Anti-virus software?

Just had a nasty bout with Symantec on getting my subscription renewed so I cancelled it and don't want to use them anymore.

Any thoughts/suggestions on (preferably free) anti-virus software. Free is good due to the # of PC's I need to protect.

If it makes any difference in the selection, I'm running Spy-Sweeper and Norton System Works. I don't mind getting rid of the latter.

Brian.......I use the AVG free edition from Grisoft AVG Free It updates daily & works for me with no problems.

bczoom,

Get the AVG Free Edition virus software! It works great and best of all IT"S FREE!!

Kevin in Kansas

Thanks Guys,

AVG it will be...

I use a Mac. What is Anti-Virus software? Acutally I had Norton's Anti-Virus on my computer for 2 years. It never registered a hit of any type so I never renewed it.

Any problem with keeping Norton System Works but replacing only its expired Norton Anti-Virus with AVG?

California said:

Any problem with keeping Norton System Works but replacing only its expired Norton Anti-Virus with AVG?

Click to expand...

I'm finding out now...
It's in the process of a full system scan (as part of the installation) so I'll find out when it's done.
Personally, I don't like System Works and wouldn't really care if I had to uninstall.

My experience it is all or nothing. I have Norton, but not for long. Microsoft offered a Beta version of their virus protection, but now I can't find it. Possibly they already threw in the towel because they now show links to the other virus protection sites. I am running the Microsoft Beta Anti Spyware and it works well, but doesn't get everything. I also have Pest Patrol, Spyware Blaster, Spyware Doctor, Spy Sweeper, Ad-Aware SE Personal, and eCondom. I run each one every few days looking for problems and they keep finding them, so I have to assume that they do work. What I don't understand is why I keep getting the spyware, because I don't go to strange sights. Must be the wife surfing the internet looking for my replacement....

[ Must be the wife surfing the internet looking for my replacement.... [/QUOTE]


Tell her to post her interesting finds along with mine

Funny you should mention the problems with Norton and renewing; the protestion for Betsy's and my computers expires in February, so they started dunning us. However, when I went on to sign up, they asked for some sort of key, and I don;t have a clue what it is. It says I need to call them on the phone to renew. I don't want to call them on the phone; I hate calling people on the phone, and the reason I have a computer is to use online procedures. The only reason I can think of why they want me to call them is so they can try to sell me something. Whatever, the reason, I now remember that it was a hassle last year, and I don't want the hassle again, this year.

The thing is, I have learned to depend on Norton. I had McAfee and had problems keeping the computer running, and the updating was weird. Norton has stopped several nasty viruses, both from sites that were poisoned and from infected emails.

Will AVG really do as well? I love free; I dropped MS Office in favor or Open Office, and have several other open source programs that work great (most from SourceForge).

Approximately ten years ago I bought Norton Corporate Anti-Virus. Along with it I had to purchase 15 extra license for clients. With the 23 clients I was able to install on my two computers at home. The license was to be good for 1 year. Well ten years later I am still updating free automatically every week and every so often they send me free a software update. They even once every two years send me an email tellling me that my renewel is up and I am to call them with my credit card so I can continue gettin updates. The software started out at 6.9 or something like that and now I am up to 8.5. The program has been working fine. Only one of my stand alone computers ever got a virus past it. But my server and all clients have worked great now for ten years with no problem. Don't understand it but hey what the heck.


murph

My company installs McAffe. It sucks up all my CPU when it runs and hogs my hard drive access. I hate it. Always seems to run at the wrong time on my computer because it is a laptop. Being the the laptop is not on 24/7 the virus checker needs to run with it has the chance. I.e, it does not get the chance to run by itself in the middle of the night (laptop off).
Had the same experience with Symantec. What good is a "fast" 3 Ghz lapto if it is dogged down a good portion of the time with a Virus checker. POS.

I have heard that AVS checker meantioned above is pretty lite on CPU/Disk hogging. of course, not has good as not having one at all. See Bob's comment above.

OkeeDon said:

However, when I went on to sign up, they asked for some sort of key, and I don;t have a clue what it is. It says I need to call them on the phone to renew.

Click to expand...

Don,

My renewal process started last weekend but if/as I recall correctly, when it expired the "Live Update" process opened an new window pointing me to the Symantec store. From there, I purchased the subscription renewal. It sent me a confirmation e-mail. In there was a "subscription key".

On the next "Live Update", it prompted for the new key. In my case, the "subscription key" didn't work. After spending way too much time on the phone and not getting anywhere, I told them I don't want it and to give me my $ back. They said they couldn't... Well, the "get the supervisor on the phone" took care of that...