Recommended antivirus?

^ I personally don't know any good antivirus programs and I don't trust Norton at all since it sucks period. Anyone know a anti virus that is worth using?

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I use Avast! myself and have had no trouble with it or viruses since installing it some 6 months ago.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

I've got Avast on my windows partition. It seems like one of the best free ones. I had Antivir (the free version) before Avast, and it was okay. It displayed an ad every time it checked for updates though, which was sort of annoying.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Is Norton really not that good? I've been using the 2003 version for quite some time, and didn't really think it was that bad...I also admit that I really have nothing to compare it to, though...

Maybe I'll give this Avast a try...

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Hmm I've been using AVG for years and never got infected with a virus since. But I have to ask. Is Avast better than AVG? Or is this purely based on preference?

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If AVG has worked fine for you for so long, I wouldn't worry with changing. I doubt Avast is significantly superior or inferior to it. I am, however, heavily biased against both Norton and McAfee. The bias is based on a personal experience, but it's a bias nonetheless. And besides, if I can choose between free and $60 or so plus a yearly update fee, I'm gonna go with free every time.

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Common sense > antivirus. Saves a lot of resources.
I've been virus and antivirus free for 3 years, exept that time that my FUCKING MP3 PLAYER came with one.

FELIPE NO

That said, of the paid solutions, Norton is usually considered the best (the other two primary options being McAfee and Microsoft OneCare). I've never had a problem with Norton myself, so I'd recommend it.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

best paid antivirus
NOD32 http://www.eset.com/

i use AVG Free and it has protected me a couple times (though i do agree if you don't do <use your imagination > on your computer, you have no need for an antivirus)

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by ShadowVlican

best paid antivirus
NOD32 http://www.eset.com/

Seconded. F-Prot being the runner-up.

Out of all the virus problems I ever faced:

NOD32 removed everything but one virus dll over a period of years (on a computer having something like 800 viruses on it, due to being a service-pack-less WinXP exposed to porn sites with Internet Explorer 6. Even so, it catched every other virus that said dll was trying to generate afterwards, making it easy to manually take care of. I gotta say, the windows desktop looked extremely funky on that computer. I couldn't figure out how to restore desktop wallpapers on that broken installation ever since, without the nuking of a whole user account.).

F-Prot worked well, but every once in a while it didnt even offer options to delete an infected file. Resulting in continous nag screens sometimes. It worked fine and caught almost everything I threw at it though. A nasty virus which trojaned itself as freaking Explorer.exe (shutting it down killed the windows gui too, and restarting it restarted the virus as well) proved smarter though, F-Prot kinda choked on that and I had to manually disinfect the explorer shell and then clean up the rest with NOD32 - later I noticed that NOD32 actually found more stuff then fprot could.

I also used Norton for a while, but then ditched it when I noticed the extreme resource consumption and overall lack of effectiveness (got dozens of viruses on computers shielded by Norton).

NOD32 and F-Prot both used extremely minimal resources, I have NOD32 installed on my moms CELERON 400 running WINXP, and it causes absolutely no (noticable) performance hit.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Cam

Common sense > antivirus. Saves a lot of resources.
I've been virus and antivirus free for 3 years, exept that time that my FUCKING MP3 PLAYER came with one.

I have to second this one. In part because I'm a Mac user and thus somehow entitled to be a smug asshole, but even on my Windows box I've had no need for AV software.

I've been thinking about getting an AV app, and was about to start this very same thread myself, but I keep going back and forth between "I'm an InfoSec specialist and I should know better" and "I've been fine so far, why bother?" Also of concern is that I'm working on an unattended XP install and don't want to look up yet another set of silent install switches, unattended-friendly versions, etc. Not to mention that commercial/for-pay software is out of the question as I know of no way to automate the unattended application of cracks.

I do consider firewall software to be a slightly different story--not so much to keep unfriendlies out (I'm already behind a nice high-end hardware firewall) but rather because every fucking app under the sun these days wants to phone home and report god-knows-what bullshit back to its corporate masters and a software "application warden" style firewall is a nice way to smack them down and say "no soup for you." Of course CheckPoint decided to remove key unattended functionality from the free version of ZoneAlarm so it's even harder for me to integrate it into my hands-off install. Fuckers.

Sorry to 'jack the thread, but on a related note to the author's inquiry, anyone know of a good freeware firewall that doesn't have 10,000,000 nag screens, "special limited-time offers," and other crap that would impede a smooth unattended setup?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.