Vista - Antivirus program with low RAM and CPU usage?

does avast use very much ram/CPU? i'd like an antivirus program that does not sacrifice performance (or very little)

When Norton put cpu/ram usage meters in their program and brags about it too you know "resources" is not an issue

I dont think you find many AV programs which slow down computer in any way you notice. Not resident parts at least. Some are heavier than others - like Kaspersky. You should not care about saving 1-2% cpu usage when you have 100% available. Care more about how stable it runs and how much you can tweak to own liking. Avast lets you play with settings, disable modules you dont use - or see the point in having running. Also exclude folders, drives even. You can decide system is 100% clean and disable scanning for open programs, only new programs/create files. See if you notice a difference, my guess is nope.

Avast on-demand scanner seem fairly slow to me but be careful about the logic between speed and quality. Like with defraggers, the fastest can be the worst even if some enjoy the "speed". If for example Avast support 7-zip files (it does) and you have 10000 of those - how bad would it not look compared to other AV which skip all 7z files?

Much easier if you just tried it out. If you like it you can definitely also live with resource usage. If you dont like it will be uninstalled even if light as a feather. I think they are working on a new 5 version, assuming they dont screw up it is not likely to become slower than 4.x.

NOD32 has the fastest/most acurate scanning, with the smallest resource footprint.
Free ESET Online Antivirus Scanner

For futher info on antivirus products (how well they perform)
Vista SP1 Antivirus Performance

Well he was asking about Avasts cpu/ram usage. May be find AV-comparatives Performance report from october 08 which is somewhat relevant - and showing another picture, 9 AV products all got highest ranking, including Avast and ESET

Also note until that report they would not do such a test and still regard it as an introduction and mainly focusing on real time scanner. Some did not get Advanced+ because of 1 test they say is "highly controversial". They are good at testing because they make an effort and dont hide conditions, like so many others who dont write long pdf files, but this one is close to not so important.

NOD32 was the only product to get Advanced+ "3 star" certification in the November 2008 testing from AV-Comparatives. it also has consistently recieved VB100 awards from Virus Bulletin across all O/S platforms . Avast got low certification (Standard "1 star"), and failed to recieve the VB100 in recent Vista x64 and Vista SP1 testing (April and December 2008) for failling to detect malware, and for detecting legitimate programs as "malware" which causes system/program instability (ultimately this can result in Windows reinstallation due to file corruption).

May be you should make a thread about your favorite AV then? Dont see what your posts has to with question asked.

There is already a thread regarding the performance of antivirus products in system security, and the question here is "What program has low CPU and RAM usage?" (i.e., system resource footprint), and that is NOD32.
An antivirus product that has a small footprint, but inferior protection is a useless program IMO as it results in low resource usage UNTIL you are infected by malware and viruses which then can put an excessive load on the system that can cause corruption and loss of system functionality (thus defeating the purpose of a small footprint AV program in the first place). One has to look at the bigger picture here: Do you want a AV program that performs and protects, or one that doesnt?

No it is not, he mentions Avast in particular and not what is "best" - as if that would be interesting. There is much reason to think he also would prefer free AV btw. I think you should read their pdf-files instead of just refering to stars and gold medals. How come higher detection rate than ESET give lower ranking for example? Does it matter, why and why not? How come Avast can go from + to no + - and will that change in 2-3 months? It is a bit more complicated than one-liniers. AV-Comparatives do their stuff to prevent that way of looking at this. When they pick and rank they evaluate more than a few parameters.

If you look at their questionable performance report you will see only 2 regular AV programs can be said to fall out of the frame.

Avira was chosen as AV of the year by AV-Comparatives so may be time to change current favorite?

"i'd like an antivirus program that does not sacrifice performance (or very little)"
my fault I thought the thread starter was asking about small footprints AND performance

BTW, It s not just AV-Comparatives, but also Virus Bulletin. I evaluate according to "Certified" Lab test results of real world malware detection rates, and find no value in "editor's Picks" (as most Editor's picks are a result of a Vendor paying them to promote their AV).Avira is ok (other than the fact that it detects legitimate programs as malware excessively which results in system/program instability and corruption)

Rite now believe it or not Norton AV 2009 ( Either the normal one or gaming edition one, both rock)