What's the best antivirus / security software?

[Bearsden06]

I am using AVG8 what I like about it it installed with no problems straight download,
The overview page as symbols and as long as they are all green then all the bits are working and up to date much easier than trying to read things.
But I think the big plus it s user friendly a lot of these programmes presume that the user is very computor literate which in my case is just the opposite,I want something easy to set up easy to configure to what I want not what someone thinks I should have.
Cost mine works out at round figures £60.00p two years


Bearsden

[maroy41]

I use AVG8 too, the free version never had any problems with it, when I had Norton I had no end of problems with slow system etc, I was glad to get rid of it

[nemo14444]

avg is what i would prefer

[heatemyfather]

I just had a run-in with a few trojans (like about 50 million by the sounds of it! Once the door is open they just flood in) on Windows XP Pro running in an emulator on my Mac. Yeah, it probably was my fault for running some little downloaded app that I shouldn't have, guilty as charged, but what a hassle trying to get rid of the blighters!

After trying out several of the big free anti-virus apps I finally had success with Avast! Personal Home Edition (which is a free download), none of the others installed properly or actually did any virus removal, this could be because Windows runs slowly in the emulator, or because the viruses were causing problems, but Avast! installed and sorted the viruses out without any problems. I ran it several times just to be sure they were gone.

So, for anyone running Windows in an emulator or a slow machine I can recommend Avast! as a low-resource anti-virus application.

I would use it over AVG 8 any day.

[sapientpearwood]

Hi

I am currently using "Kaspersky" and saw this week that PC Pro have again rated it the best.

Sapientpearwood

[leevc]

I use PC-CILLIN and have for 3 years. Multiple licenses are given with the purchase and it cathces everything. Never had a problem with it. Lots of features and everything you'd expect. $40 per year i think, which seems well worth the price.

[cheap2clear]

Hi I have run NTL/Virgin PC Guard for years which is free and never had any problems with it. What I like about it is some times when I go on a web site looking for holidays or prices they leave a cookie or spywear when you re visit that site the price has gone up so if you go into the pcg control pannel you can find the site and what it left on your pc delete them visit the site again and you get the original lower price offered again. This is only availavle if you are on Virgin or one of the companies they took over.
I would like to know if it is a after market product and can be purchased as time is comming when I am going to dump Virgin

[Spyder1942]

AVG8 let loads of trogans on to my computer and i had a job getting rid of them.hundreds.Cloged up AVG8.Now i use PC tools free.

[heatemyfather]

I used to use the free version of avast, it was well useless. I had about 40 worms, trojans and viruses running on my pc and about 10 in my operating memory. Avast missed all of them.

it was obvious something was wrong, when my pc started reseting itself randomly. until I installed nod32 which picked them all up and destroyed them.

Hmm, perhaps I shall seek out this nod32 and give it a try.

wouldn't it make more sense to use bootcamp instead of an emulator to run windows?

Yes, but I am on Tiger and the BootCamp beta has expired. Besides, I would find it damned inconvenient having to reboot when all I want to do is run a self-extracting archive or something like that (those annoying exe files that can't be run on anything but Windows!) It's probably one of these that got me the virus / trojan in the first place, grr!

[cruellady]

A friend of mine who tried AVG 8 has bought Zone Alarm instead, which is apparently just as good or better than AVG, certainly easier to get on with and faster than AVG 8 by the sounds of things.

Norton/AVG etc are virus scanners, and Zone Alarm is a firewall - they are entirely different beasties. If you have a broadband router, these usually have fierce, inbuilt firewalls, so all you need is a virus scanner.

A firewall monitors realtime activity on your connection i.e. if you click on a webpage, launch an infected program, or reply to someone on a chat program and it/they tries to insert summat on to your PC from the net, it'll kill it, or warn you not to proceed. It may also spot some, but not all, threats when you download your email.

A virus scanner is more passive - it'll look at your email as it comes in, and scan your files, registry and boot sector when you want for stuff that's already snuck in. AVG8 has the more pro-active linkscanner, which checks all links on a webpage, and warns you if you click something dodgy. But I agree that it's a pig - I switched this bit off, as it doesn't distinguish between page content and advertisments.

If you're looking for security without paying for it, I've found that you have to use a belt-and-braces approach, and put in a bit of extra time and effort to learn how the programs work, and how to configure them.

1) Virus Scanning. I have Win2K, so AVG8 is fine for me. If you're using XP, a combination of this and another freeware virus scanner as suggested above should cover you, but make sure they're not running on start up, or they'll slow your machine to a crawl.

2) For a firewall, if you're on dial up or cable, I've found with XP that Commodo works better than ZoneAlarm, and it will work alongside the XP firewall if you hit it repeatedly with a stick - again, you need to fiddle with it a bit, and it can depend on your hardware setup.

3) Spyware - AdAware, plus free online scans - AVG have also added some spyware definitions now, so you can nut them a little more easily.

4) A Registry cleaner - a number of free ones available for occasional use, which will remove potential vulnerabilities left by viruses/trojans/non-secure programs that you have removed in the past.

If you have Vista - my sympathies. There are instructions online to roll back to XP. Or give up and install Linux Ubuntu with a Windows emulator - no need for virus scanners. It might freeze occasionally, but it'll work better that your present operating system. Sorry.

Cru
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