IMO, not really. You can strip AVG down to the point where the only time AVG runs, is when it's updating, scanning the harddrive or single files. This method below will remove stuff like safe surf and link scanner from running in the background
1. After downloading the AVG setup file, right-click on it and select 'Create shortcut'. Now right-click on this
newly created shortcut and select Properties, then in the Target box, one blank space after the last character,
enter the following text exactly as shown: (it’s easier to copy and paste 
)
avgsetup.exe /NOAVGTOOLBAR /REMOVE_FEATURE fea_AVG_SafeSurf /REMOVE_FEATURE fea_AVG_SafeSearch
even better idea
avgsetup.exe /NOAVGTOOLBAR /REMOVE_FEATURE fea_AVG_SafeSurf /REMOVE_FEATURE fea_AVG_SafeSearch /REMOVE_FEATURE fea_AVG_HttpScanner /REMOVE_FEATURE fea_AVG_Firewall
Run this new shortcut and it will start the AVG setup file with the parameters specified above. This will prevent
AVG from installing the Linkscanner feature, AVG Security Toolbar and related web-browsing protection, all of which
can result in increased CPU usage and slower web browsing. These features cannot be properly disabled from within
AVG, so they need to be removed using this method. If you’ve already installed AVG then you can still follow this
step and it should remove these components from your system. More details about this method can be found in this
AVG FAQ.
- During the installation of AVG, make sure to select the Custom option, and I recommend unticking the 'Email
Scanner’ and ‘Plugin for Microsoft Office’ components, as I feel they are unnecessary. Note: More recent versions
of AVG also may have a Linkscanner option, untick this as well (if Step 1 doesn’t already remove it).
- Once AVG has installed, start it and go to the Tools menu, then select ‘Advanced Settings’. I recommend the
following settings:
- Under the Appearance menu untick the ‘Display system tray notifications’ box to remove the unnecessary AVG icon
in the System Tray/Notification Area.
- Under the Linkscanner menu untick all available boxes.
- Under the Scans menu you should tick all boxes except ‘Automatically heal/remove infections’ in each case - this
ensures that should AVG detect a false positive, it won’t automatically delete it from your system.
- Under the Schedules menu untick every available option - instead I recommend updating prior to doing a manual
scan at a time of your choosing.
- Under the Resident Shield menu untick the ‘Enable Resident Shield’ box to disable this background functionality,
as it can and will interfere with other programs and may reduce overall performance and stability.
- While the changes above will reign in most of AVG’s intrusive and problematic behavior, in addition to these
changes, it is also recommended that you take some additional steps to disable unnecessary/intrusive components. To
start with, AVG installs an active Windows Service called ‘AVG8 Watchdog’. While this service needs to be left at
Automatic for AVG 8 to work, it actually runs two separate files in the background: avgwdsvc.exe (for the Watchdog
Service) and avgrsx.exe (for the Resident Shield service). If you’ve disabled the Resident Shield feature of AVG,
then it is also recommended that you to go to your \Program Files\AVG\AVG8 directory and rename the avgrsx.exe file
to something else; this will prevent it from starting up in the background without affecting AVG scanning
capabilities.
- Now run Autoruns (see the Startup Programs chapter) and under the Everything tab, untick the following AVG
startup components which are unnecessary if AVG is configured as above:
- AVG8_Tray - this item just relates to a tray icon which has no real benefit.
- Linkscanner - this item shouldn’t be shown if AVG is installed as above, but if it exists, untick it.
- AVG Safe Search - this item shouldn’t be shown if AVG is installed as above, but if it exists, untick it.
- AVGMfx86.sys - this item is related to the Resident Shield functionality.
- Avgrsstx.dll - this item is related to the Resident Shield functionality.
- All incidences of AVG8 Shell Extension - this removes the ‘Scan with AVG Free’ context menu entries.
Once all the steps above are completed, reboot your system and start AVG. You will see one or more red warning
prompts from AVG - you can safely ignore these. Click the ‘Update Now’ tab to run the web updater to ensure that
AVG is up to date. If there are any problems, recheck the procedures above, and if nothing else works, uninstall
AVG and reinstall it, then only follow steps 1-3 above this time. To start a manual scan of your system with AVG
click the ‘Computer Scanner’ tab and then select ‘Scan whole computer’ to scan everything, or 'Scan specific files
and folders’ and then specify the particular folder(s) you wish to scan. I strongly recommend running the AVG
Updater by clicking the ‘Update Now’ tab before doing any scan, to make sure the virus definitions are always up to
date. Manually scanning your entire system once a week, and always scanning potentially harmful files which you
have downloaded before you open or launch them is strongly recommended and more than adequate when combined with
some common sense if you want to ensure your system remains clear of major malware.
Note that AVG 8 has a known incompatibility with the ‘immunize’ function of certain other malware products like
Spybot, and this will result in excessive false malware detection in such cases. Note: This may have been fixed in
more recent versions.
I don’t know how much more effective AVG8.0 Free will be - reports are that it’s quite good (based on the paid
version) - but I hope an update to the program allows users to disable the resident shield service within the
program’s normal settings because it serves absolutely no purpose when resident shield is disabled. I don’t like
being forced to have any form of background scanning active.