Solved Slow/delayed programs launch in fresh-ish install

I'm currently reinstalling Windows due to unrelated issues. I'm using the same Windows 11 edition as in the previous installation.
I've encountered this exact same issue in the past already but never found a root cause. Always fixed it after like 3 reinstalls later. But here we go again...


I'm experiencing an interesting phenomenon. Programs - as in any kind of executables - are taking literal minutes to actually launch. It's really reminiscent of the overwhelmed system disk that happened mainly when running os on HDD. You launch the program once, twice, thrice, ... and then suddenly you'd get all your 30 instances launched at the same time.
Except this is now happening on a modern SSD, with high system specs and an idle OS. I therefore believe there is no hw bottleneck (mainly bcs it works fine (programs launch as fast as they should) on in the old install).

There are some interesting remarks about this behavior:
1. It affects mainly installers but also normal programs (takes minutes to finally launch)
2. Most of the time it apparently affects only the first-ever launch of a specific executable and subsequent launches are much faster, as would one expect from the beginning. This however isn't consistent.
3. It affects OTHER executables that are run by other programs. For example, I was installing utility that required some C++ redistributable. I already waited a good minute for the utility installer to launch but when the utility installer invoked the redistributable installer, it took another few minutes for redistributable to actually execute and get installed (the install itself was quite fast - again, it's always the launch itself that takes ages).


I can't unfortunately reliably reproduce this, but what I usually do is:
After OOBE let Windows update do its thing,
Start installing my programs such as web browsers etc...
Defender starts to eat any tweak / open source sw I'm used to using, and I remember why I hate the defender
Attempt to permanently disable defender the official way (Tamper protection, gpedit, etc...)
Doesn't work bcs ofc it doesn't, keeps reenabling itself, eats files despite being supposedly disabled, flags the registry setting that disables behavior analysis as a malware attack, and 'remediates' it whilist being disabled (YES THIS ACTUALLY HAPPENED WTF DEFENDER)
Get fed up with its bullshit, download Windows tweakers and sordum defender control utility and throw everything on the defender until it stays put!
After half a day-long battle it seems to be finally disabled, continue installing sw.

Around the time of fighting Defender, the issue I'm making this post about surfaces and programs start to take ages to launch.
It's almost like the defender would still try to scan or analyze the executables prior to being launched but for some reason, it now takes ages to finish/fail.

Has anybody encountered such behavior as well? Or perhaps have some better - as in surefire reliable safe permanent - way of turning off defender (yes, I already tried countless guides including from this forum/website and similar).

Thank you!

I am experiencing the same issue on my Laptop:
Asus Vivo Book17 X712-JA
Intel Core i5-1035G1
12 GB RAM
1 TB Lexar NVME

Windows Defender and Smart Screen completely disabled.

I am willing to collaborate and have evidence that helps solve this problem.

Windows seems to work correctly and fast, just opening and installing programs for the first time is extremely slow.

The issue occurs exactly as described in the previous message.

Hi there, it is me, the OP!

sysdevops said:

I am experiencing the same issue on my Laptop:
Asus Vivo Book17 X712-JA
Intel Core i5-1035G1
12 GB RAM
1 TB Lexar NVME

Windows Defender and Smart Screen completely disabled.

I am willing to collaborate and have evidence that helps solve this problem.

Windows seems to work correctly and fast, just opening and installing programs for the first time is extremely slow.

The issue occurs exactly as described in the previous message.

Click to expand...

So I ended up just completely disabling the defender and I mean like really kind of irreversibly (it's kind of supposed to be irreversible but I kind of made it reversible, it's a long story) uprooting it from the system. I'm actually gonna call this (permanently disabling Windows Defender) a solution since I don't really need the defender and it does indeed solve the issues I've been long facing.

If you're interested - and if it's allowed, I can share what I nowadays use as a reliable means to outright uproot the defender and some of its parts from the system - permanently - if I do say so myself.

(And I really do want to emphasize that, since I've seen so many claims of permanent defender disabling/removal, and none of them - as in literally zero of them were actually permanent.)

Msprg said:

Hi there, it is me, the OP!

So I ended up just completely disabling the defender and I mean like really kind of irreversibly (it's kind of supposed to be irreversible but I kind of made it reversible, it's a long story) uprooting it from the system. I'm actually gonna call this (permanently disabling Windows Defender) a solution since I don't really need the defender and it does indeed solve the issues I've been long facing.

If you're interested - and if it's allowed, I can share what I nowadays use as a reliable means to outright uproot the defender and some of its parts from the system - permanently - if I do say so myself.

(And I really do want to emphasize that, since I've seen so many claims of permanent defender disabling/removal, and none of them - as in literally zero of them were actually permanent.)

Click to expand...

Thank you by your feedback. I usually use the utility program called "Defender Control" from Sordum, to disable Windows Defender (Smart Screen), this program claims that it disables them completely and it is possible to enable and disable it on demand (ON-OFF), for me it has been enough until now.

About the issue, it seems that when we run executable files or installers, that "normal delay" occurs that occurs when we have Windows Defender (Smart Screen) activated and running, while it "scans" the application or the executable, but this time it is being very long and extensive even with Windows Defender (Smart Screen) "disabled" and "still scanning executable files or installers" beyond normal time.

Can you please share your solution about permanently disabling Windows Defender? I could do tests on my Windows and check if the issue disappears.

sysdevops said:

Thank you by your feedback. I usually use the utility program called "Defender Control" from Sordum, to disable Windows Defender (Smart Screen), this program claims that it disables them completely and it is possible to enable and disable it on demand (ON-OFF), for me it has been enough until now.

Click to expand...

Tried it and countless other tools. None of them ever worked well / permanently - but then I repeat myself.

sysdevops said:

About the issue, it seems that when we run executable files or installers, that "normal delay" occurs that occurs when we have Windows Defender (Smart Screen) activated and running, while it "scans" the application or the executable, but this time it is being very long and extensive even with Windows Defender (Smart Screen) "disabled" and "still scanning executable files or installers" beyond normal time.

Click to expand...

Yes, it looks like that, however I have decided that the whole "defender" part of the built-in Windows security is a hot mess. I was done with it when it outright ignored and/or even reverted system group policies that disabled it either partially or completely, on a non-home Windows edition nonetheless. What I'm trying to say is - god knows what's it actually doing - might as well be just bad quality code where profiler would show some dumb extra long threads unnecessarily blocking the execution of the rest of the threads, etc...

(offtopic: Windows XP or 7 can't quite recall now, had the login startup sound playing in a main or blocking thread. Meaning if you put a long custom logon sound, you wouldn't get to the desktop until the whole sound file played. Luckily there were some limits in place to prevent 10 hour block by setting a 10 hour long audio file as a custom log-on sound. Like it would time out and terminate in about 3 minutes or so)

sysdevops said:

Can you please share your solution about permanently disabling Windows Defender? I could do tests on my Windows and check if the issue disappears.

Click to expand...

Here.

Defender Remover / Defender Disabler​

I use this to Disable Defender Works well

Wolfzz said:

Defender Remover / Defender Disabler​

I use this to Disable Defender Works well

GitHub - ionuttbara/windows-defender-remover: A tool which is uses to remove Windows Defender in Windows 8.x, Windows 10 (every version) and Windows 11.

A tool which is uses to remove Windows Defender in Windows 8.x, Windows 10 (every version) and Windows 11. - ionuttbara/windows-defender-remover

github.com

Click to expand...

Ah. So I have tried this one as well - it just utterly broke my system.

Likely removed defender, yes, but also just straight up broke not only uwp but also partly stuff like an explorer etc.

Can't say if it removed it permanently as I hasn't lasted with such utterly broken system, and no, no amount of SFC, dism and reregistering components could bring system back to stable, not even some revert options I believe it had... I just had to restore a system image.


In this regard, my approach is much safer.

I am experiencing the issue on another new Asus Laptop K1703ZA i3-12220P, after fresh Windows 11 Install. Redirecting

Msprg said:

I'm currently reinstalling Windows due to unrelated issues. I'm using the same Windows 11 edition as in the previous installation.
I've encountered this exact same issue in the past already but never found a root cause. Always fixed it after like 3 reinstalls later. But here we go again...


I'm experiencing an interesting phenomenon. Programs - as in any kind of executables - are taking literal minutes to actually launch. It's really reminiscent of the overwhelmed system disk that happened mainly when running os on HDD. You launch the program once, twice, thrice, ... and then suddenly you'd get all your 30 instances launched at the same time.
Except this is now happening on a modern SSD, with high system specs and an idle OS. I therefore believe there is no hw bottleneck (mainly bcs it works fine (programs launch as fast as they should) on in the old install).

There are some interesting remarks about this behavior:
1. It affects mainly installers but also normal programs (takes minutes to finally launch)
2. Most of the time it apparently affects only the first-ever launch of a specific executable and subsequent launches are much faster, as would one expect from the beginning. This however isn't consistent.

Click to expand...

Prepare to replace the SSD, the SSD is likely faulty. You have one of the classic symptoms ->Slow like a very old drive.

RJARRRPCGP said:

Prepare to replace the SSD, the SSD is likely faulty. You have one of the classic symptoms ->Slow like a very old drive.

Click to expand...

No. The SSD is okay. The latency is low, transfer speeds high, and it's not full either. It's slow SSD was never the cause of this issue.

Also I already experienced slow SSD, on other system, due to it being cheap (no drama), qlc, and full. The symptoms are similar but different in many key details, such as system (or programs that have already launched and are running) responsiveness.

Disabling defender / Windows security components resolved it for me with immediate effect.

Msprg said:

Ah. So I have tried this one as well - it just utterly broke my system.

Likely removed defender, yes, but also just straight up broke not only uwp but also partly stuff like an explorer etc.

Can't say if it removed it permanently as I hasn't lasted with such utterly broken system, and no, no amount of SFC, dism and reregistering components could bring system back to stable, not even some revert options I believe it had... I just had to restore a system image.


In this regard, my approach is much safer.

Click to expand...

This script doesn't work...

Msprg said:

Ah. So I have tried this one as well - it just utterly broke my system.

Likely removed defender, yes, but also just straight up broke not only uwp but also partly stuff like an explorer etc.

Can't say if it removed it permanently as I hasn't lasted with such utterly broken system, and no, no amount of SFC, dism and reregistering components could bring system back to stable, not even some revert options I believe it had... I just had to restore a system image.


In this regard, my approach is much safer.

Click to expand...

The script that you mention doesn't work, absolutely useless: GitHub - Msprg/Disable-Windows-Defender-Permanently: I've had it with the Windows Defender bullshit, and maybe you too. If that's the reason you came here, be at peace for your struggle ends here.

sysdevops said:

The script that you mention doesn't work, absolutely useless

Click to expand...

The only things that are absolutely useless here, are your feedback, quoting, troubleshooting, and computer literacy skills.

If it didn't work for you, from all the information you provided, I can only assume that you just used it wrong.
But you know what? I tried it again anyway. What if it doesn't work on new installs because Microsoft changed something again or due to any other issue.

...And then it worked. On the first try. In very much the same way as it was designed.

Shocking. I know.

Honestly, I try to give people the benefit of the doubt, as long as they remain polite. Given that you have decided to be rude instead, in this case, I'll just assume that you can't use computers.

You can say as you want.

I am reporting the fact that the script is not working for me.

I tested the mentioned script as soon as you mentioned on first time, and then tested Consecutively several times.

I'm not being rude. I am telling the truth. And I say the script is "useless" because it apparently made absolutely no changes to the system.

Have tried multiple times even with fresh installations. If you are too sensitive to accept that, then I can't deal with your problems.

Now I realize that you are the author of the Script and that is why you feel so offended. I congratulate you, I hope you continue to improve your script, for me it doesn't work so far. The only rude one here is you who uses a rude message, even on your GitHub page, that is far from being a polite professional.

Have a good day and continue fighting with everyone on the internet for everything they say, maybe you are not emotionally prepared or educated to use the internet.

I can't confirm what I'm about to say, but I suspect that the "Slow/delayed programs launch in fresh-ish install" problem is related to the Intel® Rapid Storage Technology and/or Intel® Volume Management Device (Intel® VMD) drivers.

I have tried disabling Intel RST and/or Intel VMD on an Asus 10th gen laptop and two other Asus 13th gen laptops all of them with diferentes NVMEs Lexar and Western Digital, and it seems to have solved the issue. I would recommend disabling these options before performing fresh Windows installations.

After following risky procedures and some that do not work 100% as indicated and that require certain workaorunds. After disabling those two things, I have not observed lag when launching applications.

These were the tutorials that I followed, take extra precautions before doing anything, back up your data in case you cannot repair Windows boot or in case your SSD/NVMe disk is incompatible with AHCI (Check first).

Disclaimer: I would recommend that you add a disclaimer in your answer that this method would not work if one has a NVMe SSD as NVMe is not backward compatible with AHCI. This may save a lot of paing and confusion for many users.

Procedure #1: Appears to be safe and works well.

Alternative procedure: It did not work for me as expressed in the instructions.


In case of problems, this helped me to repair the startup once the Intel RST was disabled through the Windows registry (Workaround for the alternative procedure):