What's the best antivirus program?

I use Avira antivirus, malwarebytes, and comodo firewall.....After lots of research and reading many, many reviews, it seemed that these were pretty much as good as you can get as far as "free goes".... I have already uninstalled my paid version of pc-cillin because Avast and Malwarebytes were finding things that pc-cillin wasn't.... I think you would be happy with these 3 options....

onmyown, in the future the best thing you should do is start your own thread rather than attach to one

As for your question, Norton is a resource hog and you should see improvement with an AV that requires less rsources.

Keep in mind Norton is notorious for leaving remnants of itself behind even when you do a full uninstall so make surre you go to their website and search for the correct removal tool for your version.

I am in total agreement with kimsland's choice of Avast! I run the free version on two laptops and our second (family) PC. I also agree with you about wanting additional protection so I also inconjunction with Avast run the free version of SUPERantispyware. The only thing with the free SAS is you have to manually update. I run the money version on my main rig and I love it. In addition, I have Online Armor free firewall that even has HIPS.

This is the update components again for Norton products.
Removal of norton will also remove this problem.

EDIT Sorry didnt see the answers was posted

Is it worth linking to the norton removal tool so this post is not totally pointless
http://service1.symantec.com/Support/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039

That's the only reason I stayed with Norton. But in these difficult economic times I am willing to experiment with a free AV. My Norton subscription expires in a few days.

I use my computer for work, so I welcome suggestions and words of encouragement to feel good about my decision.

kimsland said:

Kaspersky 3 years ago was excellent
But now the newest version (2009) again is too resource heavy

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I politely disagree. The 2009 incarnation has much less pronounced effect on my machine. I had the prior version and it was upgraded mid-year to the 2009 version. The same machine with no upgrades is much more responsive now.

I read the PC World review of the antivirus suites in the last issue. Norton 360 comes up first and Kaspersky as a middle of the pack due to, primarily, high price and non-intuitive interface. I can attest to one thing though: in the past I used both McAfee and Norton and it was enough for me not to use their products ever again.

I use freeware version of Pctools Spyware Doctor with AntiVirus no problems with the system ever! Can be had here: http://downloads.zdnet.co.uk/0,1000000375,39364872s,00.htm

Runs on Windows Vista/2005 MCE)/XP and Server 2008/2003

Well I've seen the Norton 360 first hand here, in dealing with users computers totally infected by Virus infection and malware, and it aint good
Not only that but Norton still comes with the multitude of system startups, services, tasks and and usually takes over Windows system files and the registry, All in all it's still quite heavy.
For what it's worth, run the normal uninstaller, and then follow up with running the Norton Removal tool. Seeming it still is not removed.

As for McAfee, another highly resourced program. This program is stated as MS preferred, no wonder why it's not detecting the latest Viruses - Ahh they'll get to it For what it's worth, run the uninstaller, and then follow up with running the McAfee Removal Tool (again the normal uninstaller, really doesn't work).

And lastly Kaspersky. Written up along side Norton 360 and McAfee, yep it looks marvelous, certainly the online scans seem to work well (actually Norton does a good job with that too). But it does seem to fault a bit when installing unless your computer starts perfectly clean (Windows system files wise) Still not my number one though.

Install Avira free AntiVirus. And you won't look back The only thing I can fault with this free Antivirus, is those huge splash screens when it updates. A small price to not pay for, for this excellent Virus\Malware detection and automatic removal program

What's the best antivirus

OK, so basically what I am getting from this is that anti-virus seems to be as personal a choice as deodorant brands.

I have almost always used AVG, the couple of times I have used others I havent been impressed, and I recently discovered Comodo for the firewall which during the scan picked up stuff that PC tools hadnt, so I am happy to trial that one for a while.

Thanks for your info everyone.

That's right, personal choice :grinthumb
Although I've nearly totally conclusively proven, that AVG8 is useless (personally I'm sure of it though )

been there, done that.

I used to have Norton, upgraded to 2009 and then I was pretty impressed. It really runs good. I also had Kaspersky 2009, which kinda blew me away. The paid AV programs are just way ahead of everything else.

But imho if I can find one just as good and nearly is as featured for free that would be awesome.

As for freeware, I've tried the following:

avira: good but i once got a scan from another av that said avira was actually malware (???) but i did like the interface, and it did run decent.

avg: decent really, though it's really in need of some fine tuning.

avast: the best! it works like a charm. scans memory and startups when you boot the av "provider". don't like the skin? just get a new one! 14month license means you're actually good for a while, and it renews a couple weeks before.

comodo: good, but VERY annoying. set defenses to training mode and that should fix it though, love the detailed network info! you can chose to install just the AV or the firewall or both if you want. imho the firewall is pretty good, but can be annoying.

As for misc addons and firewalls, you all should really get PCTools' ThreatFire ZeroDay malware protection. It's behavioral scanning engine picks up where signature-based AV programs stop. It's able to prevent malware that's just emerging (before it's been made aware of) by observing common malware signs and system responsiveness. And best of all it installs together with your existing AV, so you have that extra layer of protection. Also you might consider Comodo's Memory Firewall and PCTools Firewall.

The best firewalls imho were the ones that come with paid services. A lot of freeware stuff out there is either a pain to configure or just plain stuborn.

My Windows XP system has avast home, pctools threatfire, and comodo memory firewall. As well as Windows Defender, and Windows Firewall.

FabNMun said:

My Windows XP system has avast home, pctools threatfire, and comodo memory firewall. As well as Windows Defender, and Windows Firewall.

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Well you were doing well until you said the above

You can only have 1 AntiVirus (you chose Avast, that's good)
But you can only have 1 Firewall as well

As for Malware (Spyware, adware etc)
Malwarebytes and SuperAntispyware are good

Maybe "Nod32" (Eset) if you're willing to pay. Or so they tell me.

kimsland said:

Well you were doing well until you said the above

You can only have 1 AntiVirus (you chose Avast, that's good)
But you can only have 1 Firewall as well

As for Malware (Spyware, adware etc)
Malwarebytes and SuperAntispyware are good

Click to expand...

No, you can have 2 if you want. Two of anything really, it just means that you have to see which 2 work the best together without conflicting. Trust me, I've done just that for the last few months! Avast Home doesn't conflict with Threatfire, but it DOES conflict with Comodo's "Firewall". But not with Comodo's "Memory Firewall", which a different thing alltogether.

I've gotten avast home, comodo "memory" firewall, pctool's threatfire, AND Windows' own programs to happily coexist without skipping a beat. It reports that having 2 firewalls can cause conflicts, so sure, if it causes conflicts on your particular system (nobody can tell you really) then adjust accordingly. I've also gotten them to work really well in Windows Vista, though it's on my sacred laptop and (if I could) I'd rather pay the premium for either Kaspersky or Norton.

edit:

In order to yeild a little here, yes it's absolutely preferable to have only one program for each purpose. and that decision is easier to make when you buy your AV program and it's as fully featured as the aforementioned. But when you're depending on FREEWARE, it doesn't hurt to experiment and find a couple that can cover the bases. You already know that one's going to have a couple features that the other doesn't have.

FabNMun said:

Trust me, I've done just that for the last few months!

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Yes I know
I've done this too, back when I had Sygate and perfectly configured to allow the other Firewall I had at the time

After many years since then, I've now realised that there can only be one (and use the force too )

Just use 1 Firewall to do the lot.

Observe the reports. Go into your event reports and see what's going on. If the logs are cluttered with inconsistencies (ie, failed services or resource usage warnings) then uninstall your AV or firewall and see what happens. If it's the firewall, set it to lesser aggressive settings.

kimsland said:

Yes I know
I've done this too, back when I had Sygate and perfectly configured to allow the other Firewall I had at the time

After many years since then, I've now realised that there can only be one (and use the force too )

Just use 1 Firewall to do the lot.

Click to expand...

Yeah, you're right. It would seem kinda paranoid anyway, huh! Also, where it can be applied The Force is always welcome

I used to swear by norton corporate - I wouldn't use norton home products, but I use aging systems and norton started really bogging down my systems. Now I use clamwin and it's great and not system hogging at all. Best of all it's open source and free.

i use norton, hahahah

crap i didn't know,

AVG & kaspersky, I prefer one of this they are best.