Goodbye Spybot, Hello MSSE? Part III

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Comparing the installation footprints of SpyBot – Search and Destroy, Avira AntiVir Personal and
Microsoft Security Essentials in their respective folders in C:\Program Files, it is not a surprise to find out the following:

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SpyBot – Search and Destroy‘s footprint is about 76MB comprising the main executables, plus seven sub-folders, namely: Dummies, Help, Includes comprising Spyware supplemental files [sbs], Spyware include files [sbi], Usage tracks include file, and Targets.nfo; Languages (only English.sbl); Plugins; Skins; and Updates. In SpyBot main directory three scr files, i.e., JAZUHJYVYC.scr [1,526 KB], MRVSXTE.scr [1.791 KB] and YUUZXMMTJLXWPL.scr [1.791 KB] which all seemed essential to the application. The 76MB exclude the zipped definition files downloaded during the online update. These were purged prior to the snapshot. In C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Spybot – Search & Destroy occupying a minuscule 26 KB spread across six sub-folders containing the excludes, logs, configuration settings and .csv snapshots.

Thus, total footprint for SpyBot: 77 MB

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Avira AntiVir Personal occupies about 69MB of hard disk space in C:\Program Files. The 69MB excludes the .tmp files after the update. Usually the .tmp files are automatically deleted by the program after a system reboot. See below for snapshot. In C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Avira, an additional of approximately 44.5MB, the bulk of which accounts for the avguard.tmp (the 44.4MB application setup) contained in the TEMP folder, plus 14 other folders which are usually empty.

Avira during Definition Update showing .tmp files

Thus, total footprint for Avira: 113 MB

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Meanwhile, Microsoft Security Essentials can really boast off its smallest footprint compared to the above-mentioned applications because the files in the installed folder in C:\Program Files only amount to about 16MB!

Moreover, in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Microsoft Antimalware, approximately 178MB consisting of the Definition Updates (one bracketed alphanumeric-named folder plus the Backup and Updates folders) as previously blogged; an empty LocalCopy and Quarantine folders; the Scans folder containing the History results and an empty RtSigs data; plus some .bin file contained in a Support folder.

Additionally, in the C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Microsoft Security Essentials folder, there is a solitary Support sub-folder containing two .etl files namely, Application.etl and MSSESetup.etl totaling about 1.24 MB.

Thus, total footprint for Microsoft Security Essentials: 195 MB!

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Comparing the sizes of the installation file versus the installed application, respectively: Avira’s avira_antivir_personal_en.exe v.10.0.0.567 is about 42.0 MB (44,089,904 bytes), while the installed application totaled about 113.1 MB (118,979,201 bytes) or approximately a 270% increase. SpyBot’s spybotsd162.exe v.1.6.2.0 is about 15.6 MB (16,409,960 bytes) while the installed version is 76.7 MB (80,197,401 bytes), or 489% increase. Microsoft’s mssefullinstall-x86fre-en-us-xp.exe v.1.0.2498 is about 12.4 MB (13,063,352 bytes) compared to the total installed files of about 195 MB (204,778,615 bytes), 1,568% increase. WHOOPS!

Thus, considering hard drive footprint for this post, Avira is much leaner than MSSE. Even if we add the footprints of both Avira and SpyBot, then Microsot Security Essentials [MSSE] is still bloated.

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Notes:

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