Anti-Virus Software

[crockett]

I'm looking for an Anti-Virus software that is freeware or shareware. I'm running Windows XP. Is their something out their considered far and above everything else?

I realize Norton is the leader but I would rather not spend the money at this time.

Thanks in advance.

[Adde]

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=1344014&page=4&view=colla psed&sb=5&o=14&fpart=1#Post1355516

[itsmarty]

AVG from Grisoft.

http://free.grisoft.com/freeweb.php/doc/2/

Martin

[crockett]

Thanks for the reply.

Just so others know...this link is an EXCELLENT link for Spyware. I am looking for Ant-Virus software.

Thanks though.

[Izaak_Walton]

Re:Norton
IMHO not paying $3/month (10 cents/day) is "penny-wise-and-pound-foolish" when you consider the nightmare of getting infected. Cheap insurance--it is automatically updated every couple of days--I can't believe anything that's free can offer this level of protection.

[itsmarty]

See my link to AVG. Free, auto-updates as often as the others, has a normal user interface (no more difficult for newbies than commercial products).

Martin

[crockett]

Martin,

I did see that link. Thank you by the way.

In doing my own searching I also found avast! which has a very professional looking website (for whatever that is worth) and of course it advertises the we'll do it all as well.

Any experience or comments as to one over the other?

Thanks in advance.

[mosuavea]

I would go with one called Antivir. Avast is good but it is quite slow and hogs a lot of RAM and AVG doesn't look to do as hot as some other free anti-virus software.

One mans opinion of Antvir (http://www.schadentech.com/Reviews/Antivirus/antivir.htm)

The link will give you some pros and cons of antivir and also has a review of 11 anti-virus programs and Antivir came out on top for the free programs. You can take a look at those and figure which one you want to choose.

[itsmarty]

I've never used any other free ones, but I'm sure there are other quality choices. We've been using AVG in my house for several years without problems, but we also use Mozilla for mail and web browsing so we haven't tested our antivirus solution like IE/OE people do /images/graemlins/smile.gif

Martin

(btw, the "see my link" comment was for Isaak, who didn't know about free solutions that updated like the commerical ones)

[Izaak_Walton]

Thanks for the info--

One thing that I just cannot understand is how companies like these that give their product away (also Mozilla/Firefox) can afford to pay their people and stay in business? Any theories???

[Alobar]

because people lime me use the free one for a while and then buy the retail version

I have and reccomend AVG

[itsmarty]

For a lot of companies using this model, word of mouth from the free version brings attention they wouldn't get by entering a crowded field with only a commercial offering. We certainly wouldn't be talking about AVG today if they didn't have a free product.

Other organizations make their money off of support, like mysql (database) and snort (intrusion detection), which are free with no restrictions, but are sufficiently complex that it's easier/cheaper in many cases to pay for support than to have experts in house. While you lose the free aspect, you're still ahead of many strictly commercial solutions due to not being stuck in upgrade hell with regard to new versions.

I honestly have no idea how Mozilla is funded these days. It grew out of a Sun/AOL alliance, which worked for them because both companies stood to gain from any erosion in Microsoft's browser dominance.

It's a totally different paradigm, but as someone making their living supporting free software (linux, apache, postfix), I hope it continues /images/graemlins/smile.gif

Martin

[Kenrick]

AVG. It's free and is as good as if not better than everything else. The last time I used Norton, it missed two or three viruses that AVG and another free online scanner (Panda?) caught.

[Hiding]

ditto on AVG for me, whipped on Norton's and its free. Updates almost everyday now and does email scans in and out. Since I started using it (2 years ago?) not one virus

[mosta]

I know you specified freeware, but I just wanted to raise the issue of your passing comment re norton, that it is the leader in for-pay. I'm not running antivirus, but I've trialed a couple and never found a thing. But in one of my phases of fear, I did as much online research as I could and the message that I got was that Norton and McAffee were both slow and system hogs and had other issues. and that the cheapest leanest and fastest was EZ Trust now owned by Computer Associates. somehow I got the idea if I was going to buy one, I should buy that one. anyone care to differ?

[Hiding]

I won't comment on any others, but I have always heard that Norton's was about as much protection (firewall and anti-virus) as toilet paper, and once its on, god help you removing it (I went through the uninstall once a year ago, unless they changed it, it sucks)

[crockett]

O.k. I'm the one who started this so I thought I'd add some.

I ended up going with Antivir. The link in this thread that compares a lot of Anti-Virus software is decent. The content is fairly shallow but provides enough information for someone like me who is nob and needed to make a fairly quick decision. Whoever provided that link, thank you, because I was just about to install avast! and after reading that article and the rest of the posts it would now be my last choice of three I have heard about (Antivir, avast! and AVG).

I choose antivir because I hate programs that hog memomry and it was the leanest but also had the highest detection rate in testing. The one drawback to antivir is that there were several complaints about long download times for the updates. This could end up being my mistake because where I live only dial-up is available. We'll see how it pans out. Apparently the problem lies in the fact that they don't do incremental updates but have plans to switch this in the near future.

AVG got very good reviews but had a much lower detection rate and used a bit more memory so I went with Antivir.

I tried it last night and it performed exactly as advertised. Very easy install and very easy to use.

I first ran MacAfee Stinger (free virus detection scan) and it picked up 10 hits. Then after some other stuff I installed Antivir and it picked up 19 more hits. I did a bunch of protection related stuff to my computer (mostly following the spyware link from a fellow 2+2er) last night. After I was all done, I rebooted and I am very happy to say it looks like 1 of my 2 problems are fixed. Fortunately, it was the BIG one.

I just have one little nagging problem left were my hourglass will continually flash. Off for 15-30 seconds, on for 2-5 seconds, no matter what I am doing.

Thanks to everyone who contributed.

[Kenrick]

[ QUOTE ]
'm not running antivirus,

[/ QUOTE ]

Since it's free, you really should. /images/graemlins/smile.gif AVG and Kerio personal firewall and you're good to go.

[mosta]

thanks. I took the advice and got anti-vir today. and I've had zone alarm for a while. my debut scan turned up one alleged trojan horse, in the java run-time environment (which I suspect was just a vulnerability in the code, not an honest to god infection...). I was a little worried about slowing down my performance, but so far I notice no noticeable change.