Scanning multiple HDD

[dcarlisle]

Does Spybot scan multiple HDDs. I check the help FAQ and found that it scans multiple OS installs but there's no mention of multiple HHD scans.

[md usa spybot fan]

The answer is yes, but there are no settings within Spybot to scan specific drives or to include or exclude specific drives. Unlike most anti-virus programs and some other anti-spyware programs, Spybot does not do an in-depth scan of every file even on the primary drive. For a brief description of how Spybot scans see:

• Why is Spybot-S&D so fast?
  http://www.safer-networking.org/en/faq/1.html

In other words, Spybot scans the portion of the drive(s) required automatically.

There is a special scan for Spyware installers (files not installed yet) that can be limited to specific directories (actually it should be limited) which can be located on either internal or external drives. To activate this feature go into Spybot > Mode > Advanced mode > Settings > Directories and add directories. There is more on what this feature scans for here:

• Why does Spybot-S&D find so many Spyware installers / how is that Download directories setting used?
  http://www.safer-networking.org/en/faq/15.html

[enelrah]

Sorry, I don't quite understand (and I read the articles you linked to). If I have a C & E drive and I've installed Spybot S&D on the E drive, will it automatically search both drives?

Thanks.

[bitman]

Spybot Search and Destroy is not a file scanner, that's what AntiVirus does.

Spybot S&D instead looks for signs of several types of malware (mostly spyware though also some others like trojans) in the registry. Rather than looking at each file on a disk, it looks for these telltale signs in the registry, which is basically an index of everything installed on your PC, and then follows these index pointers to the malware files themselves and removes both.

These files are most often found somewhere on your 'System' (usually C:\) drive, but could be found anywhere on your PC drives. Since Spybot looks in the registry 'index' it doesn't have to waste time looking at every file on every disk, so it leaves that to your AntiVirus which usually already performs that task.

Bitman

[enelrah]

Thanks for the explanation. I understand it better now.