Which anti-virus?

[valkyrie]

Thanks everyone, I've installed AVG free and it seems pretty decent.

[HTFB]

Anyone got any newer advice?

This laptop's Norton was making it just about unusable eighteen months ago, but some update must have fixed its resource-grabbing and offensive startup time. Now it's asking me to renew, at vast expense.

Do I go ahead, or switch to AVG (which was never very satisfactory on my now-dead PC), or something else? The laptop is my Beloved Stoker's, so I'll need to be able to provide justification rather than a mere gut sense for whatever course is chosen.

[vorsprung]

Norton AV software is rubbish.  It's expensive, it does not detect viriuses and it slows your computer to a crawl

I have had good results with NOD32, fsecure and Kaspersky

Kaspersky get my money at the moment.  Put a copy on vorsprung jnrs laptop a couple of weeks ago

[Sergeant Pluck]

I've always removed / deleted anything Norton on sight. However, one of the computers I set up for my parents last weekend came with Norton 360. With some trepidation I installed it in favour of my usual AVG + ZoneAlarm combination. It seemed pretty good to me and as far as I could tell used less system resources than the AVG / ZA duo. Not intrusive at all.

[saturn]

Switch! What greater justification do you need than saving money by replacing bloatware?

[Gattopardo]

I found avast to be very good and low resource uses.

[CommuteTooFar]

It really depends on how much protection you want.  The cheap lightweight anti-virus programs tend to miss a lot if the machine is fully under attack.

The programs that found the most viruses (when I looked sometime ago) are Kapersky and F-Secure.  I also noticed that Norton despite being heavywight was not better than the cheap  programs.

Personally I use F-Secure or nothing. I chose F-Secure because I had some contact with their programmers and found them capable and cooperative. (I am a device driver writer).  In general I hate anti virus drivers.  They do all kinds of intentionally undocumented techniques that break legitimate software.  If they were written perfectly you should be able to install two of them without them conflicting (very small chance of success).

[frankly frankie]

In general I hate anti virus drivers.  They do all kinds of intentionally undocumented techniques that break legitimate software. 

Set a thief to catch a thief, innit.

If I'm foolish enough to get roped in to sort someone's pest-ridden PC, I always start by telling them that they might just find the cure is worse than the ailment. 

[Jaded]

...Filofax

[HTFB]

... Linux installation CD. Yes, I know.

[Woofage]

... Linux installation CD. Yes, I know.

Buy ??

[mrcharly-YHT]

ESET NOD32 - you have to pay, but it's good, and not too resource hungry.

Big +1 from here for that.

The newest version also does things like checking if your OS has the latest security updates installed. It's not bothered about general updates, just security ones.

It's very configurable as well, you can set it to scan emails, word docs, just files on your pc, however you like it.

[fred the great]

The last couple of days my Notebook has been acting like a pig

Although I have used AVG for years I decided to try the Kaspersky on line scan. 3 hours later the updated download was finished and then another 1.5 hours to do a critical scan resulted in three .exe files from Nirsoft reported to be viruses

Is this correct? I don't use Nirsoft so this was promptly fired but I would like to know of any other experiences.

For the record, I have never had any issues with AVG or Spybot which have been my protection for Microshaft XP although infrequently used these days

[nuttycyclist]

ESET NOD32 - you have to pay, but it's good, and not too resource hungry.

Big +1 from here for that.

The newest version also does things like checking if your OS has the latest security updates installed. It's not bothered about general updates, just security ones.

It's very configurable as well, you can set it to scan emails, word docs, just files on your pc, however you like it.

Do NOT do what my neighbour did.

Nod32 trial version plus bit torrent "nod32 fix" to up the trial days from 30 to x million.

IT IS A TROJAN.

AV disabled, backdoor stuff installed, blah blah blah.



That was a happy afternoon's cleaning 

[mattc]

I'm in the process of rebuilding an elderly (and feeble) XP laptop, so this thread has been useful. I'm particularly concerned with making the most of the poor thing's resources:

A few posters seem of the opinion that AV is more trouble than it's worth - anyone care to elaborate? What exactly is AV software doing for us (beyond the protection of a firewall)? Is downloading stuff from untrustworthy sources the biggest danger?

(I seem to recall having a PC for years without AV software and not having any trouble - maybe those were younger, more naive days!)

[ian]

I'm in the process of rebuilding an elderly (and feeble) XP laptop, so this thread has been useful. I'm particularly concerned with making the most of the poor thing's resources:

A few posters seem of the opinion that AV is more trouble than it's worth - anyone care to elaborate? What exactly is AV software doing for us (beyond the protection of a firewall)? Is downloading stuff from untrustworthy sources the biggest danger?

(I seem to recall having a PC for years without AV software and not having any trouble - maybe those were younger, more naive days!)

I have always run an AV on Windows machines - probably always will - that said, I've never had a virus even detected.

General commonsense is probably the best AV we have. If you follow a link to download a free version of PhotoShop CS4, and download said package, you're probably getting a little 'extra'. If a pop-up tells you have a virus and click here to remove it - clicking there probably isn't a good idea. Free goat p0rn? It probably isn't.

And oh look, a friend you've not heard from for ages has emailed you pictures of a naked celebrity. How kind.

Given the number of machines I have cleaned up over the years, I can deduce that commonsense is not in overabundance. Folders full of mucky videos on the other hand, seem very abundant.

Basic AVs and firewalls have a minimal footprint and do the job just as well as the full bloated security suites.

[Wendy]

I see a fair number of email viruses get dumped by my AV.  I wouldn't run a machine without a firewall and good AV, personally.

[mattc]

I see a fair number of email viruses get dumped by my AV.

Do you mean viruses that affect Outlook? Or virii in email attachments?

[Pancho]

I'm on a Linux machine and have not got any AV.

I know that Linux is supposed to be safer in this respect but am I being a little bit reckless?

That said, I can't even find an AV package from my recent brief search.

[fred the great]

I have AV on  Ubuntu. I think I installed it from the synaptic package manager.

Too busy to check at this moment

[mr endon]

While we're on the subject - or very near it - what disc cleaner do you all  recommend? Have been happily using Piriform CCleaner for some time, but installing latest variants triggers a flurry of Comodo virus/malware/trojan alerts.

[border-rider]

I'm on a Linux machine and have not got any AV.

I know that Linux is supposed to be safer in this respect but am I being a little bit reckless?

That said, I can't even find an AV package from my recent brief search.

Clam AV is in the repositories.

It never finds anything though, and (rather annoyingly) it messes with T-Bird so that when I click on certain attachments it virus-scans them instead of opening them.

I periodically get sufficiently irritated by this to remove it, and then think better and put it back.  I'm not convinced it's worth the hassle though.

[Bluebottle]

ClamAV does find things if you stick a student's infected USB into yr machine and scan it.  I tend to use it as a way of removing nasties without compromising the many porous windows machines at the work.

[border-rider]

ClamAV does find things if you stick a student's infected USB into yr machine and scan it. 

Sorry, I meant that there's not usually anything for it to find on my machine and emails - not that it doesn't work

It did find something once - we were in Turkey, giving presentations at a meeting in a hotel with a Win computer with out-of-date AV, and just as expected my memory stick picked up a trojan  - which Clam found and dealt with.

[Bluebottle]

Wasn't meant to be a disagreement, just an extension.

Same as yourself, I never find anything other than scanning USBs from itenerant infected students.  I agree - tis ver' ver' useful whilst on travels with work.  One of our agents in India is notorious for infecting any machine whose direction he has vaguely looked in.  Clam has tidied this up on numerous occassions.