Which antivirus app do you like and why?

locutus24 said:
Dont defend norton
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That is probably the funniest thing i have read on [h] ever..

ANYWAYS, im from oregon too, maybe thats why this guy is so funny
 
Hey i have used norton, i do believe sir that i can say whatever i want about norton. My computer has been compromised so many times when i was running norton, a few times i almost had to get out my knoppix live cd. But then again a couple of those times were my fault, like when i attempted to manually edit the boot screen :eek: Didnt quite work out, but still norton cause me to lose more files, and more ram then i was willing to lose.
 
thuper said:
I used to love AVG but I got the latest version a couple weeks ago and it uses so much memory. I'm just going without now because firefox and common sense work perfectly.
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Agree.
 
You really think that those two coming together would work, cause i was thinking of taking that path but wasnt sure about if it would be alright.
 
locutus24 said:
Hey i have used norton, i do believe sir that i can say whatever i want about norton. My computer has been compromised so many times when i was running norton, a few times i almost had to get out my knoppix live cd. But then again a couple of those times were my fault, like when i attempted to manually edit the boot screen :eek: Didnt quite work out, but still norton cause me to lose more files, and more ram then i was willing to lose.
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15megs Vs 10Megs of ram?
 
OMFG. There is a lot of FUD in this thread...

First, let me say Norton Corp. AV is apparently not the same as the home product. I don't have experience with this POS you folks call "Norton" but Norton Corp. is a very good product. When you broadly say "norton sucks because SAV is a POS" it's akin to saying "Ford sucks because of the Pinto." Drive a GT and lemme know if you think it sucks (don't read too much into this, I could have said GM/grand am/vette, or any other combination of manuf./bad product/good product).

Next, some companies consider different things a "virus" or not. Many are counting spyware as a virus (rightly so). So if you download a new scanner that does this and scan a machine you may find eleventy billion new "virus" that the old scanner didn't. The anecdotal "I downloaded a new scanner and it found stuff the other one missed" doesn't always mean the first scanner missed anything. It could be they simply don't consider that file a virus or not (right or wrong). Heh, it's a feature not a bug. ;)

AVG is decent for free, but it doesn't rank as high as other programs. NOD32 gets the highest rankings. There is a "standard" set of tests thrown at these, sorry I don't remember the link right now, but I can look it up if needed. Anyways, there are tests that rate each vendor's products.

As far as "XYZ is fast" I'd like to see some people quantify that statement. Do you mean it performs a full scan faster? Who cares? You scan on idle, right? If your asleep, why would it matter if one scanner takes 20 minutes and the other 22?

Memory usage is of consideration since AV will stay resident in RAM, but how lean is one vs. the other? 3MB difference or 30? "XYZ is trimmer" is a useless statement.
 
Phoenix86 said:
OMFG. There is a lot of FUD in this thread...

First, let me say Norton Corp. AV is apparently not the same as the home product. I don't have experience with this POS you folks call "Norton" but Norton Corp. is a very good product. When you broadly say "norton sucks because SAV is a POS" it's akin to saying "Ford sucks because of the Pinto." Drive a GT and lemme know if you think it sucks (don't read too much into this, I could have said GM/grand am/vette, or any other combination of manuf./bad product/good product).

Next, some companies consider different things a "virus" or not. Many are counting spyware as a virus (rightly so). So if you download a new scanner that does this and scan a machine you may find eleventy billion new "virus" that the old scanner didn't. The anecdotal "I downloaded a new scanner and it found stuff the other one missed" doesn't always mean the first scanner missed anything. It could be they simply don't consider that file a virus or not (right or wrong). Heh, it's a feature not a bug. ;)

AVG is decent for free, but it doesn't rank as high as other programs. NOD32 gets the highest rankings. There is a "standard" set of tests thrown at these, sorry I don't remember the link right now, but I can look it up if needed. Anyways, there are tests that rate each vendor's products.

As far as "XYZ is fast" I'd like to see some people quantify that statement. Do you mean it performs a full scan faster? Who cares? You scan on idle, right? If your asleep, why would it matter if one scanner takes 20 minutes and the other 22?

Memory usage is of consideration since AV will stay resident in RAM, but how lean is one vs. the other? 3MB difference or 30? "XYZ is trimmer" is a useless statement.
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My Norton Internet Security takes...about 15megs of ram that I can tell in the System Proccesses Thats Firewall, Adblocking, Anti-Virus, IM Scanning, Email Scanning, ect ect.
 
aarmenaa said:
Absolutely, under no circumstances, should you consider keeping Norton. I live on a college campus where I constantly work on people's computers. Most of them are infected with viruses, and most are using up to date copies of Norton or McAffee. I just can't understand how so much gets by; half the time the damage is so bad that I end up reinstalling Windows. Wherever you take your money, don't go there.

As a poor college student, I prefer AVG Free. It's feature complete: it can do automatic updates and scans, has a resident shield, email scanning, and a Virus Vault (quarantine).

Also, my mother can use it, which is quite a feat in itself! ;)
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I have McAfee 8.0i Enterprise version (free from my college) and it does quite well. It's caught several viruses with the resident shield, which I haven't seen anything get past so far. I've even ran AVG and PCillin, and they find nothing that McAfee has missed, either. True, this is not your average home edtion of McAfee that comes on your new Dell...
 
AuroraProject said:
Of course! :rolleyes:
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I used to work for a small biz consulting shop. Here was our standard day:

Customer comes in with virus infection.
We check their Norton AV, 90% of the time they are updated, we scan anyway.
Nothing found, even if they are fully updated (normally they are when they come in, if not we update them).
We install AVG temporarily and clean off viruses.
Uninstall AVG. Recommend AVG to customer for half the price and twice the subscription (2 years).
Customer sticks with Norton because of its branding/gold shininess.
Customer comes back later with virus problem. :D

In all fairness I hear the corporate client is loads better. But I'm an AVG man, have been for years. Free AND paid for versions. Am running the server version with Exchange plug-in on a few machines and it catches 'em all. The home user version of Norton AV is the AOL of anti-virus.
 
chronic9 said:
norton corporate 9 edition. for small use of system resources and simplicity.
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x2... i run symantec a/v corp on my computers.. it catches viruses when i go to "questionable" sites.. unpates about every week automatically.. and uses the smae amount of resources as f@h...
 
I've used both the home and corporate editions of McAfee and feel that the latter is lightyears beyond the home. It takes up far less resources and doesn't intrude on your computer usage with a bunch of warnings and virus notifications. The home edition is simply too bloated. I now have Trend Micro Internet Secuirty for my home computer and it is much more efficient than the McAfee software (home edition anyways).

BTW: You can pick up Trend Micro's software for $1.99 if you have a competitive product (so all of those with Norton or McAffee home you may want to listen up).
 
AVG Free for sure. I had Norton 04 for a while and it just slowed down my system so much, and every time I went to restart my computer an alert popped up about ending CCApp, which slowed down the restart even more. It was like day and night when I switched to AVG
 
scottatwittenberg said:
x2... i run symantec a/v corp on my computers.. it catches viruses when i go to "questionable" sites.. unpates about every week automatically.. and uses the smae amount of resources as f@h...
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I only have version 8 of corp but I agree with what you said. Norton is just fine and does a great job for me. I remember having a conversation/test with a Best buy computer guy about how Norton Corp was a piece of crap and he wanted to me to buy mcafee from BB.

Amazing people they have. Fun as hell to correct thier statement that thier product is better then what the user has when they are lieing out the ass. You get some great reactions and customer complaints against the BB employee :) Yes Im an ass, just trying to help the common customer from getting screwed. :p
 
Have any of you guys used Norton systemworks 2005? I like a lot of the features, but it adds a lot of proccesses to my machine. It comes with a disk defragmenter that's better than what windows comes with. Are there any good free defragementers? I'll need one when I possibly switch.

I have systemworks 2002 on one of my other machines, which is about to expire. So, NOD32 is a very good AV, but is not free. AVG is good and has a free version.
 
erehwon6811 said:
Have any of you guys used Norton systemworks 2005? I like a lot of the features, but it adds a lot of proccesses to my machine. It comes with a disk defragmenter that's better than what windows comes with. Are there any good free defragementers? I'll need one when I possibly switch.

I have systemworks 2002 on one of my other machines, which is about to expire. So, NOD32 is a very good AV, but is not free. AVG is good and has a free version.
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Sweet, a fellow Fort Wayner!

I used to stand by Systemworks until they started packaging Go-Back with it. Add to that the only two things I used from it were Speed Disk and Disk Doctor and you see why I didn't want to go Systemworks again. :D
 
I used norton for a long while (the home line, not corp) and was pleased with it through systemworks 2002. Every iteration since then has gotten more bloated and useless it was appalling.
2004 used a ridiculous amount of ram (~30 megs, if I recall), and took over 5 minutes to start auto-protect after a system boot. This made me start looking at alternatives.

I found AVG Free after a quick run through these forums, and I must say, I liked it. One issue did bother me, the free update server seemed to be so bogged down that sometimes my client would fail to update for days on end. It apparently gets notification to get the update, tries a couple times, then decides to wait another day... no amount of tweaking on my end would fix it, aside from sitting there and manually hammering the update button.

So I moved on to Eset NOD32, and I have to say that even though its payware, I cant believe I went without it for this long. Their virus definition update frequency is incredible. Since I bought it, I havent gone over 36 hours without a new definition file, and there have been 3 updates since I woke up this morning (~12 hours.)

I love NOD32, and I'll stick to it :D

EDIT: btw, NOD32 is currently using 12MB of ram total.

 
NOD32 is the best... why? because its excelent and uses almost no system resources...

Deffinatly not bloated like Norton
 
DaSmurf said:
it, I havent gone over 36 hours without a new definition file, and there have been 3 updates since I woke up this morning (~12 hours.)

I love NOD32, and I'll stick to it :D

EDIT: btw, NOD32 is currently using 12MB of ram total.

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I've gotten 4 updates since I've woken up, and Norton Internet Security 2003 only uses 3 more megs then NOD32.


So, unless you have 32meg of ram where every kilobit of space is important, I fail to see why everyone is bashing
 
yet another vote for AVG free. I also put f-prot on any Linux box that has samba shares on it.
 
What is NOD32? I'm not familiar with it? What does it stand for?

Thanks.
 
I use AVG, Norton, Spybot, Adware, and Microsoft's Antispyware program.

Norton, AVG, and MS run each night when I'm asleep.
 
Apallohadas said:
I use AVG, Norton, Spybot, Adware, and Microsoft's Antispyware program.

Norton, AVG, and MS run each night when I'm asleep.
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Three things :eek: where you going that you feel you need to do that, i havent even ran ad-aware lately maybe i should sometime
 
TheExile said:
AVG Free for sure. I had Norton 04 for a while and it just slowed down my system so much, and every time I went to restart my computer an alert popped up about ending CCApp, which slowed down the restart even more. It was like day and night when I switched to AVG
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So THAT'S what that is! I get the ccApp message too, man it's quite annoying.
 
Phoenix86 said:
OMFG. There is a lot of FUD in this thread...

First, let me say Norton Corp. AV is apparently not the same as the home product. I don't have experience with this POS you folks call "Norton" but Norton Corp. is a very good product. When you broadly say "norton sucks because SAV is a POS" it's akin to saying "Ford sucks because of the Pinto." Drive a GT and lemme know if you think it sucks (don't read too much into this, I could have said GM/grand am/vette, or any other combination of manuf./bad product/good product).

Next, some companies consider different things a "virus" or not. Many are counting spyware as a virus (rightly so). So if you download a new scanner that does this and scan a machine you may find eleventy billion new "virus" that the old scanner didn't. The anecdotal "I downloaded a new scanner and it found stuff the other one missed" doesn't always mean the first scanner missed anything. It could be they simply don't consider that file a virus or not (right or wrong). Heh, it's a feature not a bug. ;)

AVG is decent for free, but it doesn't rank as high as other programs. NOD32 gets the highest rankings. There is a "standard" set of tests thrown at these, sorry I don't remember the link right now, but I can look it up if needed. Anyways, there are tests that rate each vendor's products.

As far as "XYZ is fast" I'd like to see some people quantify that statement. Do you mean it performs a full scan faster? Who cares? You scan on idle, right? If your asleep, why would it matter if one scanner takes 20 minutes and the other 22?

Memory usage is of consideration since AV will stay resident in RAM, but how lean is one vs. the other? 3MB difference or 30? "XYZ is trimmer" is a useless statement.
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I've used both. I implemented (as the lead designer) a multi-tier Symantec distribution system that serves Client Security to over 7000 seats to this day. I've had multiple versions of NAV and SAV and related products on my PC's for the past 5 years. There is neither fear, nor uncertainty, nor doubt on my part. Symantec spews out shit these days. It's year after year of dealing with the same wonky behavior. NAV/SAV is about as unruly as Internet Explorer, and just as tightly wrapped into everything. Try cleaning things up on a SAV install gone bad. Good Luck
 
My personal favorite is Panda. It works great it does the updates, lets me know of and intruder, blocks it and it responds to the intruder as well. I've been using it for about 8 months now and I'm really happy with it. I used to have McAffe and is was a nightmare and a piece of shit so don't waste your money on it.
 
locutus24 said:
Three things :eek: where you going that you feel you need to do that, i havent even ran ad-aware lately maybe i should sometime
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A few reasons.

I keep my financial information on my system. I game on the system regularly. I caught kiddies trying to tap into my system before.

All in all, I've had *1* virus ever, immediately caught. And I was rather surprised where I picked it up *cough*albinoblacksheep.com*cough*. I've only had a handful of spyware actually make it on to the system and they come off right away as well.

Outside of that stuff, I'm paranoid. The voices tell me so. Sometimes they're louder than others, but my meds make it ok.
 
rcolbert said:
I've used both. I implemented (as the lead designer) a multi-tier Symantec distribution system that serves Client Security to over 7000 seats to this day. I've had multiple versions of NAV and SAV and related products on my PC's for the past 5 years. There is neither fear, nor uncertainty, nor doubt on my part. Symantec spews out shit these days. It's year after year of dealing with the same wonky behavior. NAV/SAV is about as unruly as Internet Explorer, and just as tightly wrapped into everything. Try cleaning things up on a SAV install gone bad. Good Luck
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...and yet your example is exactlly what I said, SAV, not NAV corp. Your still saying "norton sucks because SAV is a POS." Please re-read my post again. Everything else if FUD. IE you "doubt" symantec's ability, but provide little example outside SAV. Heck even if you did it's pointless.

Who cares if product X is bad, if product Y is good even if they are made by the same manufacturers? Every manuf. producs a junk product from time to time. So who you going to buy from with that logic? No one.

I like products that work. NAV corp. is a good product. I don't know about SAV, but I'm willing to accept it has issues based on numerous posts.
 
I was once a NAV user. But one day I clicket the wrong file and NAV no catchet the baddy. Yes Pa-hoe-nix, it was updated. I was there with you once. I was a NAV pusher. But..... fyi - I have the NAV corp version on my server and it works just fine...but I really don't use my server for much so...

So I looked around and saw the NOD32 was the best. But I'm a dirt poor hick from the guettos of chi-town and I can't afford it.

So AVG gets installed on all PCs! Mine, friend's, family's, customer's....everybody! It's easy to use. It updates itself nicely (never had a server connection problem.) And it's FREE.

AVG for me.
 
Apallohadas said:
A few reasons.

I keep my financial information on my system. I game on the system regularly. I caught kiddies trying to tap into my system before.

All in all, I've had *1* virus ever, immediately caught. And I was rather surprised where I picked it up *cough*albinoblacksheep.com*cough*. I've only had a handful of spyware actually make it on to the system and they come off right away as well.

Outside of that stuff, I'm paranoid. The voices tell me so. Sometimes they're louder than others, but my meds make it ok.
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Im only paranoid with deleting information, not storing it.
 
pulldownyourpants said:
I was once a NAV user. But one day I clicket the wrong file and NAV no catchet the baddy. Yes Pa-hoe-nix, it was updated. I was there with you once. I was a NAV pusher. But..... fyi - I have the NAV corp version on my server and it works just fine...but I really don't use my server for much so...

So I looked around and saw the NOD32 was the best. But I'm a dirt poor hick from the guettos of chi-town and I can't afford it.

So AVG gets installed on all PCs! Mine, friend's, family's, customer's....everybody! It's easy to use. It updates itself nicely (never had a server connection problem.) And it's FREE.

AVG for me.
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"Pa-hoe-nix" :confused:

Well, I have been in virus fighting mode the last few days (it's amazing how a fairly good layered approach to virus can go to shit when unprotected machines are allowed on the network, damn auditors. DIE IN A FIRE!!!) and I actually just cleaned a machine with 4 brand spanking new virus (this one was a home machine). The definitions came out yesterday for these, but what good does that do?

Anyways, AVG tends to update slower than NAV, just an FYI. It also cathces less virus according to the reports I have read (compared to NAV, NOD32, and a few others).

Can't beat free with a stick though, -eh? :)
 
Phoenix86 said:
"Pa-hoe-nix" :confused:

Anyways, AVG tends to update slower than NAV, just an FYI. It also cathces less virus according to the reports I have read (compared to NAV, NOD32, and a few others).

Can't beat free with a stick though, -eh? :)
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Sorry....got that pronunciation from a commercial....made me giggle. :p

Free is good and you're probably right about the updates, but it is free. Free meaning slower support.
 
I'll toss in my vote for:

avast: Home Edition

it's free, has caught every virus I've ever encountered and disposed of it no problems, hell its even caught files that were infected that weren't even done downloading yet. Bottom line, its way better than Norton!!!!!

Almost forgot: http://www.avast.com/
 
This is an awesome thread. I work for an ISP, and I can't stand when a customer calls up saying their email does not work but they refuse to disable their Norton Internet Security to troubleshoot. 9 times out of 10 the norton firewall is blocking email. WTF?! The other 1 time its usually the customer isn't dialed up ;)

College kids have to have McAfee installed where I'm from. When they come home from breaks I usually run AVG on their system and find around 13 viruses. I would like to blame shoddy software. I think that mainly the most popular anti-virus programs are the most targeted because they are the most used.

I love AVG, stick with it!
 
Anyone have a comparison chart handy? I have Norton SysWorks02 and I'm afraid its missing stuff (mainly because my Windows crashed :( ). I take it AVG is good, but how does it compare to Norton and Nod32 when using tests (IE, something like AVG catches 29% virii, compared to 14% for Norton)? I'm probably changing virus scanners, but I'd like to know what freeware and payware is the BEST before I jump ship.
 
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