[dba-Tech] Mcafee Viruscan Central slows down closing form from1 to 40 seconds.

DJK(John) Robinson djkr at msn.com
Thu Sep 13 04:25:19 CDT 2007


Exact same policy here - recommend clients remove all traces of MacAfee and
Symantec/Norton - if they can!  I haven't seen this particular problem, but
these companies have a long track record of seeming ok to some users but
screwing up others badly.

I'm very happy with Sophos, and have been for a long time, as have a number
of clients, colleagues etc.  NO hassle, NO false positives, NO complaints -
ever.  No, I don't work for them, etc.  Yes, you do have to pay - well worth
it, I reckon!

John


-----Original Message-----
From: dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Gustav Brock
Sent: 13 September 2007 09:08
To: dba-tech at databaseadvisors.com
Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] Mcafee Viruscan Central slows down closing form
from1 to 40 seconds.


Hi Erwin

It is for a reason that we do not recommend our clients to run this package,
not even the OEM version supplied with some machines. If they insist, we
stress that they must be prepared for all sort of troubles. That said, some
machines run nicely with the package. The situation is the same for
Symantec/Norton.

Our first choice is CA E-trust which costs a little but never has caused
trouble for us.

/gustav

>>> Erwin.Craps at ithelps.eu 13-09-2007 09:06 >>>
Hi
 
I found this pretty gross of McAfee so I wanted to know if someone had the
same issue and what you done to resolve it.
 
I have written an application in Access for inventorising a real estate
property in order to generate a value estimation of the property. The
application keep a list of question and answer and generates a form to
display on a tablet pc which is carried around the property by the expert.
 
The form is pretty large around 16 tabs and a combined number of +/- 500
questions and their answers. It is mainly this form that causes a problem
with McAfee anti virus. The form is unbound and loads/saves data when
opening/closing (only saves date when a change is noticed).
 
The application was running very smootly on three computers (2 tablets, one
desktop) until a certain McAfee update about 1,5 year ago. 
Suddenly, after this update was installed, closing the form took a huge time
even without saving the data. Instead of 1 or 2 seconds, the form took 40
seconds to close, without saving data!!! We quickly found that it was the
virusscanner that caused the issue. I tried to add an exclusion for MDB, but
that is not posible in that Virusscanner. So we decided to deactivate the
viruscanner. 
Yesterday, one and a half year later, I installed the latest version
(11.x) Mcafee Anti Virus, and the problem still is present.
I contacted McAfee support, several times, the frontline people where not
really knowledgeable about there own soft and my case was escalated to a
higher level. In the meanwhile I supplied them with some additional
information where I believe the problem is situated.
 
Apparantly, when I open this form, Access creates 508 temporary file in the
"local settings\temp" folder. I suspect 1 for each control. The file are
named "~[random].TMP". The virusscanner does not slow down the opening and
getting data very much (and creating those 508 tmp files), let's say 1 or 2
seconds, for which I'm ok with. But closing the form (without saving data),
delays the form from 2 to 40 seconds, it freezes Access. When I take a look
at the temp folder, I see that deleting those tmp files, or whatever is
related to that action, is what causing the delay. Files are fully deleted
after those 40 seconds.
 
What is causing the delay of 40 seconds, is it deleting those 508 tmp files
or is it some MDB updating that is done before deleting each file?
 
Because the form has worked perfectly for a period of 2 years togheter with
Mcafee, until a certain update, I suspect McAfee added the TMP extension to
the "document and programs" list (the virusscaner has always been set to doc
and prog). But then again, why is McAfee freesing Access for 40 seconds
while DELETING the files???
 
The response from McAfee was that they are aware that using MDB's with the
virusscaner are problematic and they do not have a solution for it, since 1
year and a half!!! They found it was not that problematic. I told him that
if the users opens this form 100 times a day (which is probably the case) he
had to wait 1,5 hours per day....
 
I asked if I could add an exclusing to the virusscanner but this is not
posible. So I said that I then my only option is to install another brand of
virusscaner, he answered that the user could turn of the virusscanner off/on
while he uses the form... 100 times a day!!!
 
Great support :-(
 
I used to love McAfee, but the problems I have with them and the level of
support in the last 2 or 3 years are sickening.
 
 
 

Erwin Craps

Zaakvoerder 


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