As a former user of Kaspersky I am amazed. A full system scan that took over an hour with Kaspersky antivirus 2015, took 10 minutes with Webroot. It is also a bit confusing that there are no options - while in Kapersky and Bitdefender and others there is Quick scan, System scan etc.
That raises the question if Webroot really makes a complete system scan. If it takes so much less time to do that, it must use a different approach but I cannot find anything about their technology in the Webroot website. It caused some uncertainty in me.
If this is such a superior technology, why not explain how it can work so fast?
I think Webroot looses lots of potential customers by not making it conceivable to people that it can work reliably and make a comprehensive scan still being so fast.
The ranking of Webroot is, in some rankings of AV programs low because conventional AV testing apparently cannot make Webroot justice as explained in the PCMag review by Rubenking. Unless reading Rubenkings review I think many prefer other AV solutions. Therefore I thnk is necessary to explain about the technology.
Can anyone explain how Webroot can work so rapidly and apparently yet reliably?
Solved
Does Webroot really make a full system scan?
Best answer by RetiredTripleHelix
I just keep it at the Default Deep scan and is recommended no sense in doing any full scans IMO. Also WSA's Realtime Shield is always active so it will not miss anything! My scans take 30 to 40 seconds and the reason I have SSD Drives so eveyone's system it's different so scan times will vary.
Daniel 😉
View originalDaniel 😉
The default scan is not a Full scan, We dont say that we do full system scans in 2/3 minutes btw. You can run a full scan if you so wish but its a giant waste of system time and resources. Some of our friends in the AV industry do similar in fact if I remember correctly the creators of Malwarebytes only put the Full scan option in to stop complaints not for any actual performance reasons!
@ wrote:
The default scan is not a Full scan, We dont say that we do full system scans in 2/3 minutes btw. You can run a deep scan if you so wish but its a giant waste of system time and resources. Some of our friends in the AV industry do similar in fact if I remember correctly the creators of Malwarebytes only put the Full scan option in to stop complaints not for any actual performance reasons!
When the testing was done by Rubenking at PC-mag - was only default scanning then used?
And what about the Webroot test by the two independent testing institutes that gave Webroot a top ranking?
Also, I could not find any option for making a system scan with Webroot. Is there any?
Jaan
To add to what @ has said...
To be honest I have to dissagree a little bit with you Roy. I have mine set to perform a deep scan (The option to "Perform a scheduled Quick Scan instead of a Deep Scan" is NOT checked.) yet my scans still take under 2 minutes.
I DO keep my temp files and Temp Internet files cleared out... that helps a lot. I am not the best at explaining the Cloud scanning, and how it makes scans so very much faster over traditional definition based solutions, so I will leave that for someone else.
One thing to remember though is that WSA does not scan 100% of your hard drive. 99% of malware can be found on 5% or less of your hard drive: there simply is no need to scan the entire drive looking in places where malware won't be. That is kind of like going to an apple orchard looking for oranges.
In the even that anything IS in the areas not scanned, it generally isn't active. It is just there, not doing anything. The moment an infected file does become active, WSA catches it and blocks it.
I hope this very un-technical explanation is a bit of help :)
To be honest I have to dissagree a little bit with you Roy. I have mine set to perform a deep scan (The option to "Perform a scheduled Quick Scan instead of a Deep Scan" is NOT checked.) yet my scans still take under 2 minutes.
I DO keep my temp files and Temp Internet files cleared out... that helps a lot. I am not the best at explaining the Cloud scanning, and how it makes scans so very much faster over traditional definition based solutions, so I will leave that for someone else.
One thing to remember though is that WSA does not scan 100% of your hard drive. 99% of malware can be found on 5% or less of your hard drive: there simply is no need to scan the entire drive looking in places where malware won't be. That is kind of like going to an apple orchard looking for oranges.
In the even that anything IS in the areas not scanned, it generally isn't active. It is just there, not doing anything. The moment an infected file does become active, WSA catches it and blocks it.
I hope this very un-technical explanation is a bit of help :)
@ wrote:
(clipped)That was very valuable. Webroot should quote you in their product info :D
To be honest I have to dissagree a little bit with you Roy. I have mine set to perform a deep scan (The option to "Perform a scheduled Quick Scan instead of a Deep Scan" is NOT checked.) yet my scans still take under 2 minutes.
..99% of malware can be found on 5% or less of your hard drive: there simply is no need to scan the entire drive looking in places where malware won't be. That is kind of like going to an apple orchard looking for oranges.
In the event that anything IS in the areas not scanned, it generally isn't active. It is just there, not doing anything. The moment an infected file does become active, WSA catches it and blocks it.
I hope this very un-technical explanation is a bit of help :)
But I cannot find any entry "Deep scan" - where is it - if it is there, Webroot should make it more visible, along with a recommendation not to use it routinely, explaining like you did.
As I got it from Rubenking, Webroot has a unique way of rapidly identifying abnormal virus-suspect behavior - does anyone know more about that?
Thank you for the comments! :) That explanation was essentially a modified form of how a former Webroot Support type described it, so it really was not entirely my own :)
To find the scan options:
Open WSA
Click Advanced Options at the upper right corner
Click on Scheduler on the left side: the settings for scheduled scans (such as I use) will appear in the right side
Click on Scan Settings on the left side for a few more scan options
I hope this helps?
To find the scan options:
Open WSA
Click Advanced Options at the upper right corner
Click on Scheduler on the left side: the settings for scheduled scans (such as I use) will appear in the right side
Click on Scan Settings on the left side for a few more scan options
I hope this helps?
I think you have got my comments mixed up David, just to clarify the default scan is a deep scan and not a quick or full scan.I said that a full scan wont take less than 2/3 minutes. A deep scan is a different thing altogether, it takes 23 seconds on my home PC.
+56I just keep it at the Default Deep scan and is recommended no sense in doing any full scans IMO. Also WSA's Realtime Shield is always active so it will not miss anything! My scans take 30 to 40 seconds and the reason I have SSD Drives so eveyone's system it's different so scan times will vary.
Daniel 😉
Daniel 😉
I think I did have your comments mixed up LOL. Thanks Roy :)@ wrote:
I think you have got my comments mixed up David, just to clarify the default scan is a deep scan and not a quick or full scan.I said that a full scan wont take less than 2/3 minutes. A deep scan is a different thing altogether, it takes 23 seconds on my home PC.
That is OK though... in the end, the only that matter is that WSA is FAST, and it really does work.
In your first reply you said@ wrote:
I think you have got my comments mixed up David, just to clarify the default scan is a deep scan and not a quick or full scan.I said that a full scan wont take less than 2/3 minutes. A deep scan is a different thing altogether, it takes 23 seconds on my home PC.
"You can run a full scan if you so wish but its a giant waste of system time and resources".
You said it won't take less than 2/3 minutes - I am curious how much more time it will take - does it take about the same time as eg Kaspersky for the same amount of data? For example, I have about 40 gig and it took over an hour with Kaspersky. How much do you think it might take with Webroot.
My guess is that it will take 2 minutes or less most likley, but of course there are a lot of variables. Still, you will be quite surprised.
Until a few months ago I was using an old 2008 Toshiba laptop. It was memory starved and CPU poor by today's standards. Even that machine would do a scan in under 2-3 minutes, and that was using a 500_ Gb drive with quite a bit of 'big' software installed such as all of Office, parts of Visual Studio, etc etc.
Give it a try, either with a free trial or with your own key code!
NOTE: Hey... did you manage to get the Key Code working within the software or do we still have to work on that issue?
As you can tell so far.... any time you have a question just let us know. While most of us on here, like myself, are volunteers there are Webroot staff such as Rakanisheu who was a Threat Researcher/Support Tech. We are always happy to help anytime we can 🙂
Until a few months ago I was using an old 2008 Toshiba laptop. It was memory starved and CPU poor by today's standards. Even that machine would do a scan in under 2-3 minutes, and that was using a 500_ Gb drive with quite a bit of 'big' software installed such as all of Office, parts of Visual Studio, etc etc.
Give it a try, either with a free trial or with your own key code!
NOTE: Hey... did you manage to get the Key Code working within the software or do we still have to work on that issue?
As you can tell so far.... any time you have a question just let us know. While most of us on here, like myself, are volunteers there are Webroot staff such as Rakanisheu who was a Threat Researcher/Support Tech. We are always happy to help anytime we can 🙂
A final comment that perhaps should open as a separat topic:
From this interesting discussion it appears to me that the thinking needs to be more result-oriented.
That is, we have to consider what degree of protection does the AV program provide, rather than considering whether a full or partial scan is done as a default.
I have the impression from Rubenkings article that Webroot has some ingenious ways of rapidly identifying virus-like behavior combined with an ability to rapidly locate and eliminate the culprit before it can do any damage. If so, a full scan is a waste of time especially as only very rarely, if ever, malware hide in other than that 5% or so of all data as shorTcircuiT said.
From Rubenkings article I got convinced that Webroot gives top level protection however it does it.
Jaan
From this interesting discussion it appears to me that the thinking needs to be more result-oriented.
That is, we have to consider what degree of protection does the AV program provide, rather than considering whether a full or partial scan is done as a default.
I have the impression from Rubenkings article that Webroot has some ingenious ways of rapidly identifying virus-like behavior combined with an ability to rapidly locate and eliminate the culprit before it can do any damage. If so, a full scan is a waste of time especially as only very rarely, if ever, malware hide in other than that 5% or so of all data as shorTcircuiT said.
From Rubenkings article I got convinced that Webroot gives top level protection however it does it.
Jaan
That, in a nutshell, is exactly on point. As you noted earlier, there are AV tests that just plain either cannot include, or WSA does not do well due to the test being more "how" oriented rather than 'results' oriented.@ wrote:
A final comment that perhaps should open as a separat topic:
From this interesting discussion it appears to me that the thinking needs to be more result-oriented.
......................
Jaan
I hope you enjoy WSA and that you become a regular here on the Community. You have had some really good questions and comments that made me really think, and that is good 🙂
What you say is really sensational. I suggest Webroot challenges the AV competitors in a "Speed&protection competition".
Regarding the account - I got it going and Webroot is running, and I am going to ask for a refund from Kaspersky that I bought recently.
Thank you for valuable, interesting and rapid replies.
Jaan
Regarding the account - I got it going and Webroot is running, and I am going to ask for a refund from Kaspersky that I bought recently.
Thank you for valuable, interesting and rapid replies.
Jaan
Excellent 🙂 Glad to hear that is taken care of!@ wrote:
................
Regarding the account - I got it going and Webroot is running, and I am going to ask for a refund from Kaspersky that I bought recently.
Jaan
Again, any time you have a question or problem, let us know and we will do our best to give a hand with it!
+56Already done that been there: https://community.webroot.com/t5/Community-Announcements/Webroot-SecureAnywhere-Tops-PassMark-Bench-Test-s-once-again/td-p/156865 and here: https://community.webroot.com/t5/Community-Announcements/WSA-performance-in-MRG-Effitas-360-Assessment-amp-Certification/td-p/164205@ wrote:
What you say is really sensational. I suggest Webroot challenges the AV competitors in a "Speed&protection competition".
Thank you for valuable, interesting and rapid replies.
Jaan
HTH,
Daniel 😉
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