Serious issue under Windows 7 x64 RTM

[Dazeon]

As a long time user of SpywareBlaster I have never had any problems with the program, and it has always served me perfectly.

As an official Windows 7 beta tester I have used the latest version of SpywareBlaster throughout the Windows 7 beta under x86.

I recently installed the RTM version of Windows 7 opting to go with the x64 version. Everything was running extremely well until I installed SpywareBlaster.

Having installed SpywareBlaster I right-clicked on the program in the Start Menu and chose 'Run as Administrator', as I have always done, in order to apply any updates and configure my options.

As soon as I did this the Start Menu froze and my CPU usage jumped and remained stuck at 100%. Attempting to click on the Start Menu again, as the program had failed to load, Windows Explorer crashed and I was unable to do anything.

I restarted the computer and tried again, once again, exactly the same thing happened. Performing another restart I uninstalled SpywareBlaster and after yet another restart everything was fine once again. The system was extremely responsive and after several days running 24/7 I am yet to see any further issues.

I am running Microsoft Security Essentials (beta), plus Spybot - Search & Destroy if that helps, previously I was running Avast Home Edition plus SpywareBlaster and Spybot - Search & Destroy. This combination has served me well for over a year now.

I really don't want to have to give up on Spyware Blaster as I have a lot of faith in the product. :'(

Can anyone advise?

I am running a Pentium D 820 on a Gigabyte GA-P35-DQ6 with 3GB RAM and a 300GB RAID 0, with an ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro and a Creative XiFi Xtreme Music PCI.

[javacool]

Hi,

The Windows 7 RTM build will be publically released by Microsoft for ISV testing in about a week. At that point, I'll be able to run through a test with the final RTM build.

Our testing on the Windows 7 x64 RC build did not exhibit any issues.

Given its "beta" nature, have you tried temporarily disabling Microsoft Security Essentials to see if it might be a contributing factor? Could you also try adding "spywareblaster.exe" to its exclusion/ignore list, so it won't try and scan it "on access"?

Best regards,

-Javacool

[javacool]

Hi,

An update:

I've run SpywareBlaster 4.2 through the whole battery of tests on Windows 7 RTM (64-bit), and I have not been able to reproduce any issues. :)

So I strongly suspect what you're seeing is the result of some other software you have installed - and given the information you've provided, the most likely candidate is probably the (beta) version of Microsoft Security Essentials. Please see my suggestions in the post above regarding temporarily disabling MSE or adding an exclusion for spywareblaster.exe, and let me know if that helps resolve the issue you're seeing.

Best regards,

-Javacool

[Dazeon]

Thank you very much for your assistance.

I have reinstalled SpywareBlaster and added the .exe under Microsoft Security Essentials exclusion list. I am pleased to say that this appears to have worked, so far so good.

I have reported the issue to Microsoft via the official Connect channel and I await any feedback.

However, I am still seeing pretty high CPU usage in the region of 50-60%, I am going to perform a clean install of Windows 7 in the next few days and I will see how that goes, whilst I wait for a new build of Microsoft Security Essentials.

Thanks again.