Bitdefender Total Security - high RAM usage and always asking for restart

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JChris

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Oct 1, 2017
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I've got a great deal for Bitdefender Family Pack for 3 years, which basically is Bitdefender Total Security with unlimited activations for 3 years, where I paid $40. Prior to using Bitdefender on my main rig, I used Kaspersky Internet Security, it was light and without any hassles. After changing to Bitdefender I was surprised and pissed to see this:

GW1swXq.png


Isimkho.png


A bunch of small processes (not a big issue, as a bunch of them are very low on resources, but I find this ugly) and the engine process which is eating more than 250MB on IDLE, there are times that it can go as high as 450MB on IDLE. What's worse is that some of those are processes are BS I don't even use, like the Wallet Agent. On the other hand, KIS had only 2 processes, one for the GUI and another for the engine.

Another big issue, whenever there's an update, the client asks for a restart, like so:

knAiv3r.png


KIS would always update its DAT files and never asks for restart, this is just ridiculous!

I'll see if I can get a refund and go back to Kaspersky or go with emisoft, because Bitdefender is dead to me, I'd rather use the "refreshed" Windows Defender from W10 than this trash. My advice to you guys: AVOID BITDEFENDER AT ALL COSTS!!!
 

mlnevese

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The only updates from Bitdefender that require a restart are software updates. If your copy is requesting constant reboots there is something wrong with your installation. Go to uninstall programs select uninstall Bitdefender and then do a repair install... I've been testing Bitdefender in one of my machines for about 30 days and it required me to reboot twice, after the first update, totally expected many security programs require a reboot after first update, and some 10 days ago when a new version was released.
 
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JChris

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Oct 1, 2017
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The only updates from Bitdefender that require a restart are software updates. If your copy is requesting constant reboots there is something wrong with your installation. Go to uninstall programs select uninstall Bitdefender and then do a repair install... I've been testing Bitdefender in one of my machines for about 30 days and it required me to reboot twice, after the first update, totally expected many security programs require a reboot after first update, and some 10 days ago when a new version was released.

During the first install/update it can reboot how many times it wants, I don't care, but what I showed here is after the installation process. The software was in the last update already, and out of nowhere I saw that request on the GUI.

What about resource consumption, how is your Bitdefender doing?

I reinstalled KIS, just to be sure I wasn't crazy, and I wasn't, this is KIS usage on IDLE:

SZkvsvC.png


XkLyYa8.png


Just two processes, way less RAM intensive...

PS: After a long time of idling this is the lowest I ever got with Bitdefender:

fDXrQkU.png


Unbelievable, I'm uninstalling it right now, and firing the 30-day money back guarantee...
 
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JChris

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Oct 1, 2017
24

How long does it stays like that, roughly 90MB usage counting all Bitdefender stuff? I installed the client on two machines, both have the bare minimum softwares needed for work, all up-to-date, and I never got anything near that.

Did you make any modification on your installation?
 

mlnevese

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As you can imagine at 0,2% CPU and a little over 90mb I can barely say it's there. It's as light or even lighter than Kaspersky on my machine.
 

mlnevese

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How long does it stays like that, roughly 90MB usage counting all Bitdefender stuff? I installed the client on two machines, both have the bare minimum softwares needed for work, all up-to-date, and I never got anything near that.

Did you make any modification on your installation?


Nope... just disabled the password vault as I use Stickypasswords. And it only goes above that during a scan... let me capture it...
 

JChris

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Oct 1, 2017
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CPU usage was never the issue, it varies quite a lot, but always was low, the issue was RAM.

I really don't know what is going on, if it used 90MB I'd sticky with it, but this is nothing near what I get and I tried 2 machines!

Are you using Bitdefender Total Security too?
 

mlnevese

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Any other realtime security software? It may be conflicting with something
 

JChris

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Oct 1, 2017
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Any other realtime security software? It may be conflicting with something

No, I removed KIS and when Bitdefender is installing it automatically disables Windows Defender and Firewall that were activated when I removed KIS (which also disables Defender and Firewall).
 

mlnevese

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No, I removed KIS and when Bitdefender is installing it automatically disables Windows Defender and Firewall that were activated when I removed KIS (which also disables Defender and Firewall).

It may be anything... a driver, for instance... but unless something is causing your computer to slow down I wouldn't worry about it.

The constant reboots are a problem though... try to download the latest version from Bitdefender Central and see if it solves the problem
 

JChris

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Oct 1, 2017
24
It may be anything... a driver, for instance... but unless something is causing your computer to slow down I wouldn't worry about it.

The constant reboots are a problem though... try to download the latest version from Bitdefender Central and see if it solves the problem

It's not automatically rebooting, but it's asking for reboot to "update". There's no way it's something else, the issue is with Bitdefender, I don't know if their software has any issue with drivers or any other software installed on my computer, but their support is quite slow and I don't wanna waste time troubleshooting for them. Before install, the computer was OK, no issues at all. I installed Bitdefender and noticed the issues. Removed it, and everything goes back to normal. It bothers me having the AV consuming that much on idle, it also bothers me all those processes. I'm very pick about what I have on my PC, and if it's not good enough I remove it.

The only software I still use that consumes way too much RAM without a good excuse is Chrome, but that may change with Firefox Quantum, rsrsrs.

Anyway, thank you for all your help and prints, really. (y)

Edit: another print from KIS, after some hours idle:

Capture.PNG


Look at that, beautiful!
 
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Aluno

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Aug 15, 2016
33
Hello

After the instalatin proces, run update and at the end run a full system scan and restart your copmuter. Try this and checkd
 

JChris

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Oct 1, 2017
24
Same problem, Bitdefender Security Service use huge ram. Any solution?

q0KvqK1.jpg

The solution: if you paid for it, get a refund and look for another AV. If it's the free version, uninstall an look for another AV.



This is misleading, while AVs need fast memory to operate, all AVs are aiming for less and less resources usage, let alone on idle. Bitdefender uses that much RAM on idle because it's a terrible, buggy AV who feels like an incomplete alpha/beta software. I used/tested Norton Enterprise, Kaspersky Internet Security, Palo Alto TRAPS, CrowdStrike Falcon, Windows Defender, Trend Micro etc and all of them were using less than 100MB on idle. There's no excuse for what Bitdefender is consuming.
 

Marcos Milton

Level 1
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Dec 28, 2017
16
I had the same issue. Even my games were running at half the usual FPS. Glad I tried it before buyng.
 

JChris

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Oct 1, 2017
24
I had the same issue. Even my games were running at half the usual FPS. Glad I tried it before buyng.


KIS uses about 50MB on my machine.

Exactly, KIS here varies between 30MB~80MB. Anything below 100MB on idle is OK for me. Bitdefender was hitting 200MB+ on idle, ridiculous. As you said, it's not just RAM, it's affecting the system as a whole, I got FPS hit too and even worse, I got milliseconds delays when changing the volume on the computer, when I clicked to volume up/down it would take a tiny more to change, but it was perceivable. As soon as I uninstalled this mess, it went back to normal, I even reinstalled again just to prove, and it went back to "delay-mode" again, so uninstalled for good and charged-back.

Now I'm with KIS again.
 
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