Free anti virus software?

[ballistic]

As you can see everybody reSponding is saying xyz is best due mainly because that's the flavour of virus protection they have. Most of us only know the product we use. The best one is the one you feel most comfortable using. If you are OK manually updating once a week pick x, if you're happy running and interpreting scans choose y, if you want to use one with no user intervention pick z. They are all much of a muchness, I personally have used Symantec products since Norton DOS days and know their products very well, I have no evidence it is better than another. I never had a problem with viruses, IsAs you can see everybody reponding is saying xyz is best due mainly because that's the flavour of virus protection they have. Most of us only know the product we use. The best one is the one you feel most comfortable using. If you are OK manually updating once a week pick x, if you're happy running and interpreting scans choose y, if you want to use one with no user intervention pick z. They are all much of a muchness, I personally have used Symantec products since Norton DOS days and know their products very well, I have no evidence it is better than another. I've never had a problem with viruses, is it down to me or AV software?

Sorry... can't resist. Can a virus package affect your cut & paste functions?

 

[repomanbe]

Sorry... can't resist. Can a virus package affect your cut & paste functions?

Doh! Feckin Ipad


Meant to cut a sentence from the end and move it to the top.

 

[Deleted account 190920001]

Microsoft security essentials. We use the paid for version at work its that good. Only difference between the two is the licensing and you can put the paid version on a server OS

 

[STUBBS]

avg on my samsung netbook

 

[Popell]

IMHO, lose Norton, forget Mcafee always have been too big for their own good.
Used AVG for years on all the machines I have worked on but in the last year that too has got to be major bloatware.
Rather surprisingly my fave for the last 8 months or so is Microsoft Essentials, works well and not too heavy on resources.

Not used but read good things about Avast too

HTH

 

[john1215]

Like many people here I too used AVG Free on my daughter's PC and if I'm honest she had no issues until a week ago when she downloaded an image of Barack Obama for homework. Hidden with the image was a Trojan scam program called System Fix. If you haven't yet heard of System Fix then you ought to view what might happen. AVG didn't stop it and before my daughter had clicked anywhere she lost access to all windows facilities such as My Computer, Control Panel, System Restore etc etc, it also hid all of her documents and removed all of the folders she had saved her work in.
To cut a long story short, removing System Fix is not easy. Myself and my wife both have Mcafee installed and running in the background, we don't know it is there. My daughter now has Mcafee on on PC (Vista) and to prove that it worked I clicked on the same photograph that caused the problems in the first place and Mcafee jumped in, identified the file as a Trojan and removed it.
I know AVG is good and it is free but beware, you get what you pay for(or not as the case may be)

john1215

 

[Pauly S]

ditto..

and then found microshit had launched Microsoft security essentials.
It is much less intrusive than any other anti virus I have tried, is free, and does not bring the computer to a halt as many others do. A total recommendation. Upgrades without even telling you it is doing so.
My experiences with both McAfee & Norton make me fear them more than viruses.
Myke

+1...

 

[gipsymagpie]

Defintely malwarebytes + whatever floats your AV boat. By the way malwarebytes is well worth paying for. It dug out some nasty stuff on mine.