Looking for a Good Antivirus....

[rd2005]

Hey, I'm looking for a solid/good Antivirus/Spyware program for my computer. My Norton just ended & as usual it is causing problems (100% CPU usage being used keeps showing up & computer is running slow) even though usage looks ok. Anyways I want to get rid of Norton. What do you all use for computer protection? What do you all recommend?

[Scottt89]

AVG Free edition, and Zone Alarm free Firewall.

[CJM]

Avast, its quite good and never had a problem. AVG is good also, but it didnt pick up everything avast did for me.

[Honda#4]

Norton 360 is the only one I trust. I had Kaspersky when I bought my comp and it was a issue pit for me, very doggy and it didn't catch everything that 360 does. My mom had AVG and I swear it came with viruses on it, it took the HD out in a year, she put 360 on now and not one problem since then. McAfee doesn't come close to picking stuff up compared to 360 and no one I know runs that.

Don't believe all that free crap online, it doesn't take much for a Trojan to slip pass them, some come with viruses on them and people don't notice until its to late.

Just my .02

[OutlawBill]

NOD32 will not slow down your PC

[kbnorth99]

I have had good luck with AVG as Scott89 recommended but the best I have found so far has been the Microsoft Security Essentials. It is free and it's from Microsoft so it works very well with the Windows OS. I work for a software development company so we are pretty particular about our software and our entire organization uses the Microsoft software on a corporate level. Millions of dollars are on the line and it's what we trust.

[TRX_450]

Panda Security hands down

[ZeroLogic]

I use Avast, but AVG is good as well. Northern plain sucks period.

[motochamp250]

another vote for avast

[fastredrider44]

avast here as well

[Canadian144]

Get a Mac, then you don't have to run one!

[rd2005]

Lot's of forum users like Avast...looking into it. My Norton is good but pricey & I think when the subscription runs out their program makes you have trouble & I certainly think that's crappy! Regarding a Mac no thank you. Never could really get the feel for that brand of computer. My sister had one & I hated using it. I want to get an anti-virus that people use & like...reviews today on stuff just aren't really reliable anymore.
Let me ask one more question if you have an external hard drive are they worth the money & purpose? Do they work & are they hard to figure out how to use? I'm sure hook-up is easy but how about program installation & actual usage (moving files over)? My need for one would be to put my pictures/videos on & some documents. I think my pictures & videos are just taking up space & I certainly don't want to loose them.

[CJM]

I HIGHLY dislike norton and macafee (coincidentally they are both made b symantec!)

I refer to them as bloatware. They HOG every available resource on the computer and slow it down.

A hard drive will not fail b/c it has a virus on it-so the poster saying the HDD went after a year-sorry but it aint cause of a virus and AVG doesnt have virus's on it either.

As for an external hard drive: Im quite happy with my seagate externals. Work just like a normal hard drive and are powered off a wall socket and use USB or firewire. So far they havent failed in 3 years.

[Honda#4]

I HIGHLY dislike norton and macafee (coincidentally they are both made b symantec!) I refer to them as bloatware. They HOG every available resource on the computer and slow it down. A hard drive will not fail b/c it has a virus on it-so the poster saying the HDD went after a year-sorry but it aint cause of a virus and AVG doesnt have virus's on it either.

1) simply having a virus on an HDD will not solely cause a HDD to fail. But in this case the virus that was on the drive corrupted the main NTFS files causing the drive to be un-usable. True if we have wiped the drive and re-installed windows it probably would have been fine (this one was old and small and needed to be replaced soon anyway).

2) AVG itself should not contain viruses. Depending on what site the program is downloaded from however the EXE may contain additional files or viruses - this is true of any program downloaded from the web.

3) Norton is a great program if used correctly. Yes there are setting which should be shut off as most daily users will not use them. I can honestly say that I have NEVER had a problem with Norton. The issue I have with AVG and other "free" anti viruses is that you don't have a good support team if you need it. At least with Norton if there's a problem with my program I have someone to call. Also I would rather spend a little money up front and have everything backed up somewhere then have to replace my HDD and lose everything due to a "Free" anti virus.

[NacsMXer]

Originally posted by OutlawBill
NOD32 will not slow down your PC

I can vouch for this. NOD32/ ESET Smart Security 4 works excellent and consumes very low resources in it's background state. It's my favorite antivirus so far simply because its no nonsense and works well. The scanning is pretty comprehensive as well. It was recommended to me by a guy in the data recovery business when he was helping me after my hard drive crashed.

Tried Norton in the past and was pretty good at catching viruses, but was a huge resource hog and would bog down the computer in its background state. I tried Microsoft Security Essentials as well for a bit, but also found it to be a big resource hog so that got uninstalled.