Installed BD Free on Windows 10 VM

[simmerskool]

Is it still light? That's good news, when I used it from 2016-2020 it was light, in old laptop with SSD, it makes me want to go back to using BD as the main AV, but with MD and Emsisoft, it's hard for me to change. With the tool of @Andy Ful the Hard_Configurator I think I settled in, what I wanted was a firewall, but I believe that windows is enough for me and I still have F-Secure license until 2027 that I'm not using. AVS options have a range for me to choose, but unfortunately we only install one at a time.

I had avoided BD for awhile as several years ago I installed BD on win8.1 (wife's) and I think it was older or mediocre hardware and BD was problematic on that pc. Now more time using the current vm with BD free and wow, I think it's the lightest I've seen! Also running Andy's SWH and Dan's WLC (stand-alone). Very pleasantly surprised by how good this setup is. Perhaps only "con" is NO safepay, or rather it's not enabled on free version, but not sure how important that is?? (I can always pay on Host running ESET) BD free is becoming my new fav.

 

[Trident]

I had avoided BD for awhile as several years ago I installed BD on win8.1 (wife's) and I think it was older or mediocre hardware and BD was problematic on that pc. Now more time using the current vm with BD free and wow, I think it's the lightest I've seen! Also running Andy's SWH and Dan's WLC (stand-alone). Very pleasantly surprised by how good this setup is. Perhaps only "con" is NO safepay, or rather it's not enabled on free version, but not sure how important that is?? (I can always pay on Host running ESET) BD free is becoming my new fav.

Just bear in mind some other good features such as the memory scanner, the script scanning and command line monitoring are disabled as well. Bitdefender will still provide good protection, but the paid products are better.

 

[Templarware]

Is it lighter than MD, Kaspersky Free and Avast Free?

 

[simmerskool]

Is it lighter than MD, Kaspersky Free and Avast Free?

IMO here, BD free is lighter than MD, much lighter than Kaspersky Standard, even lighter than F-Secure v19 (paid), my subjective perception. I cannot comment Kfree and Avast free as I haven't tried them, at least not yet.

 

[Trident]

IMO here, BD free is lighter than MD, much lighter than Kaspersky Standard, even lighter than F-Secure v19 (paid), my subjective perception. I cannot comment Kfree and Avast free as I haven't tried them, at least not yet.

I would say it is lighter than Avast. Avast is normally a high performer but I’ve observed a lot of continuous activity from the IDP (behavioural blocking) on using applications. I have not observed that from Bitdefender, so I would say on CPU usage it is lighter. Avast has a smaller and more elegant threat database and is a bit lighter on disk usage.

 

[simmerskool]

Avast has a smaller and more elegant threat database and is a bit lighter on disk usage.

what's a "more elegant threat database" mean, ie, have not seen or read that before in reference to threat database I was forced to use Avast few years ago on a work pc and just did not like it... not the same as saying it gave bad protection. On work pc it seemed heavy, IT used it because it was free and company was non-profit.

 

[Trident]

what's a "more elegant threat database" mean, ie, have not seen or read that before in reference to threat database I was forced to use Avast few years ago on a work pc and just did not like it... not the same as saying it gave bad protection. On work pc it seemed heavy, IT used it because it was free and company was non-profit.

The Bitdefender local database + AV engine modules are more than twice the size of Avast (~600 mb vs ~250).
They update frequently (auto update interval can be changed and I personally would change it to 12 hours on systems that are not mission-critical) and overall it is not light on disk.
It matters, because on every update the old database is left as a backup in case a revert is necessary, the new files are written in a new folder and all files from the old folder are copied. Again, about 600mb.
Avast with its small streaming updates, Evo-Gen signatures and smaller engine/database is more forgiving to the SSD but the IDP is very active on CPU.

The only reason why I don’t use Bitdefender is the massive database, as well as the lack of IPS equivalent.

 

[Jonny Quest]

RAM usage is very high, for PCs with 8GB considering how much a browser and Windows itself uses, I would not recommend installing Bitdefender. But CPU usage on a modern CPU such as 11th Gen Core i5 is very low. On idle, it rarely even reaches 1%. For other metrics I will have to look again, but on full scan, I believe it was about 40% and when opening apps it was <10. Someone who uses Bitdefender at the moment can chime in now with these metrics.

I'm not using the free version but a BD forum member who is, mentioned memory fluctuations anywhere from 350/300 (startup?) to 75/80 and that Avast free and Kaspersky Free were more stable and even. For me on my 8GB Surface 5 laptop using Total Security, it can be very high as well. It can start out at 425/375MB before calming down to around 135MB (edited) this is with Early Boot scan and Vulnerability scan disabled. The below is after 10 minutes from a restart. So as Trident mentioned, it is something to be considered.

 

[Trident]

I'm not using the free version but a BD forum member who is, mentioned memory fluctuations anywhere from 350/300 (startup?) to 75/80 and that Avast free and Kaspersky Free were more stable and even. For me on my 8GB Surface 5 laptop using Total Security, it can be very high as well. It can start out at 425/375MB before calming down to around 225MB This is with Early Boot scan and Vulnerability scan disabled. The below is after 10 minutes from a restart. So as Trident mentioned, it is something to be considered.


View attachment 273647

The total working set memory for Bitdefender on this screenshot that I calculated is 475.9 mb. Considering Chrome with few tabs and extensions is easily 1GB of RAM used, it is definitely something to be considered. Norton’s RAM usage reported in task manager is barely 20MB.
On systems with 16GB or more, it won’t matter.

 

[Jonny Quest]

The total working set memory for Bitdefender on this screenshot that I calculated is 475.9 mb. Considering Chrome with few tabs and extensions is easily 1GB of RAM used, it is definitely something to be considered. Norton’s RAM usage reported in task manager is barely 20MB.
On systems with 16GB or more, it won’t matter.

That's why I thought I would include the full screenshot of the BD Processes..I knew someone would appreciate it
Yep, and with 16GB of Ram, not even an issue

 

[simmerskool]

I'm not using the free version but a BD forum member who is, mentioned memory fluctuations anywhere from 350/300 (startup?) to 75/80 and that Avast free and Kaspersky Free were more stable and even. For me on my 8GB Surface 5 laptop using Total Security, it can be very high as well. It can start out at 425/375MB before calming down to around 135MB (edited) this is with Early Boot scan and Vulnerability scan disabled. The below is after 10 minutes from a restart. So as Trident mentioned, it is something to be considered.


View attachment 273647

on BD free in this win10_vm the bitdefender virus shield memory usage is 262 mb. various indicators report "very low"

 

[simmerskool]

That's why I thought I would include the full screenshot of the BD Processes..I knew someone would appreciate it
Yep, and with 16GB of Ram, not even an issue

+1

 

[legendcampos]

I've been using BD free for a while and it consumes around 300mb it's not relatively light, I feel a certain slowness especially when browsing, its web filter is quite robust sometimes even aggressive. On the other hand CPU usage is low around 5%

 

[ForgottenSeer 97327]

I have BD Free running on my wife's laptop (Windows 11) with Hard_Configurator. It is light. Nice thing about DB Free is that I can still use MD Exploit protection to add Code Integrity Guard and block child process creation for Office. The latter gives a problem with printing, but this can be evaded by saving as PDF and printing Word/Powerpoint/Excel sheets from PDF.

 

[NormanF]

The Bitdefender local database + AV engine modules are more than twice the size of Avast (~600 mb vs ~250).
They update frequently (auto update interval can be changed and I personally would change it to 12 hours on systems that are not mission-critical) and overall it is not light on disk.
It matters, because on every update the old database is left as a backup in case a revert is necessary, the new files are written in a new folder and all files from the old folder are copied. Again, about 600mb.
Avast with its small streaming updates, Evo-Gen signatures and smaller engine/database is more forgiving to the SSD but the IDP is very active on CPU.

The only reason why I don’t use Bitdefender is the massive database, as well as the lack of IPS equivalent.

They do have an IPS in their Business Security suite which can be enabled in the GravityZone Control Centre. Its about a $4 a month upgrade from the free version so that cost would also bring in the BD firewall as well as the AV. You're getting a lot more if you switch to the paid BD.

 

[SeriousHoax]

They do have an IPS in their Business Security suite which can be enabled in the GravityZone Control Centre. Its about a $4 a month upgrade from the free version so that cost would also bring in the BD firewall as well as the AV. You're getting a lot more if you switch to the paid BD.

BD Home paid version has "Network Threat Prevention" which is IDS I believe.
So the IPS you're talking about is another different feature in GravityZone?

Network Threat Prevention

The new cyber threat intelligence technologies included can analyze and identify suspicious network-level activities, and block sophisticated exploits, malware or botnet-related URLs, and brute force attacks

 

[likeastar20]

BD GZ settings

 

[Trident]

BD Home paid version has "Network Threat Prevention" which is IDS I believe.
So the IPS you're talking about is another different feature in GravityZone?

Network Threat Prevention is a very light IPS that I’ve never seen in action. I just browsed all the GravityZone products and IPS is not available in any of them.

 

[NormanF]

BD Home paid version has "Network Threat Prevention" which is IDS I believe.
So the IPS you're talking about is another different feature in GravityZone?

I think you can toggle it on in Policy under Network and this like is HIPS in Kaspersky. Its the marketing; the function is the same.

 

[Trident]

I think you can toggle it on in Policy under Network and this like is HIPS in Kaspersky. Its the marketing; the function is the same.

That’s IDS, not IPS. By IPS I meant network intrusion prevention. The one that you are mentioning is an extension of the behavioural blocking. The control for it was in home products years ago but then it was removed together with other controls seen in GravityZone now. It terminates applications according to a set policy that looks like violation of security. For example, Adobe reader is not supposed to drop executables here and there.

The only thing I see in GravityZone and not in home products is HyperDetect and the sandbox analyser. All in all, doesn’t seem worth the money.