anti-virus software

[iloveglee]

I am just about to renew my antivirus software on my laptop and am completely and totally at a loss to know whether to just renew the one I have now - Norton, or change to something different or download a free one. I bought the Norton in the USA andpaid less in $ than I am expected to pay in £ to renew - i.e. pretty pricey. I have a free McAfee on a netbook which I shall have to renew at some point as the free one was through my bank and only lasted for the year. They are not doing it now. As far as I can tell they both work fine,i.e. I have no viruses, worms or any other nasty creatures infecting my computers but really what is to chose between them and whether the free ones like AVG are just as good as the ones you pay for. Not being that technical they just do their own thing in the background without any input from me. I use the internet a lot, but don't do much in the way of downloading, I use itv and bbc players occasionally. I obviously have to have something but just don't know that. Comments and help appreciated.

[squarebear]

I use AVG for free and have never had a virus (touch wood)
I also check it once a month or so over at http://www.antivirus.com just in case.

[chelle7272]

I found AVG to be just as good as Norton. I had trouble using it with Vista though so now use Avira which I also have found reliable. Under advice, being no expert, I also use Malwarebytes whis is free, you do have to remember to run the scans though.

[jake-the-peg]

There is more to AV than it's ability to detect viruses

There are questions like how quickly the companies detect the latest threats, the amount of resources they take on your machine, what if any support they offer etc. etc.

Having said that it doesn't sound as if your internet habits are what I'd term high risk so you'll probably not find a whole lot of diference between them.

I work for one of the big companies so I make it a rule never to recommend any on here because I'm obviously biassed

However whatever you choose make sure that you keep it up to date as old av software is not much good - theats come and go so quickly now.

Also make sure the software on your computer up to date with windows update as many nasties use faults in software to get their hooks in too

[squarebear]

Are you one of the back room boys creating viruses which you then charge us to clear? ;-)

[jake-the-peg]

No I'm one of the firemen going around setting light to buildings :c)

[squarebear]

hehe!

[squarebear]

Strange though isn't it? A new virus comes out and within a few hours, a cure has been written and distributed by the av people. Hmmmmm.....

[jake-the-peg]

That's because a lot of the analysis and signature authoring is done by automatic systems it wouldn't be possible to keep up manually

[squarebear]

How do you get hold of the viruses in the first place to cure them? I'm not winding you up or anything, just curious.

[rojash]

"How do you get hold of the viruses in the first place to cure them?"
Most AV programs report back suspicious files to the manufacturer, periodically.

[iloveglee]

I have heard from other sources that AVG and Vista don't work too well together, since the laptop runs on Vista maybe I'll give that one a miss. Only have 4 days more on my current one though so have to get on with deciding

[VHG]

Try Microsoft Security Essentials which is free

http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/

[squarebear]

Sorry to labour the point but how does an av program know it is a suspicious file if it has no knowledge of the virus?

[rojash]

It uses a technique which analyses the file and tries to predict its behaviour. Just as with people, certain types of behaviour can be described as suspicious (although they may be innocent). Any file flagged as suspicious can be analysed further, or even run on completely isolated machine to see what it actually does.

[squarebear]

Thanks for your answer rojash.

[Hopkirk]

VHG is right, use Microsoft Security Essentials.

It's free, and if Microsoft don't know what to do, then Lord help us.

I was using Norton, but the computer ran so slowly with that compared to Microsoft.

If you do, don't forget to switch on the Windows firewall, which will be switched off with Norton.

[amy.lillian]

I recommend you to download this Kingsoft Free Antivirus. I get it from download.com. Also you can download from the it official website. Media URL: http://www.kingsoftsecurity.com/kingsoft-antivirus.html
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