Auslogics Blog

Part One

This day and age it’s absolutely crucial to have good antivirus software installed on your computer to protect your operating system and your personal data. Developers offer us dozens of solutions, all of which have extensive functionality and loads of features and options. Sounds good, doesn’t it? But there are a couple of drawbacks -  most antiviruses are pretty heavy on system resources when using default settings and not very easy to configure to fit your particular needs. As a result, a lot of people get so frustrated, that they either disable or uninstall their security software. Then they catch numerous infections and have to deal with the consequences.

Luckily, there is a better solution. Most antiviruses allow you to configure them to your liking. In this post I’m going to describe the best ways to configure and optimize Auslogics Antivirus, but you can use my advice to configure pretty much any antivirus software.

1. Choose Advanced User Interface Mode

First of all you’ll need to switch the user interface to Advanced mode. That way all customization options will become available. To choose Advanced mode:

1. Find Auslogics Antivirus tray icon (red triangle) and right-click on it
2. Go to Basic Setting
3. Find and select Advanced Mode
4. 
5. Click Apply and click OK

2. Disable Unneeded Components

Like a lot of other programs, Auslogics Antivirus protects your computer from nearly all possible security threats.  It monitors all system components and all ways malware uses to get installed onto your PC. This boosts your protection levels, but also slows down your computer. The solution is to decide which antivirus components you need and disable the rest.

For example, if you only use web based email from known providers (like Gmail), you can safely disable email scans, because all attachments get scanned anyway. Most anti-viruses use a special service to scan emails, so disabling those scans will help you free up RAM.

Here’s how you can disable email scans in Auslogics Antivirus:

1. Open Auslogics Antivirus
2. Go to the Shield tab and click on the Custom Level button
3. 
4. Then uncheck the relevant checkboxes
5. 
6. Click OK

If you don’t use any IM programs, then it will make sense to disable antiphishing protection for Yahoo and Live messengers. Just go to the main program window and uncheck the relevant checkboxes. You can also disable antiphishing for browsers that you’ve got installed, but never use (I almost never use IE).

However, if you use IM programs a lot, it’s best to ensure that they are well protected – it’s way too easy to get infected through such programs. And what’s worse, you will never suspect a thing. You might get infected through a file sent to you by a friend or a relative, if their computer is already infected.

To ensure that your IMs are protected:

1. Open Auslogics Antivirus and click on the Shield tab
2. Click on the Custom Level button
3. Check the Scan Files sent/received over IM checkbox

If you are really concerned about your chat privacy, you might want to enable encryption. To do that, click on the Encryption tab on the left hand side and make sure encryption is enabled.

Anyway, back to optimizing your antivirus.

3. Exclude Safe Folders

I’m sure that you have folders with photos, music, and movies saved on your hard drive. Most of them will have either a lot of files, or pretty large files (or both).  If your antivirus software scans these folders every time it performs a routine scan, it must be taking ages to complete.

Well, let me tell you that it’s highly unlikely to get a virus into one of those folders. And even if you do, you are bound to notice it immediately. So why not add them to the exclusions list and speed up scans? Just be sensible and don’t exclude too many folders.

Here’s how it’s done:

1. Open the program and click on the Antivirus tab on the left hand side
   
2. Then click on the Exclusions tab
3. Make sure that exclusions are enabled
4. Click on the “+” sign
5. 
6. Select Do not scan files or folders and click Next
7. Select files and folders you don’t want to be scanned and click Next
   
8. 
9. Now select when not to scan those files and folders – on the right hand side select On-demand, On-access, or Both
10. Click Next

I have more tips to share with you, but I think that’s enough for one post. Look out for Part 2.

TBC