Lightest security suite.

Ah, i forgot. When you run Comodo, the most of CPU load of the firewall part, will appear under "System" in task manager. Some firewalls do that, Comodo is one of them. So while you won't see Comodo itself consuming CPU, system will. It's easy to verify. See system CPU on idle. Start a download at your full speed. System will go up. Other firewalls instead , take the CPU usage on their own processes, leaving system alone.

 

Once you get used to running without an AV, any suite will seem heavy- especially on a computer as old as mine.

 

True. Windows explorer simply feels snappier. Windows open quicker...

 

So what would be your recommendation for someone with SSD and 16 GB of RAM?

I'm currently using Comodo because their free version has everything; AV, HIPS, FW and seems light in terms of its effect on boot times and program launch times. I was using Avast Free with various Windows Firewall controllers/notifiers, but they clashed so I wanted everything from one company to avoid conflicts and Comodo seemed like the only free choice.

 

I don't know... I haven't seen how other firewalls behave in that. I just noticed that Comodo uses hard disk access because i use it... I guess Win7 firewall would be a start to see how it behaves. There are various "controllers" for Win7 firewall, some of which free. You can also try other firewalls.

When i will buy an SSD, then i will be forced to find the answer too.

It's not that Comodo is making insane use of HDD. It reads quite a bit. Writing i believe depends on whether you create new rules often. When you do, then it writes quite a bit, then settles down again.

Right now i use Comodo with D+ because i don't use AV, so having a HIPS is the best thing to feel safe. Besides, many AVs, access the HDD more than Comodo, so the slowdown from Comodo isn't that bad all considering...

 

That's an easy one, ESET or Webroot

And no I don't measure lightness based on the RAM usage, more likely I/O and CPU, and of course how it actually feels.

 

Ive never experienced slowdowns with comodo ever and it runs very lightly on my machine.

 

pajenn;

If you are looking for an integrated freeware security suite, your choices are (as far as I know) limited to Comodo, Zone Alarm, Fortinet, Agnitum (Outpost), and Roboscan.
Norman Labs also had one some time ago but I believe it's been discontinued. Besides, it was a very basic suite and I've never been impressed with Norman antivirus.

I vaguely remember something about a freeware suite from Panda, and Rising also had one but I know it was discontinued.

If there are others, I can't think of them at this time.

Good luck in your search.

 

By slowdown i don't mean that it hogs the PC or something. Simply, when i have the PC without anything and then i put Comodo, i do feel a tiny slowdown in opening explorer windows-folders. It's something subjective. I feel it with AVs too. It's natural. When something reads the HDD a lot, unless the HDD is very fast, there will be a small delay. But not all people see it. Some people were using very heavy AVs and couldn't feel the difference. Or they had velociraptors for HDDs.

For being also a HIPS, i think Comodo is great and the current 5.10 is finally mature enough to use without worrying about incompatibilities, BSODs, etc.

 

Av-Comparatives tests this sort of thing. Performance tests for system impact.

 

I have found that on some computers (not all), at times ESET products do cause noticeable slowdowns. A good example is when using driver update software. The scan for new drivers runs much faster with real time protection disabled. I even installed the old v2.7 of NOD32 a few months back, because on old threads here I was suggested that I was one of the lightest versions. However I did cause a big hit in performance on my laptop. I was running it on Windows 7 which it doesn't support - but I highly doubt this would be the cause.

 

Webroot SecureAnywhere is the lightest I've ever used.

 

I tested CIS on my old P4 1gb ram desktop from 2004 and, all AV's and suites including CIS noticeably slowed explorer responsiveness, boot time, and performance when opening more than 5-6 tabs in firefox would take a hit too.

Task Manager would show CIS using only 25mb ram, however my overall system after boot would use about 255mb ram, whereas before installing CIS is used 120. So obviously CIS was using more ram than task manager was showing. Its a great product, probably the best free security program out there, and it shouldn't bother you if you have a modern machine, but I cannot call it light.

 

You took the words out of my mouth. light applications are no longer those that access minimal RAM but rather those that don't trash your CPU. I can get 8GB very cheap these days, why should I care if a program uses 0.2 or 0.4GB of ram

On the other hand you got Skype constantly eating 60% of my CPU and trashing my computer...

 

Webroot product suites are the lightest of course.

 

Roboscan

 

Exactly this. I see screenshots all of the time that show how much "RAM" is used. Where is the screenshot that shows they achieved that by hiding it all by paging it?

 

@Fuzzfuss and @xxJackxx
Just couldn't agree more.

 

So since we all agree that CPU and I/O disk access is what defines a program light then what is the lightest security suit out there?

 

This is really "all" that matters in the end. The numbers are often misleading, even skewed as another person mentioned (resources showing up in "System" instead).

I would only use a suite that had a strong FW/HIPS components, with AV coming as the last consideration. Many choose the other way around, and take their favorite AV's then buy the suite. CIS is the only suite I'd use.

 

Built in or none, hence zero.
Mrk