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Which Anti-Virus Software Do You Use?  

5 members have voted

  1. 1. Which Anti-Virus Software Do You Use?

    • Symantec/Norton
      4
    • McAfee
      5
    • Kaspersky
      3
    • AVG
      4
    • Avast
      3
    • Trend Micro/PCCillin
      1
    • NOD 32
      2
    • F-Secure
      1
    • Other (describe below)
      7
    • Morally opposed to the use of prophylactics
      1


Recommended Posts

Posted

Selfishly posted, because I want to switch. So what do you use and why? Note your OS too...

 

Motherhood is the strangest thing, it can be like being one's own Trojan horse, :reallyconfused:

Buffy

Posted

I use McAfee. It's very simple to use, and very reliable.

I don't know what the competition looks like, but McAfee seems to do the job quite well. It auto updates every day, it has a really easy security interface, fully customizable settings, and it catches just about everything with its VirusScan.

 

It also helps prevent spam and popups, and provides warnings for various websites. Love it.

Posted

I have used CheckPoint ZoneAlarm Antivirus for quite a while and I'm very happy with it. Small footprint and easy to configure. It tells me when programs try to get online.

 

Edit: OS: Win XP SP2

Posted

I use Spysweeper AV on my XP setup (P4 3.2ghz, 1GB mem). It has active spyware/malware/virus/trojan detection and is very light on resources.

Task Manager is showing it using 11k memory and it oscillates between 00 and 02 for cpu usage. I do a lot of music production, so every little resource counts and this one is hardly noticeable when in the background.

 

The downside is that it takes about an hour and a half to do a complete scan, but YMMV. The scan time doesn't bother me though as it catches everything on the way in, so I never have to scan, and when I do (mainly for low priority spyware), I just leave it running while I'm away.

 

I don't even use a firewall anymore and have had no problems. :omg:

 

I've tried a few of them on the list, so I'll post my experience with them as it may help you. (btw, I had a computer repair biz a few years ago, so I speak from experience FWIW :hihi:)

 

avg free - Probably the best choice for free, but does not actively protect and is rather heavy on the resources. No support.

 

avast - I briefly tried this one while 'shopping' for an upgrade from avg free. It was easy to use, but it detected far less than the others I tried.

 

Norton - Total nightmare! It attempts to 'take over' your system with a bulky interface, annoying popups, and very little in the way of customized user settings. Avoid like the plague.

 

Mcafee - Better than Norton, but I also found it too invasive. It does seem to be pretty good at scanning, but it's "Norton-esque" attributes turn me off.

 

Trend - Trend has got it together! If I wasn't using Spysweeper, I would be using Trend. It's interface is no nonsense and it gets the job done.

 

The problem is that no one cure exists. I've had to resort to combinations to clean my clients' computers. In my experience, Spysweeper was the most effective at finding and removing trojans.

Posted

I was concerned that the poll was not getting a lot of votes, until I realized I missed a very important option on the list that was certainly not covered by the "Other" option, so I've added it...

 

Not barefoot and pregnant,

Buffy

Posted

I've never used AV software on any of my machines. On plenty of occasions I've had to clean and protect someone else's machine and I usually install AVG for them. I also keep a copy of ClamWin Portable on my thumb drive for these types of calls in case I run into an infected box that is unable to access the internet.

Posted

That list does not tell the truth. First of all the time is much longer than it actually takes, and secondly it does have an estimated time & a timer, and it offers p2p protection.

Posted
I was concerned that the poll was not getting a lot of votes, until I realized I missed a very important option on the list that was certainly not covered by the "Other" option, so I've added it...

 

...but where's the fish? :turtle:

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