tend2it

Why can U edit posts? Should read ... doing normal activities (web browsing, YouTube, gaming, Discord, etc.) with NO freezes nor performance issues.

So far, so good running the 1.0.527 BETA build on 2x Win7 machines (Enterprise and Pro) for about 48 hours now ... doing normal activities (web browsing, YouTube, gaming, Discord, etc.) with freezes nor performance issues ... Auto Updates is turned on ... This is looking like a winner !

This banner can also be used as a News feed on status/fix confirmation/etc. ... but wouldn't be helpful for us who rolled back to a previous version ... unless you also push an updated version of that older version with this update feature.

Perhaps the best way to directly contact users is a software update that pushes a warning Malwarebytes Main Graphical User Interface (that displays options to run) which can display a Big Red Banner (at startup or Notification if system is not restarted) clearly stating the Issue that may affect certain computers running Win7 and current workaround info link.

Glad battle.net updater was repeatable on your internal test environment ... hopefully, you can get to the bottom of this very soon. I actually rolled back my son's system to August 2018 using SW to backup/restore because of the random freezes. He had to re-install/update everything past Aug to bring the system up to present. However, since MB was not known to be the cause, Its auto-update component was still active and installed the latest updates. This of course made it appear that the backup was also freezing. Very misleading issue indeed, as I was thinking perhaps a HW component might be failing since the freeze was also occurring on the backup as well. Definitely a hair-pulling troubleshooting nightmare. This issue definitely needs a higher exposure to the general public, especially for the non-tech savvy folks as mentioned above.

When did the freeze first start occurring? Towards the End of Nov/Beginning of Dec. They were random ranging from 1-2 times a week (at start) to once a day (middle Dec) to multiple times a day (end Dec/beginning Jan) What were you doing on the computer immediately prior to the latest freeze? Trying to run Blizzard's battle.net updater (see below). Did you notice anything significant occur around the time of the latest freeze (e.g. AV notification, application crash, etc)? No system/application MB related logs before/after system freeze, no blue screen crash log. Keyboard and windows would not respond, followed by mouse pointer interaction slowing and lagging to a dead position and complete system unresponsiveness. Has a freeze occurred when the computer is idle? Yes. It also occurs at random: be it at startup/login after password entered, browsing the web in firefox, watching videos on YouTube, playing games, running programs like Task Manager, MB GUI, Afterburner, Registry Mechanic, etc. Have you noticed a correlation between high network traffic and the computer freezing? Yes and No. It has froze during heavy traffic due to battle.net attempting to update Overwatch/Destiny2/etc or watching YouTube streaming videos in HD. However, it also froze during less network centric activity running local programs that were not accessing the Network. How often does the computer freeze? Again, it is random. Could be instantly on login, after 5 mins, an hour, a few hours, we even had it run for a day without a freeze. Are you able to reproduce the freeze on-demand? If the answer is yes, what are the steps? What really froze the system consistently was when Blizzard games battle.net update utility was patch updating Overwatch. It would freeze immediately after initiating the update process. This is where I turned off MB and was able to successfully run through a full update of all games and run freeze free. How old is the computer? The Z800 computer was initially released ~2009. It was used as a software verification system ( for a few years) till I recently (within last year) modded it into a gaming system for son with upgraded 2x SAS 1TB drives, GTX970, new 850W power supply, new 24 GB RAM, and new CPU thermo-paste. Processor is a single Zeon Z5500 series 2.8GHz quad core. Specs: https://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c01709726 Was the computer upgraded from XP/Vista to Windows 7? No; clean install of Windows 7 Enterprise. Is the computer fully up-to-date with Windows Updates? Which updates have been installed after the first freeze occurred? Automatic updates keeps the Computer up-to-date throughout the freeze period. Does the computer have multiple network adapters? If it does, what happens when you disable the adapter currently in use and switch to a different adapter? No, wired LAN via a Broadcom (5761) NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet Plus NIC.

My son's computer has been experiencing random freezes since Dec ... Tried a troubleshooting option with MBs. -> Created exceptions for web access applications for both the battle.net exe and launcher and also the Overwatch exe and launcher to test if this would make a difference The Overwatch updates still froze. Once uninstalled MBs, updates succeeded. Reinstalled MB, ran Overwatch, it froze in the loading screen. Random freezes did happen (observed by son): * as MB does the rootkit scan just after the windows login screen starts the login process * while watching YouTube videos * while the computer was performing a Registry Mechanic registry compact function * while playing Overwatch or other games * while Discord is loading * in File Manager or Task Manager or anything There is no rhyme nor reason for this madness. As some have noticed, the freezes have become more frequent than back in Dec. Can't say that it happened after an idle/sleep episode for sure. As I mentioned previously, the battle.net updater for Overwatch is the repeatable freeze case that we experienced. We looked at task manager at the time of the freezes on occasion and there were no spikes in memory nor HDD activity like the Jan 2018 MB system crash release. This leads me to suspect that the Real-Time protection build could the culprit. It is constantly scanning in the background for ransomware, know attack signatures, vulnerabilities, etc. ... and could have another memory leak or over-checking when it shouldn't. It definitely is crashing before it posts an error to the Application or System Error Logs. There is nothing there before and after the crash. Checked both logs. Its not rocket science in SW troubleshooting (some simplified examples ... hope MB is doing something similar): 1) Create a test environment and find a freeze condition/situation that is repeatable every time on a system affected. 2) Revision check the current release vs the prior release that is working (rollback) and identify the code differences. What was functionality/checks were added or removed? What was changed? What is difference and start with the working release and add functionality back in one by one till the crash is found. 3)Turn on verbose debug trace logging functionally and see how far it gets before the freeze. ID the module/section that failed and compare against the working version. ID the cause/causes 4) Try on different HW/SW systems affected. Is it the same or different? If different, ID the next module affected. 5) Rinse/Repeat

Yes, Battle.net updater (specifically Overwatch) will repeatedly reproduce the crash on my system ... if MB wants a test case to use. I posted some info to Blizzard Technical Support forum after I discovered the bleeping computer article ... https://us.battle.net/forums/en/bnet/topic/20770537321#post-11

I've been troubleshooting this issue since Dec on my son's z800 workstation. Random freezing/crashes and more frequent ones of late especially when running battle.net to update Overwatch (which resulted in an instant repeatable freeze). Was worried I had some hardware failing with no clue on what it may be. Since MB had that infamous Jan 2018 system killer update, any system related crashes put MB on the possible cause radar. As soon as I clean uninstalled MB, the freezes went away. Forced to do Hard Resets is not good for the HDD. After much googling, I found a topic that pointed back to MB, which brought me here. Currently, I rolled back MB per Workaround #2 on the official issue announcement, Attached are the requested files. It appears to be isolated to this particular system hardware. My other Win7 Home system hasn't exhibited any symptoms that I know of. Hope this gets resolved soon. mbst-grab-results.zip

All fixed

Same here on multiple machines. Version 3.4.5 ... Maintenance mode shouldn't break it ... they should send out a general message the application can display then if that is the cause.

All 5x computers back up and running. The problem is related to MWBs taking 99% of Physical Memory, which essentially prevents you and your computer from doing anything, appearing to freeze or lock it up. Real-Time protection OFF (without ability to turn back on) and sometimes internet connectivity lock-out preventing License checking are indicators as well. This is what I did to get things working again: 1) Reboot (via Windows Restart) or Hard Reboot (if system is non-responsive, hold down power button for a few seconds) to get back into the logon screen. 2) As soon as the computer boots, click on the MWB's desktop icon to get the Graphical User Interface (GUI) panel up and navigate to the Settings -> About tab and look at the "Update package version" under Version Information. 3) Two ways to start the Update before hitting the 99% phys mem lockout (need to do this immediately after booting or it won't allow you to do anything): a) Click on the MWB's System Tray Icon (bottom right of screen), left mouse click, and select the top option "Check for Updates". If the MWB's icon is not visible, use ^ Show Hidden Icons to select it from there. b) Or within the MWB's GUI panel, go to Scan -> Start Scan ... this forces a Check for Updates before it starts. 4) Once the update is completed, it can be verified within the MWB's GUI panel under Settings -> About tab and look at the "Update package version" under Version Information. It should be 1.0.3804 ... Real-Time Protection or 99% Phys Mem issues may persist with the update in place. 5) Once 1.0.3804 is verified, quit MWB's by right mouse clicking and selecting "Quit Malwarebytes" on the System Tray Icon. 6) Restart MWB's as administrator and it should come up error free. NOTE: that if the system locks up or freezes, you may need to do a Hard Reboot to get it back to Windows. It may take several tries/reboots to get the update to load. One older computer took 3x tries while another took 2x tries. Newer computers allowed updates to be performed before the system freeze occurred. Good luck everyone !

I had that problem along with the Mem leak after the update ... quitting MWBs and restarting fixed it.

Thanks ... but it is already disabled to off as part of the license access problem. One laptop somehow got updated ... I Checked For Updates several times via the MWB System Icon, the last time at 99% Physical Memory lockout, let the system hang for 10-15 minutes while the 1% allowed the update to possibly work, then mysteriously, on the next reboot, MWB was updated to the patch and the problem was fixed. Why is there no physical Check For Updates button in the GUI?

Have a major problem with two of my older Win7 laptops: On bootup, I immediately get to the system tray Malwarebytes icon and click check for updates, and bring up the Status Panel to look at the current update installed. The computer gets to 99% Physical Memory usage before performing the update and completely locks up the computer. I've tried on startup, starting a scan that automatically checks for updates from status panel or turning off all protection features, forcing check for updates via system tray icon, and several hard reboots to no solution. 99% Physical Memory kills any progress. Killing the process tree or stopping the service on boot doesn't do much either, since as soon as the process restarts, the problem persists. I would love some suggestions as this has become a total time sync on something that should be easy to do. My more powerful Win10 system is fixed, but the kid's laptops are becoming a headache.

garbage attachments somehow got added ... reposting

Looks like its fixed ... Big Thanks !!! After updating to 1.0.3803, be sure to quit Malwarebytes and restart it. This will insure that Real-Time protection turned back on and excessive memory usage went back to normal. Without the restart after the update, the problem remained. All is good now. Thanks for the quick turn-around time.

Instead of making us wait Malwarebytes ... Why not update rollback to prev working version and push fix when ready. Lock outs are unacceptable business practices. This issue has locked out all computers in the house and shows that if a software service dependency like malwarebytes is hijacked, we are in serious trouble.