Best virus protection?

[BigMike]

so I got a lot of flak for symantec, what out there is better? How about AVG?

The reason I use Symantec is because its free through my ol' school. AVG is free...... what else is good out there thats free, or REALLY cheap?

[BigMike]

Oh yeah, and this is for windows XP PRO
(i'm going back to it. I had my fun with 2003, but its pretty big ;) )

[BigMike]

an' as long as we are on the subject, what should I turn off through msconfig when setting up my new install of XP?

[binary visions]

I've used AVG for a while, and it's been solid for me. Avast! is another good program that's also free.

Virus Bulletin rates and tests anti-virus programs:
http://www.virusbtn.com/index

As far as the services go, do a Google search for Windows XP services. There are many webpages that tell you exactly what each service does and which ones are safe to shut off.

[corey_freerider]

I use Avast! along side with Webroot Spy Sweeper which is not free but it is an amazing program.

[V-Dub GTI]

i use norton but it is not exactly "Cheap"

[Ridemonkey]

I used Norton for the longest time, but managed to still get viruses despite all the autoupdates, and whatnot. I've been using AVG for the last year or so, and it's been much better, and free...can't complain there.

[narlus]

norton is a total resource hog.

i used panda and it was fine, but when the 1 year service was up i switched over to free AVG. so far, so good.

[jonKranked]

I use linux.

[corey_freerider]

yeah norton sucks. alot of the free ones seem to be better.

[BUCKET]

Go with AVG or Panda. Trend Micro may have a decent product as well - not sure on that one.

[sanjuro]

My unbiased opinion, based on the people who work for Symantec, is that Norton products are the absolute best...

[binary visions]

I hear those guys who work at Symantic play too many video games and it rots their brain :nonono:

[sanjuro]

I hear those guys who work at Symantic play too many video games and it rots their brain :nonono:
Well, I hear that Symantec employees are too trusting with sending cash online to dubious sellers....

edit: I guess it is true about playing too much video games. GTA rocks!

[syadasti]

norton is a total resource hog.

Thats what you get for using the consumer edition :oink:

The corporate edition works acceptably and uses minimal resources as long as you aren't doing a complete system scan.

Avast! would probably be the best free protection for the average joe. Antivir PE Free has a better engine and virus response time but isn't as user friendly or full featured.

[narlus]

how is Avast! measureably better than others? just curious.

[syadasti]

how is Avast! measureably better than others? just curious.

Among free scanners it offers more protocol specific features and is more user friendly. It consistently beats out well known free scanners like AVG Free in comparisons(1 (http://www.av-comparatives.org/seiten/comparatives.html), 2 (http://www.virusbtn.com), 3 (http://www.pcworld.com/article/124475-1/article.html), 4 (http://antivirus.about.com/od/antivirussoftwarereviews/a/freeav.htm). It also is one of the free antivirus programs that supports x64 Windows (including the latest public build of Vista), Linux, and most languages. Avast! also offers free technical support on their free version scanner (most don't offer any support for free products).

Antivir PE has a superior antivirus engine (among free engines, including Avast!) and a history of faster antivirus signature generation but requires manual setup for multiple daily updates, is pretty feature bare, and has a pop-up reminding you to buy the full version every time you update your definitions.

edit - fix:
AV-PE's *Notifier* sometimes pops-up at the start of a download, with some blurb about AntiVir's commercial version. Blocking notifier with your firewall will NOT work. Neither will changing the name of Notifier's exe.

Notifier can be blocked on WinXP as follows...
Control Panel > admin tools > local security policy > additional rules -- right click and choose new hashrules -- browse for and add avnotify.exe (shows as a lot of letters and numbers) and set this rule to "dont allow" - OK

I've used both free programs, but I've never gotten an infection on any computer I've owned with or without virus protection. I did once get a virus on a computer in lab at Lucent, but it was running no virus protection and was already infected when I was assigned to it.

Here is some good advice:

f you plan to buy an Anti-Virus, please visit the vendor's site and evaluate their software by downloading a trial version, as there are also many other features (e.g. firewall, scriptblocker, etc.) and important things (e.g. compatibility, graphical user interface, speed, language, price, update frequence, etc.) for an Anti-Virus that you should evaluate by yourself. Even if quite important, the detection rate is just one aspect that you should consider when buying Anti-Virus software.

I use SAV corporate edition client/server at work.

As far as malware (ad/spyware) scanners, we recently evaluated them and for the corporate space the only suitable solutions we found were Webroot spysweeper and CA pest patrol. Spysweeper seems to be the superior managed client/server Malware solution. Malware is a much bigger problem IMHO than viruses, but we've had a big reduction in both since I've started working there with a much more restrictive firewall configuration I instituted.

[corey_freerider]

I read on a forum somewhere I don't remember but it was for Avast! and it showed a log of how often they updated their virus database and it was almost 2 times a day im not sure how the others do. I suppose I don't know too much about the others I had Norton and didn't like it. I have Avast! now and I do like it. It updates everyday automatically, I'm sure like the others? Anyway thats my opinion. I usually don't have toooo many virus encounters anyway. If something seems fishy Avast! seems to catch it right away. Way more commonly I have trouble with spyware..etc etc and I run Spysweeper for that, I may be repeating myself here from an earlier post, but Spysweeper catches Everything! It's a really great program, and would recommend it. Those are my opinions.

[dgrif]

AVG. I've used it for a while now and love it.. I took a trojan/downloader from my parents computer to analyze. Mcafee pro corp edition didnt identify it on their computer, but AVG ID'd it right away. Great software and easy to use. Free edition isn't super feature packed, but for home use who cares? as long as it updates frequently, you can scan on demand and it scans on file write thats all the average home user needs anyway. my 2c.

grif