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The consolidated ANTIVIRUS SOFTWARE thread (1 Viewer)

Clinton McClure

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My Norton antivirus subscription is about to end (NAV 2003) and I'm wondering if it would make more sense to go ahead and buy another year's subscription like I have been or pick up a copy of Norton 2005 at the store. I like the idea of having the disk around so if I need to reformat I won't have to call Symantic to reactivate my software, but on the other hand, it will soon be 2006 and a new version will be coming out.

Any recommendations?
 

Joseph DeMartino

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Yeah, dump Norton, which I think is way overpriced and which I've had fail to stop viruses that I had to use other programs to recover from. I'd download AVG anti-virus, which is free for single users, and keep that up to date. No subscription, no muss, no fuss, no bother. And it has saved my butt when commercial software failed. When my last Norton subscription ran out I uninstalled their software and loaded AVG and haven't looked back.

Regards,

Joe
 

Diallo B

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well since no one actually answered his question....:)

i would upgrade to nav2005 especially if you can get it for cheap since 2006 is around the corner.

i have always used nav and when i went to 2005 from 2003 i noticed a significant drop in the use of system resources by nav and the user interface with 2005 is better than 2003. 2005 simply plays better with your computer.

since i do alot of cpu and memory intensive tasks, the freeing up of system resources was a great bonus for me.

OH! and as with anything your virus protection is only as good as your common sense.

(i.e. don't download suspect files, don't go to suspect websites, don't open suspect emails and i definitely don't put anyone else's disks in my primary computer without running a virus check on one of my secondary computers.)

also, if you can, get norton ghost or something similar. i have a multi-partition setup on all my computers with one partition for the os only. i back up this partition about once a week on a dvd+rw. if anything starts messing up instead of spending hours trouble shooting it takes me ten minutes to go back to a previously backed up os i know that works. meanwhile all of your 'important' info is protected on other partions. windows xp system restore is not reliable to me. norton ghost filled that gap.

as with anything YMMV!!....
 

Michael Reuben

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If you keep an eye on ads from Staples and CompUSA, you can probably get it for free. Both of them have run deals recently where you can get NAV, Norton Internet Security (which includes NAV) or Norton Systemworks (ditto) with rebates from Symantec equal to the price of the software if you're upgrading from a previous version. I bought these for three different computers, and I already have the rebates back for two (the third was mailed just a week ago).

BTW, I agree with Diallo that NAV 2005 is a lot friendlier than prior versions.

M.
 

Joseph DeMartino

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His question was, "Any recommendations?" I answered it by recommending that he stop using Norton Anti-Virus and use a better program. :) Just because an answer is not the one you expect, that doesn't mean it isn't an answer. :D

Regards,

Joe
 

Mike Fassler

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get rid of norton, norton is crap software, download AVG its free and 1,000's of times better than norton.
 

Carl Miller

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I agree with Joseph and Mike...Maybe not an answer to the question, but the best recommendation made here IMO.
 

Brian Perry

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I've got a basic (stupid) question about anti-virus programs.

Whether it's Norton, MacAfee, or AVG (which I use), do these programs actually contain every known virus ever created and then scan your files to see if they're infected? It takes a very short amount of time for my computer to scan files, and it seems as though it should take longer if it's looking for any one of millions of viruses. Do all viruses have similar signatures that allow the AV program to quickly determine that one is present?

Furthermore, do viruses become extinct after a while? Or will the number of them just keep increasing to the point where the anti-virus programs become so big that they slow down the operating system significantly?
 

Arthur S

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Consumer Reports tested commercial anti-virus programs for the September 2005 issue. Norton AV 2005 rated 5th out of 8 products tested.

The number one tested program was Trend Mircro's PC-Cillin 2005. Best Buy sells it for $50 with a $25 rebate for previous Norton users. Buy.com sells it for $40.50 with the same $25 rebate and free shipping for final cost of $15.50.

I thought it was rathing telling that Hotmail uses Trend Micro to provide its anti-virus program.

PC-Cillin out-scored Norton in ease of use and scan speed.

My sister (who uses her computer 8 hours a day for business) switched from McAfee and likes PC-Cillin.

PS

If you don't have anti-spyware software, Microsoft Antispyware beta is free and was top rated.
 

Ray Chuang

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I myself use AVG Anti-Virus Free 7.0.344 and found it to be stable, fast, does a good job keeping away viruses. :emoji_thumbsup:

I use that in conjunction with Ad-Aware 1.06r1 SE and ZoneAlarm 6.0.667.000 to keep my system nice an clean. :)
 

Paul Padilla

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No such thing as a stupid question Brian.

The key word with anti-virus programs of any type is update. They are only as good as their most recent update, and even at that the chances are high that there is at least one new virus out there somewhere that the manufacturer hasn't run into yet. There are sadistic smart-ass punks out there creating new viruses every single day and anti-virus manufacturers can only protect you from threats they know about. There are certain indicators or heuristics that can indicate a possible virus which some programs use to try to stay ahead of the curve. If your anti-virus program is taking such a short time scanning then it may not be set to scan all files. They usually are set to do a "quick" scan by default. Look through the settings to make it scan the entire C: drive. Even for a basic Windows installation with only a few programs, you're still talking about 1 1/2 to 2 Gigabytes worth of files to examine which on a fast machine should still take at least 5 minutes. And no, viruses don't go "extinct". There's always the possibility of someone getting ahold of an old infected floppy disk or an old infected hard drive.

These days anti-virus needs to be coupled with anti-spyware applications too to catch every threat.

As for Clinton's question...I'm a PC-Cillin fan myself and it is rated very highly, but Norton's is a good product too. If you've had no problems then "if it ain't broke" etc. It is a resource hog so if the 2005 being better about that is true, then that's a plus. The only thing I have against Norton's is that it's very invasive and can be a problem to remove because it throws hooks all over the place in the OS. Free programs are OK, but getting support if there is an incident can be problematic.
 

Phil Kim

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While AVG is free and lightweight, it also has among the lowest detection rate. I recommmend PC-Cillin or Kasperksy (a bit of a resource hog but excellent detection rate).
 

Will_B

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I've used Nortons Systemworks (which includes AntiVirus and Firewall) for a few years and my PC has been trouble free.

But I do have a complaint about the company. I do not appreciate the way they have a dozen products, half of which are included in other products, some of which are also included in other products, and on and on.

Essentially they've made their product line one of the most confusing, duplication-prone messes one could imagine. It takes several minutes to figure out that one particular product also includes three other products.

I had once tried McAfee but the installation was a complete failure so I'll stick with Nortons, despite their marketing having taken over their good sense.
 

Joseph DeMartino

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I do IT tech support for a living. I've had machines practically wiped out when commercial products failed to detect attacks. (Norton in particular, because of all those freakin' hooks it throws out all over your system, is a disaster when it is put out of action by a virus that specifically attacks anti-virus software. You sometimes need to wipe you drive to reinstall everything because you can't uninstall a crippled version of Norton and you can't reinstall the software if you don't.) I routinely use AVG to repair machines hit by viruses that products like Trend OfficeScan, MacAfee and Norton choke on. I don't know where you're getting your "detection rate" information, but as far as I know that detection algorithms it uses are right up there with the commercial packages and its virus database is updated as least as often.

Regards,

Joe
 

Al.Anderson

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Joe, good info, thanks. Both Norton and McAfee have ticked me off with how many hooks get installed and how many unrequested tasks they load that can't be turned off. I'll be checking out AVS (my McAfee subscription just ran out too).
 

Marko Berg

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Kaspersky's latest version has a rather heavy-handed approach to getting rid of infections: you can only delete a file, not disinfect it. The software also lacks in customization and a power user probably wouldn't be too happy with its simplistic approach to virus protection.

I use F-Secure (a version that bundles antivirus and firewall software; the latest version reportedly adds a spyware detection tool to these) and have been quite happy. :emoji_thumbsup:
 

rob-h

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Joseph DeMartino, not sure what "hooks" you refer to but the virus's that specifically disable antivirus software (not just symantec) are easy to clean. The company's themselves put out seperate clean tools almost immediately. Not to mention if you were a skilled support person you could do the job yourself. Ending the in memory app and then removing it fromthe registry generally will allow your antivirus software to load. You can then update the sigs and clean the whole PC. Symantec is usually among the fastest to release new signatures to deal with new virus's. There is NOTHING wrong with Norton and I have been in the buisness a LONG time.
 

Arthur S

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Joseph DeMartino

Does it say anything to you that MSN Hotmail uses Trend Micro as its anti-virus source?
 

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