A malware on your PC might be sending your online activity or important data to some other computer. A specially designed security software will detect and remove this infection for you. MBAM is a 7 years old application that has proven to be the best malware remover for Windows.
This software can easily prove that a paid antivirus software is not a complete security solution for Windows no matter how old the product is and how skilled the engineers/researchers behind it are.
The good thing about Malwarebytes Anti-malware is that you can use it along with any other antivirus application. It doesn’t matter whether the application is free or premium. Read this review to know why Malwarebytes is an efficient and powerful tool for removing malware.
How to download and install Malwarebytes?
Get the MBAM setup file from malwarebytes.com and run it. The wizard will request you to choose your preferred language. It will also make you aware of features of the software and bugs that were found in its earlier version.
You can change the installation drive if you the installer to install Malwarebytes in drivers other than Local Disk C.
You can also opt for the desktop shortcut. After its installation, MBAM will display options to enable the trial version of the Malwarebytes Premium program.
We’ve selected the 2nd option for this review as most of the readers will be interested to know what the features of free MBAM. If you want to buy Malwarebytes, go for the 1st option.
We’ve selected the 2nd option for this review as most of the readers will be interested to know what the features of free MBAM. If you want to buy Malwarebytes, go for the 1st option.
The main window will appear immediately after the installer completes the installation of Malwarebytes. This interface has extra large size buttons to run a scan, navigate to the home window, check history or modify the settings.
Must Read: Avast Antivirus review – fast and powerful
Malwarebytes Scanner
The scan operation of MBAM is split into seven parts. Before it runs a scan operation, Malwarebytes will check for the updates. If latest definitions are available, it will install them automatically.
The scanner will first execute a series of tasks (i don’t know what they are). It will then check the system memory, startup files, Windows registry and file system for possible infections. In the last stage, this software will perform a heuristic analysis of suspected files.
Around hundred thousand Dynamic Link Libraries, Executable files and registry entries were analyzed on my laptop. The total time taken was 25 minutes.
I was amazed to see that Malwarebytes had detected some 27 infections on my Windows laptop. Believe it or not! I use the premium version of Bitdefender Total Security. Even the paid antivirus has failed to find malware infections.
Real-time protection is a part of the premium version of this antimalware software. Thus, user’s will have to run the scanner manually.
Malwarebytes Settings
MBAM hides plenty of features behind its simple UI. To know the hidden module, visit the settings window of the program.
If you’re confident that a file is not a malware, navigate to the exclusions window and add the file’s path.
If you don’t want your PC to be hijacked, check the scan for rootkits option in the detection and protection tab.
Website exclusions, scheduling, advanced options and access policy options are available only for the premium users of MBAM.
The website exclusion is a part of real-time protection. If you want Malwarebytes to ignore scanning of some portals, add their IP addresses or URLs in this window.
MBAM can scan your computer immediately on system startup if you activate and use its inbuilt scheduler.
Malwarebytes resource Consumption
A software uses a lot of RAM and CPU when its most important module is active. In the case of Malwarebytes, its scanner is the most critical module. Thus, it will use the highest computer resources when it is in the full swing.
As you can see above, MBam was consuming 228 megabyte RAM. It used 6 to 8% of CPU cycles. The storage space used is 54 megabytes.
Final Verdict
Although Malwarebytes free edition software offers very few features, it has proved that a standalone security suite may not be able to detect hidden threats that are residing in the storage memory. Thus, if you use the internet on a daily basis, it is a must-have software for your Windows computer.
