Online Armor 3.5.0.32 Release

The BAK files are protected by OA. They are autobackup files of OA systems state and should not be deleted.

 

Online Armor boot-up issue.

Respectfully addressed to Mike Nash.
I posted the following at the OA Forums yesterday.

http://support.tallemu.com/vbforum/showthread.php?t=9603

Adrian locked the thread without offering advice or help and simply referred me to a seven page, five week old thread on this very issue that remains unresolved for many users. This thread should have been made a sticky!

http://support.tallemu.com/vbforum/showthread.php?t=9077

I've installed and un-installed OA Premium five or six times since v3.5 came out, up to and including the current .32. I've scoured the OA forums for weeks and tried every suggestion I've been able to find to improve my computer's boot speed. Both warm and cold boots take between five and six minutes 'til I have a usable desktop. I've just uninstalled .32 (again!) and gone back to the Windows firewall which cuts boot time to about 60 seconds. Running XP Pro, SP3, Avast AV. Have already cut autoruns to the bare minimum. Any suggestions on how to improve boot speed would be most welcome. I'd hate to give up on this program.

Dell Optiplex GX270 1.5GB RAM
Intel Pentium4 CPU 2.60GHz
XP Pro SP3 fully patched
Maxtor 80GB HDD
FW: Online Armor w IP blocklist
AV: avast! Home Edition
Browser: Fx 3.51
SAS Free (on demand)
MBAM (on demand)
WinPatrol Plus 16.0.2009.6:16.0.2009.6
Spywareblaster
hpHosts & MVPS Hosts File (via HostsMan)

 

Re: Online Armor boot-up issue.

I think the only way to go is to find out what other realtime security OA has compatability problem with in your case. This should not bee too difficult, just disable the programs one by one.

 

Halvah, Are you importing rules/settings to the new install? One person seems to have fixed their problem by starting from scratch with the rules. http://support.tallemu.com/vbforum/showpost.php?p=98107&postcount=63

 

You bring up a good point innerpeace.
When I upgraded to OA++ a week ago I started from scratch.

No problems or slowdowns here.

 

I'm afraid Dave - i cant do that - means: they are not protected - i just deleted them this minute.
(BAK files in program folder)

 

I am the guilty party! I emailed OA Support my settings files so I hope a solution comes from it.

Halvah - Did you check your firewall/port rules for explorer.exe? Also was stated that Chrome as the default browser can cause issues? If you already did, sorry for repeating.

 

Re: Online Armor boot-up issue.

Another reason for a slow boot can be "Block all the traffic during system boot" option enabled. Some systems feel very poor when network is blocked on boot.

 

I have a pause of about 13-15 seconds from the welcome screen to the desktop when using OA. Not sure if this is normal or not.

 

I'm getting that also but don't find it a big deal.
Don't reboot much anyway.
My computer runs around the clock.

 

Installed .32 from scratch, everything including all autoruns are trusted. Only security programs running in real time are Avast Home and WinPatrol Plus. "Block all the traffic during system boot" option is not ticked. I'm at a total loss. The last version of OA that I used was 3.0.0.09 free and I had no problems whatsoever--they began with v3.5. If you check the OA Forums thread I referenced in my original post (five weeks old, seven pages long and still unresolved) you can see that there are many others with similar issues. I believe that the OA team should own the problem and address it fully before they concentrate on Win7. Just my POV. Thanks to all who offered advice.

 

Hi

Any problems that we can reproduce and fix, we do so as quickly as we can. If you are happy to help us, we will definitely review any logs.

A lot of the time it comes down to some conflict or other

As for Win7 - we're damned if we do, and we're damned it seems if we don't. People have been asking me since the first builds were available for Win7 support and complaining that the lack of such support is terrible, and we're slow, and that they don't want to see a repeat of the Vista release delay (which was basically me not caring much about Vista - even now, only 23% of our visitors use Vista so by rights we should still focus on XP).

We've also working on x64 - by frequent request - because apparently, we're bad, bad people for not doing so.

In fact, we're doing precisely what you suggest - sort of The focus at the moment for me is on bugfixing, and the only thing we're working on is Win7 (done, for all intents and purposes) and x64.

Aside from this we *might* enhance a couple of small features in some small ways, but nothing significant is currently in the pipeline.


Mike

 

Halvah, You might try what alex_s suggested.

I would start by disabling Winpatrol as it has some similar protections as OA.

I would also try getting rid of your HOSTS file/s (backup if needed), disable spywareblasters protection and delete OA's IP blocklist. You can disable one at a time and see if it helps your reboots.

Also, if you uninstall OA again, reboot it once more before trying to install it again which may help delete the drivers.

P.S. Hang it there! I know conflicts or bugs can be frustrating but the only way squash them is by trying.

 

Halvah,

I have a question on how you are installing OA? When running setup for .32, are you choosing to "trust all programs" or to manually set up your programs list?

The reason I bring this is up that manually setting my program list up was the only way i had a successful .32 install. i uninstalled .14 and clean installed .32 this way.

If you want the .14 install exe - pm me - i still have it and can get it to you.

Thanks,
Tom

 

Tom - do we have info on this? I seem to recall a thread over at our forums and maybe some logs, but just wanted to check.

 

This has happened to me too.
Just use the program for a week or so and do a reboot once in a while.
Your boot time will be a few seconds faster, but it will not be the same as without OA.

 

I have a delay of 4 - 5 secs with OA (Premium or ++) and the same without it. And I have a 6 year old machine running XP Home.
The only Security software that has caused longer than that is MSE and that is not on my machine any more.

 

The first time I installed it I manually set up the program list. I was advised by either Adrian or CatPrincess (can't remember which) of the OA Forums to always install on a "trust all programs" basis, so that's what I've been doing. I'd certainly try the .14 version again, some commentators at the OA Forums suggested that they didn't have the problem with .14. I'll probably devote some time to a re-install on Sunday. I use my computer for work all day and I'm just running the Windows firewall at the moment.

 

Yeah, strange indeed. I'm using OA++ on my main machine at present and it's by far the fastest boot up I've ever had with any security software (too embarrassing to say how many I've tried but it's lots!)

I did have OA related boot time delays in the past but I for one am not experiencing it now. Are those with the delay maybe using the 'block all the traffic during system boot' firewall option?

Cheers

 

I found it strange that on my XP system with OA free installed the Windows load screen with the bar moving from the left to the right was displayed shorter than without OA. But the welcome screen would stay for a full minute or so.

 

No Vista 32 SP2.

Out of interest I tried OA free on an older XP machine I have for testing. It's up to date but has no security software installed. It holds the welcome screen for around 7 seconds. Before OA install this was around 4 seconds.

Seeing your previous comments on boot times I know you wont agree but my view is that an extra 3 seconds on boot is nothing compared to the protection offered, the quality support you get and commitment to product development Tall Emu provides.

I guess that everyone's set up is different either in machine build, installed software or settings so the variables to be considered are too great to compare one users timings with another. The best thing to do is try it for yourself. If it works for you and your happy with performance stick with it. If not move on as you did, after all there is plenty of choice!

Cheers

 

+1 Here OA++ has minimal impact on boot , for this reasons I use it on on a super old laptop.

Cheers,
Fax

 

Once the desktop finally does come on, there's not much more delay. But I haven't noticed much decrease in wait times after rebooting.

 

Totally agree chris.
3 seconds is nothing.
I don't understand the fuss over this.