Computer scan

The on-demand scanner is an important part of ESET Endpoint Antivirus. It is used to perform scans of files and folders on your computer. From a security point of view, it is essential that computer scans are not just run when an infection is suspected, but regularly as part of routine security measures. We recommend that you perform regular (for example once a month) in-depth scans of your system to detect viruses not detected by Real-time file system protection. This can happen if Real-time file system protection was disabled at the time, if the detection engine was obsolete or if the file was not detected as a virus when it was saved to the disk.

Two types of Computer scan are available. Scan your computer quickly scans the system with no need for further configuration of the scan parameters. Custom scan enables you to select any of the pre-defined scan profiles and define specific scan targets.

See Scan progress for more information about the scanning process.

Scan your computer

Scan your computer enables you to quickly launch a computer scan and clean infected files with no need for user intervention. The advantage of Scan your computer is it is easy to operate and does not require detailed scanning configuration. This scan checks all files on local drives and automatically cleans or deletes detected infiltrations. The cleaning level is automatically set to the default value. For more detailed information about cleaning modes, see Cleaning.

You can also use the Drag and drop scan feature to scan a file or folder manually by clicking the file or folder, moving the mouse pointer to the marked area while keeping the mouse button pressed and then releasing it. After that, the application is moved to the foreground.

The following scanning options are available under Advanced scans:

Custom scan

Custom scan enables you to specify scanning parameters such as scan targets and methods. The advantage of Custom scan is that you can configure the parameters in detail. Configurations can be saved to user-defined scan profiles, which can be useful if scanning is repeatedly performed with the same parameters.

Removable media scan

Similar to Scan your computer—quickly launch a scan of removable media (such as CD/DVD/USB) that are currently connected to the computer. This may be useful when you connect a USB flash drive to a computer and want to scan its contents for malware and other potential threats.

This type of scan can also be initiated by clicking Custom scan, selecting Removable media from the Scan targets drop-down menu and clicking Scan.

Repeat last scan

Enables you to quickly launch the previously performed scan using the same settings as before.

Action after scan drop-down menu enables you to set an action to be performed automatically after a scan finishes:

• No action—After a scan finishes, no action will be performed.
• Shut down—The computer turns off after a scan finishes.
• Restart if needed—The computer restarts if only needed to complete cleaning of detected threats.
• Restart—Closes all open programs and restarts the computer after a scan finishes.
• Force restart if needed—The computer forces restart if only needed to complete cleaning of detected threats.
• Force restart— Forces closing of all open programs without waiting for user interaction and restarts the computer after a scan finishes.
• Sleep—Saves your session and puts the computer in a low-power state so that you can quickly resume working.
• Hibernate—Takes everything you have running on RAM and moves it to a special file on your hard drive. Your computer shuts down but will resume its previous state the next time you start it.

The selected action will start after all of the running scans are finished. When you select Shutdown or Restart, a confirmation dialog window will display a 30-second countdown (click Cancel to deactivate the requested action).