Anti-Virus

[Charger440]

Since Fred brought up the topic a little while back...

What is your favorite Anti-Virus and why?

[Trajet]

Norton............................

Runs & hides.
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[Charger440]

umm......

[wmmiller]

I don’t really have a favorite but I have used MSE/Defender, SUPERAntiSpyware Professional and Malwarebytes Professional for years and I don’t have issues with crapware and viruses. I use IE, always have. I can’t stand Norton and Google Chrome. I know I may be in the minority on this but it works for me and it has worked well.

Bill

[Brink]

MSE/Defender.

Reasons?

0. Yes, 0. They are free. (and computer lists start with 0 lol)

1. Philosophical. MS sells windows as their flagship product. Their AVsofts are free because if your windows is jacked up, you may decide you want to get yourself some iOS or linux or something. So their reason for providing it is to keep you as a windows user.

2. Performance related. MSE/Defender have little effect on system performance. Many other AV solutions have a moderate to severe impact on overall performance.

3. MSE/Defender are not very intrusive. Many other solutions are "in your face" with bell and whistle dialog boxes and popup windows that are about "hey - look what we just did for you. aren't we great"

4. No matter what you use, it's a game of leapfrog: Some fool writes a virus, then someone writes a detection routine, then another/better virus, then another/better detection routine etc etc. It just depends on where they are in the game when you come along and click that by mistake.

No antivirus software will make up for the lack of regular backups. No antivirus software will protect you from everything. No antivirus software will make you free of consequence from clicking every damn thing you find in your email box. No antivirus software will do for you what bench session with a qualified tech can do.

If they really must explore all those unscrupulous links, I recommend a virtual machine not antivirus.

[Fred]

I agree with brink, especially with points 0, 2 and 3. I stopped recommending avast, for instance since the version 7, because it became too heavy. Only very powerful machines can handle it without loosing at least 50% of overall performance. And now it starts also giving network problems, it's definitely put aside.

I also like Avira and AVG, but they are quite intrusive, as Brink mentioned.

My recommended payed ones are Kaspersky and Eset.

[Charger440]

OK, I guess since y'all chimed in, I will answer my own question.

I still use and recommend Avast but NOT if all your going to do is go through and click next. In recent versions Avast has kind of gone the way of Norton. We all know the general feeling on Norton now and it was once the greatest AV there was. I find that if you do a custom install and uncheck most of the additional stuff that has shown up recently it still runs fairly well. It does have popups but they are far less than Avira (This may have changed since I have not use Avira in a while) and the popups are related to special offers on buying it and to let you know important software is out of date.

To compare this to MSE/Defender; MSE stays silent because they are not trying to sell you anything but the fact that it stays silent can also be an issue. It sometimes functions similar to Chrome and Firefox in the regard that it will block stuff sometimes and not tell you why.

I do like Kaspersky for a paid one, it seems pretty solid and runs pretty well.

As far as keeping clear of viruses and spyware, nothing works as well as common sense. But, that's what keeps us in business huh?

Brink, Yep it's a base 10 system.... Always starts with 0. Try explaining to average Joe that all Base 10(Standard math) starts with 0 not 1

[wmmiller]

Yes, backups. Even after telling people they need a backup system and offering solutions they still don’t do it. They say, yea I know, I need to do that soon but then don’t. It seems they are the first to crap their pants and cry like a little girl when their pictures are gone. I guess, that’s what they get.

[Charger440]

The best time to sell backup software is AFTER someone should have used it