Have been using Avira for literally decades. Was a very nice lightweight Free AV.... until Norton Lifelock recently purchased it.

Now it slows some of my Programs ( EFI Tuning Software ) to a crawl when they try to open. It's something in a recent Aviar Update, as it was not like this back in September. Temporarily disabling Real Time Scanning puts things back to normal and the programs affected open instantly.

I suspect it's related to a Java scan as the Tuning programs affected do use Java. But even excluding scanning all .jar files and the Programs Files and Folders themselves from Real Time scanning does not help opening times. So it's something Low Level in Avira Real Time Scanning.

Any recommendations for a lightweight Free AV in place of Avira?

BTW, I have Windows 7 64 Bit... and you will only pry that OS from my hands when I'm dead and 6 feet under!!!!

So, after MUCH searching I found an Avira Forum with a link to the " unbloated " Avira Anti-Virus. Just the Anti-Virus alone. No Security Suite and no bloat-whare.

Avira Free AV standalone

Back to it's simple and lightweight routes. The Dash Display may say that " Licence has expired " Don't worry. Real Time scanning, manual scanning and " Luke Filewalker " are all back.

And no more slowing down system!!!

Man, I can't believe how much quicker my whole system has become since Deleting Avira Security Suite and reverting to the Basic Anti-Virus only.

Back to it's Saturn V performance!!!

And... that didn't last long. Avira updated to latest version and now it bog slow again.

Deleted Avira and now using Bitdefender Free AV. I'll give this a go for a while.

Typical of many free programs. You need to be extremely diligent with updates, as there are too many "hidden" tricks, to get you to buy the paid version.

Another update. wasn't happy with Bitdefender. It was causing issues as well. Was causing a Mouse " sticking " problem. Most annoying.

On a hunch I went back to Avira and downloaded a fresh version of the Avira Installer. This program had a slightly different File size than before. .

Glory Be!! It fixed all the issues. My programs all open as they should now and my System is much faster than what it had been with the previous version of Avira or Bitdefender.

This version of Avira is: 1.1.79.5

I had sent Avira a rather pointed Feedback that they had ruined the program. Maybe they found something???