Boclean...Give me the good, the bad, and the ugly

[besafe]

Now that Comodo has acquired Boclean I will probably try it out. I may even put it onmy mom's PC. I do have some questions for the people that have used the product:

1. Is it easy to use? Lots of alerts or almost none? Easy enough to put on my mom's PC who know nothing about computers?

2. How about resource usage? Does it slow you down at all?

3. What are the products strengths?

4. What are the products weaknesses?

Again, looking to hear from people that have either used it int he past or currently use it.

[optigrab]

-{ Quote: "1. Is it easy to use? Lots of alerts or almost none? Easy enough to put on my mom's PC who know nothing about computers?" }-I've used it since 2002. It is dead easy to use. In fact you really don't use it at all. Just set it up, let it update itself periodically, and forget it is there. Unless it catches something, it won't require any attention at all. Now that it is (will be) free I will definitely add it to my Mom's machine.

-{ Quote: "2. How about resource usage? Does it slow you down at all? " }-Resource usage is really low - I've previously run it and NOD32 on a very low spec machine without issue.

-{ Quote: "3. What are the products strengths?" }- In addition to the above? Daily updates, great reputation, great support (historically).

-{ Quote: "4. What are the products weaknesses?" }-You may choose to exclude some processes (like your AV) from BOClean scanning, which can be tricky - but this is merely setup stuff, do it correctly once, then forget about it. Also, you may legitimately wonder where is the independent data that demonstrates that BOCLEAN is effective; there really haven't been any recent tests/comparitives that I know of. But I have had it catch malware once or twice. Add that to the stellar reputation it enjoys here, plus the advantages above, and I am confident it is a product worth having. But you must make that decision on your own.

[Don Pelotas]

-{ Quote: "Now that Comodo has acquired Boclean I will probably try it out. I may even put it onmy mom's PC. I do have some questions for the people that have used the product:

1. Is it easy to use? Lots of alerts or almost none? Easy enough to put on my mom's PC who know nothing about computers?

2. How about resource usage? Does it slow you down at all?

3. What are the products strengths?

4. What are the products weaknesses?

Again, looking to hear from people that have either used it int he past or currently use it." }-
1. As easy as it get's.
2. No, not much if anything.
3. It's detection.
4. It's removal of what it finds, which not as great as the hype suggests IME. :)

[FanJ]

-{ Quote: "Now that Comodo has acquired Boclean I will probably try it out. I may even put it onmy mom's PC
" }-

By all means: go for it !

Long ago I've bought copies for friends/family.
There is one "conditio sine qua non" in my book: if you want me to try to help you (=friends/family) to maintain your computer, you have to run BOClean.
(Of course together with a AV.)

You can set it up to let it do its job completely silently, and that's the way I have set it up on their computers. They don't want to be bothered with questions: do you want to do this or that; they would not know what to do.
And when I come over to them, I'll check BOClean's logfile.

[mercurie]

Don please share your removal experiences of BOClean I don't think it ever found anything on my machines, but at times I may have had my sets so that if and when it did I would not know it. Thanks.

[mikeannike]

Let me start by saying hi all. I was wandering would this program cause a conflict/problem with my current security "suite" which consist of Nod32 and Blackice Protection firewall?

[CJsDad]

The older version of BOC ran quietly in the background.
The version now known as Comodo BOClean has a couple of issues that people are experiencing and posting about over on the Comodo forum.
Updates and loss of connection are the two most common issues.
I'm using BOC with NOD32 on Vista and have no problem with it although I prefer the older version of BOC for some reason which is still running on another PC I have

[Perman]

-{ Quote: "Let me start by saying hi all. I was wandering would this program cause a conflict/problem with my current security "suite" which consist of Nod32 and Blackice Protection firewall?" }-
Hi, ComodoBoClean runs very quietly on the background and has no conflict issues w/ my Avast home , ZA pro firewall and BlackIce. However, as CJsDad has mentioned that it does have some bugs such as update error message right after window bootup(something like server not available), once in a while. Overall, it is a nice to have AT app.

[besafe]

I am new to boclean. My initial impressions:

Good

1. Easy to install and set up
2. Runs quietly in background

Bad

1. I can't get the autoupdate function to work
2. Still a blacklist program

[ErikAlbert]

If you are a fan of incomplete blacklist protection, than CBOClean is good for you.
The incompleteness can be decreased by increasing the number of AV/AS/AT/AK/AR-scanners.
Two of each kind or 5 x 2 = 10 scanners is a good start, but is it enough ? A sleeping pill or relax pill might be the answer. :)

[SqueekyGeek]

I think I have a conflict between BoClean and McAfee Security Center. After I installed BoClean, on every scan McAfee finds (and removes-:dry:) Back Door Bac! rootkit trojan. I think this is a false positive, because I have scanned numerous times with several trojan hunt programs, Ad-Aware SE Personal, SpyBot, etc., in both Windows (XP Pro SP2) and safe mode. None of the other programs found any problems or trojans, and the HiJackThis log looks good.

Anyone else come across this problem? -- anyone that recently installed the free McAfee? Or do I have a tough rootkit?

By the way, Back Door and several variations are listed in BoClean's list, but its logs for this computer do not show it has found any trojans, or anything else for that matter.

[Delgado]

My experience with BoClean has taught me to leave it alone.

I have twice had to use System Restore in order to get back my Internet connection. Over on the Comodo Forum there are numerous people with the same problem. It would appear that BoClean when killing a Trojan is supposed to repair Winsock (I dont know exactly what Winsock does, but something to do with connections) but it dosent repair in a number of cases thus messing up your Internet connection.

I tested BoClean with a Trojan Simulator, and it stopped the Trojan and removed it, but as I say messed up my connection.

My experience also of Comodo is that when people are praising their products they get instant replies from the top guys, but when a serious problem arises, they all stay quiet. I have had no real answer to why this happens on my machine. They just say untick the box that says clean up Winsock.

My question is,"If BoClean is going to cause problems, why is that box ticked by default?" Needless to say I got no answer!!

[CJsDad]

I've seen more issues with people using BOC on the Comodo board in the past few weeks as compared to what I've seen in the 2 years that I've been using the program.

[Rasheed187]

Well, I would like to have some answers, I still don´t get it, is it only a memory scanner, so if you are already infected it will alert you? Or is it able to identify malware on execution?

[Trooper]

Geez, after reading some of the posts here and on the Comodo forums, BOClean is not giving me a warm fuzzy feeling.

I just installed their version last night on my main PC. I wonder if I should switch back to the older one? :-\

[CJsDad]

I still have the older version running on another PC and to be truthful about it I like the older version better.
I guess its going to come down to the user, some people don't experience any problems using BOC but on the other hand as I mentioned previously I'm seeing more problems with BOC from other users now that it is with Comodo than all the years previously when it was run under nsclean and everything was handled by Kevin and Nancy.

[trjam]

It aint the old. That is the best way to say it.:'(

[Paranoid2000]

-{ Quote: "...I'm seeing more problems with BOC from other users now that it is with Comodo than all the years previously when it was run under nsclean and everything was handled by Kevin and Nancy." }-This really should be expected since (a) BOClean is now free so is being trialled by more users and (b) an official forum now exists for users to provide feedback, good and bad.

The "Automatic reset/cleanup" options can be a problem in some cases (e.g. users with a Hosts file blocking known spy/adware URLs, manually configured network options like OpenDNS or other security software using LSP filters) so disabling such options (see BOClean Configuration (http://nsclean.com/supboc.html#bocconfig)) may be a prudent step for those concerned about possible conflicts.

[Mele20]

Hmpf. BoClean had an official forum before being sold.

I too see way, way too many problems being posted at Comodo. But the real problem I see is that many of the users with problems, many are not new to BoClean either, don't get any help or get vague attempts from other users but no official help.

Kevin has not posted at Comodo forums since April 23 and has only logged in three times since then the last time being May 10.

[CJsDad]

-{ Quote: "This really should be expected since (a) BOClean is now free so is being trialled by more users and (b) an official forum now exists for users to provide feedback, good and bad.

The "Automatic reset/cleanup" options can be a problem in some cases (e.g. users with a Hosts file blocking known spy/adware URLs, manually configured network options like OpenDNS or other security software using LSP filters) so disabling such options (see BOClean Configuration (http://nsclean.com/supboc.html#bocconfig)) may be a prudent step for those concerned about possible conflicts." }-

I've mentioned that before, not here but in another thread about the possibility of seeing alot of issues is due to the fact that BOC is now free which means more user/more problems.
However, I also have to take into account what if that isnt the case, what if the new BOC actually is more troublesome than the older version, new doesn't always mean better.
You remember the thread on Comodo and another security forum "Shhhh don't tell anyone", that was for the final release of BOC, this was done by Melih.
Kevin said he was working on getting the final release of the new version out and needed a little more time on the program.
If BOC needed more work it should have been done instead of releasing it because everyone was crying for the new "free" version.

[Caratacus]

I put the paid Boclean on my machine some time ago. I began experiencing frequent lockups on a computer that had never previously locked. This went on for a couple of weeks, then I asked for and received a refund. Last week I put the Comodo version on to see if things had changed. Within an hour the machine had locked up again, and then again with in a few hours. I took it off. It doesn't like my computer. It's a shame because I know it has a good reputation, and now it's free. I'd like to use it.

[mowergun]

-{ Quote: "


Kevin has not posted at Comodo forums since April 23 and has only logged in three times since then the last time being May 10." }-
I noticed the same thing. I have been wondering if Kevin and Melih may have had a falling out.

I also noticed that certain questions are totally ignored by the people at Comodo. Questions such as:

Will there ever be a Comodo Boclean that will install on a Win9x system?
How long will Boclean 4.22 be able to update?
Why is the Comodo Boclean 4.23 installer file size twice as large as the Boclean 4.22 installer file size?
Does the Comodo Boclean 4.23 installer install software other than Boclean?

[ccsito]

-{ Quote: "
Will there ever be a Comodo Boclean that will install on a Win9x system?
" }-

Based on recent software update trends, this is unlikely. A lot of software vendors are abandoning Windows 9x support for Vista compatibility instead which is expected since Microsoft officially ended support for W98 last year.

[pepim]

-{ Quote: "I noticed the same thing. I have been wondering if Kevin and Melih may have had a falling out.

I also noticed that certain questions are totally ignored by the people at Comodo. Questions such as:

Will there ever be a Comodo Boclean that will install on a Win9x system?
How long will Boclean 4.22 be able to update?
Why is the Comodo Boclean 4.23 installer file size twice as large as the Boclean 4.22 installer file size?
Does the Comodo Boclean 4.23 installer install software other than Boclean?" }-


Just thinking, should I keep Boclean 4.22 (purchased BOCLean a little while ago)? Or should I replace it by Comodo Boclean 4.23?

[Perman]

Hi, folks: When a corporation having a CEO-short sleeved, hand on style, tech staff will leave it in droves. I guess Comodo is no exception. Just look at their own web site re BoClean, posters are getting more discontent, far apart from the days when Kenvin was de facto in charge. This post-kevin era will certainly create more huddles for the new owner. He wants to be an expert of everything overnite, but he can not be at everywhere in any minute. Money certainly can buy most things, but there are few, perhaps more than he realizes that his money can not obtain. If Kevin indeed severed his association w/ comodo, then the lady from Hawaii, Mele20 was right on the mooney when acquisiton took place. Perhaps she knows something we all have missed or have been misinformed. Here goes, another tea-time material for myself. Read it , laugh at it and send it to shreder. Have a nice one.

[CJsDad]

Kevin is posting over at Comodo, seems like hes been busy and explained why he hasnt been around.

[mowergun]

I see that Kevin posted at the Comodo Boclean forum. Apparently he's very busy.

There still is no response from anyone at Comodo regarding questions about 9x. Kevin earlier said that the code for Boclean 4.23 that he turned over to the folks at Comodo was compatable with Win95, Win98, ME, and Xp, but that the wrapper (as he called it) that was put on the program by the folks at Comodo prevents it from installing on Win9x.

This and my other questions were, and are ignored. I think these are honest questions. I am a long term BOClean user and I have bought and paid for two licenses. My feeling as a paying customer is that I should at least get an honest answer to an honest question, even if the answer is not what I want to hear.

Oh well, at least the folks at SpyCop are still honoring their commitments to long time paid customers.

[Mele20]

-{ Quote: "Hi, folks: When a corporation having a CEO-short sleeved, hand on style, tech staff will leave it in droves. I guess Comodo is no exception. Just look at their own web site re BoClean, posters are getting more discontent, far apart from the days when Kenvin was de facto in charge. This post-kevin era will certainly create more huddles for the new owner. He wants to be an expert of everything overnite, but he can not be at everywhere in any minute. Money certainly can buy most things, but there are few, perhaps more than he realizes that his money can not obtain. If Kevin indeed severed his association w/ comodo, then the lady from Hawaii, Mele20 was right on the mooney when acquisiton took place. Perhaps she knows something we all have missed or have been misinformed. Here goes, another tea-time material for myself. Read it , laugh at it and send it to shreder. Have a nice one." }-


My comments were based on my intense gut feeling after my interaction with Melih and some history about Melih from a trusted, very respected source that I cannot reveal that strongly confirmed what my intuition was telling me.

But Kevin has posted ...one post...an interesting post. Rather revealing though that it took a threat from the OP that he was about to post all over the internet that Comodo was dissing it's long term BoClean users (he's had it four years) for Kevin to find the time to post. I don't doubt Kevin is very busy, but in the past that never stopped him from posting especially when a long term user had a question and in this case the question went unanswered for over one month!

Kevin sounded upbeat and excited to be working on version 5. I can't shake my gut feeling though and when I have this strong of a feeling I am almost never wrong. Plus, I keep seeing in my mind's eye what I can't reveal and the two together make me still think this marriage will not last long unless Melih gets out of Kevin's hair and lets him run free and I doubt Melih can or will do that.

[FanJ]

Kevin has posted at the Comodo forum:

"New CBO 4.24 will be out soon"
http://forums.comodo.com/index.php/topic,8915.0.html

I quote only the first part:

-{ Quote: "
A new BOClean 4.24 version is nearing completion. We *hope* to have it done by the end of next week, but lessons have been learned from the premature release of 4.23 and thus I'm not making any promises at this time. My reasons for posting this however are to explain what happened with 4.23 as well as to solicit some assistance in the coming days from those who have had problems with 4.23 so we can make sure that any of those problems which arose from our code will be fixed and those that arose as a result in other vendors' software can be identified and worked around.
" }-

Please read further in that thread.
Kevin explains several things there.

[Mele20]

That sounds very encouraging!

I hope, as I have stated several times before, that this is one of the rare times when I have a strong gut feeling about something that I am wrong. It certainly looks that may be the case here. Perhaps, all the problems with the premature release of 4.23 was a good learning experience for Melih.

[Perman]

Hi, folks: Customers(including most consumers) are very sensitive to their rights. Therefore any vendor should(let us say, ought to) maintain an reasonalbly fair PR work. Any action/reaction after lengthy inaction/nonreaction is not always remedial to a situation as such. Often, that straw could likely be the LAST one to break camel's back. Hope Comodo can learn this lesson sooner enough. Have a nice thinking, a nice day. BTW, nice to hear Kevin is active, losing a brain like Kevin will be a big blow to comodo CEO's face. IMO.

[CJsDad]

People demanding their free version caused alot of pressure to get version 4.23 released, which was released prematurely, unbelieveable, just pathetic, what money were these people losing out on that demanded their "free" product?
Like I posted earlier in this thread if BOClean needed more work they should have waited instead of releasing it.
Also since some people got defensive when I mentioned using the older version and that it was better than the new one it's funny how Kevin encourages people who have had BOClean to stay with version 4.22 until version 4.24 comes out.

[pugmug]

-{ Quote: "My comments were based on my intense gut feeling after my interaction with Melih and some history about Melih from a trusted, very respected source that I cannot reveal that strongly confirmed what my intuition was telling me.

But Kevin has posted ...one post...an interesting post. Rather revealing though that it took a threat from the OP that he was about to post all over the internet that Comodo was dissing it's long term BoClean users (he's had it four years) for Kevin to find the time to post. I don't doubt Kevin is very busy, but in the past that never stopped him from posting especially when a long term user had a question and in this case the question went unanswered for over one month!

Kevin sounded upbeat and excited to be working on version 5. I can't shake my gut feeling though and when I have this strong of a feeling I am almost never wrong. Plus, I keep seeing in my mind's eye what I can't reveal and the two together make me still think this marriage will not last long unless Melih gets out of Kevin's hair and lets him run free and I doubt Melih can or will do that." }-
It was not a threat just a fact.I feel it is only one of many security computer programs out there and wanted an answer to my question.Sometime you have to get a bit loud to be heard and here is my thread if you care to read it. http://forums.comodo.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=6555f5f23054e596345ed44d62ca3313&topic=7905.0

[CJsDad]

pugmug-
At least you finally got an answer from Kevin himself but something in his reply to you was an eye opener.
The very last sentence in his reply.
I'm wondering how the support of BOC will be in the future?
Thats one thing about BOC that was really great with Kevin and Nancy.

[mowergun]

I just read Kevin's latest posts at the Comodo Boclean forum and he has answered my questions and more. I feel much better. I am sorry if my frustration got out of hand and made me sound snippy or snotty. Kevin earned my trust a long time ago an just knowing he is on the job makes a world of difference.

[Trooper]

Glad to see Kevin is back and posting. Some good news in his post too. I can't wait to check out version 4.24.

[mercurie]

Thanks for the link to the info. FanJ. Yes it was good to see Kevin speaking so frank and to the point as he always does. :thumb:

I await the 4.24. ;)

A proud user of 4.22. :)

[pvsurfer]

I've been testing BOClean along with Comodo AVS and Comodo FW for the past week and (so far) I really like the 'Comodo trio'. The only thing is that the BOClean uninstaller is broken, so if and when I decide to remove it, I'll have to do a Force Uninstall (or use Rollback Rx to restore an earlier snapshot). :-\

[TopperID]

Delete the uninstaller and then reinstall the entire program over itself. With a bit of luck that will replace the faulty uninstaller with a fresh copy that works.

[pvsurfer]

-{ Quote: "Delete the uninstaller and then reinstall the entire program over itself. With a bit of luck that will replace the faulty uninstaller with a fresh copy that works." }-
Cute trick Topper, I'll try that... Thanks for the tip! ~pv

[FanJ]

-{ Quote: "Thanks for the link to the info. FanJ.
" }-

My pleasure dear old friend.

[KDNeese]

I guess what I don't really understand is what changes were needed for the re-release of BoClean other than putting the Comodo logo on it? Perhaps there are some patents or intellectual property issues that come into play that I am not aware of. At the same time, hasn't BoClean always been one of the top performers as far as AS-AT apps? Since that seems to be the case, I don't think the premature release was a good move, simply because the bugs in the program are only helping to confirm statements made by those who kept saying Comodo would take a good product and screw it up. Personally, I have been using 4.23 since the day it came out and have had no problems with it [crosses fingers, knocks on wood]. But I haven't gotten any malware for it to clean, nor have I tried to uninstall it, so it hasn't had to be anything but site there and update once a day. Since BoClean has always performed well, I just don't understand what had to be done to it in order to be re-released by Comodo. I do have confidence that the bugs will eventually be fixed, but I think it's the question of 'when' that many of us are concerned with.

[john2g]

-{ Quote: "I guess what I don't really understand is what changes were needed for the re-release of BoClean other than putting the Comodo logo on it? " }-

A different installer was used (Comodo).

[Paranoid2000]

-{ Quote: "I guess what I don't really understand is what changes were needed for the re-release of BoClean other than putting the Comodo logo on it?" }-Vista compatibility...

[EASTER.2010]

-{ Quote: "Vista compatibility..." }-

Like plenty of others i don't know exactly what changes in coding have to be integrated to be Vista compatible while at the same time maintaining stability & effectiveness for XP too, and frankly i don't want to know given Vista is not all that was expected from it anyway, but BoClean IS NOT the only program suffering instability issues, or issues in general because of Vista.

It's just that some other security related programs are fairing better/quicker to adopting over to Vista/XP, but it's definitely taking more time to sort thru all that mess thanks to good ole $M.