botnet works for example...

 

If I had that many computers under my control, I wouldn't want the computers owners to know about it either.. Just speaking from daily experience.. Not running you down personally mate, its no attack on you.. Just plain old simple findings of experimenting with other peoples kit.

Have an award for the 2012 most useless topic title

Kill 'MS Defender': it's a real pain in the &@($*!

 

And MS Security Essentials is always the worst in professional tests like:

 

http://www.av-comparatives.org/

 

I believe in: Avira Free antivirus + PC Tools Firewall Plus (free) + SpywareBlaster (free) + WinPatrol (free) + Secunia PSI (free).

 

And for a second opinion on demand only: Malwarebytes' Anti Malware (free)

 

And no worry, i tested it : no influence on FSX with a i5 2500K @ 4.3 Ghz.

 

 

Never had a problem in many years !

Never had a single problem with MS S. E. I just exclude FSX and add on folders and scan manually when I'm not flying.

 

Very uninvasive piece of software.

I feel fortunate never receiving a virus on any of my computers in my history of computing (since 1992). Have never used an anti-virus software program regularly either. Just use the firewall. Several years ago I did think I a virus hit my system as it shutdown suddenly and everyone had me thinking I was hit by a virus. But I ran an anti-virus program and nothing came up. It turned out to be a hardware issue. I do get malware occasionally but try to clean my system once a week with a registry cleaner and malware removal program. This is why I have a hard time understanding why someone is having problems running FSX and getting a CTD occasionally and I don't have the issue(s) at all. Glad the OP brought this issue with Windows Defender to the attention of the members here.

 

Best regards,

Jim