# Windows Defender - Real time protection - Does it slow vista down? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 18, 2009, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517 "2009-09-18T00:34:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/1 "2009-09-18T00:34:52Z")
I’ve been frantically trying to track down what’s causing my computer to start up slowly and I’ve come across the real time protection options in Windows Defender. Looking at the options it looks as if WD is checking virtually everything the computer does. I consider myself savy enough not to get spy ware or viruses (I haven’t had a single thing for many years) so I am tempted to turn off the real time protection. But if it’s not going to speed things up there probably isn’t much point. Does anyone know if it slows things down? And if I have AVG (Free) Do I really need it at all? ---
**Author:** ![HorseloverFat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8e8cbc/32.png) [@HorseloverFat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HorseloverFat)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/2 "2009-09-18T15:23:13Z")
Its safe to shut WD off if you have AVG or any other antivirus. MS packaged it because a lot of their customers never buy AV or let their subscriptions slide and because of antitrust reasons were afraid to develop their own AV. Recently, this has changed and MS will be releasing its own free AV soon. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/3 "2009-09-18T17:33:24Z")
Nice one. I’ll switch it off tonight (when I get home) and see if it makes a difference. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/4 "2009-09-18T19:07:15Z")
Actually, I believe Windows Defender is an anti-spyware program while AVG (at least the free one) is an anti-virus program. There may be some overlap, but overall they watch for different types of malware. You should keep them both running for security reasons… but I can’t answer the speed question. ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/5 "2009-09-18T19:51:42Z")
Windows Defender shouldn’t slow down your computer at all. I have Process Monitor to keep an eye on what’s taking resources, etc on my computer. Windows Defender takes practically no resources. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/6 "2009-09-18T20:26:40Z")
> [@aldiboronti](#): > > Windows Defender shouldn’t slow down your computer at all. I have Process Monitor to keep an eye on what’s taking resources, etc on my computer. Windows Defender takes practically no resources. Will Process Monitor show me what’s happening at startup? (so I can track down what might be slowing it down) ---
**Author:** ![HorseloverFat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8e8cbc/32.png) [@HorseloverFat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HorseloverFat)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/7 "2009-09-18T21:28:29Z")
> [@](#): > > Actually, I believe Windows Defender is an anti-spyware program while AVG (at least the free one) is an anti-virus program. AVG, like most AVs, is also a comprehensive anti-spyware program. Nowadays everything is just malware. A AV that doesnt detect non-virus malware will fail in the market pretty quickly. Sometimes you need specilized tools to remove spyware, but thats also true of viruses and trojans. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/8 "2009-09-18T21:53:46Z")
> [@HorseloverFat](#): > > AVG, like most AVs, is also a comprehensive anti-spyware program. Nowadays everything is just malware. A AV that doesnt detect non-virus malware will fail in the market pretty quickly. Sometimes you need specilized tools to remove spyware, but thats also true of viruses and trojans. Oh neat 🙂 I didn’t know and stand corrected! Time to disable Defender then. Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2009, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/9 "2009-09-18T22:11:33Z")
I’ve often wondered if AVG serves dual-purposes. It’s good to know that it does. I’m also going to disable defender. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2009, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-defender-real-time-protection-does-it-slow-vista-down/510517/10 "2009-09-21T16:33:24Z")
There’s a drawback to turning WD off, as I’ve found out. If you’ve used WD to disable other startup items, those startup items are no longer disabled if you disable WD. You have to disable them manually (again) using msconfig.