Decent Antivirus

[TudorBlue]

Hi peeps, first post here. Im looking for a decent anti virus recommendation. Ive used nod32 in the past but the nodlogin has stopped working. Dont know if there is a fix or not but a change is as good as a rest so the saying goes

[couger25]

windows has its own antivirus microsoft security essentials its free when you buy your windows. avg has a free one and so does avast as for what one is better i think that like asking is ford or chevy better its to each theyre own

[HouseCrowd]

windows has its own antivirus microsoft security essentials

And, perhaps surprisingly, it's actually pretty good too. Does the job without too much bloat or nagging, and rates quite highly in most independent reviews when tested for false positives & negatives. I install it on all my customer's computers.

[MrFredPFL]

i've heard of bad things happening in the last year or so with both free and pay versions of AVG. i stopped recommending them as a result.

[zbeast]

I use avast + malwarebytes.
Avast detects and blocks all viruses Iv'e encountered and malwarebytes
http://www.malwarebytes.org/

cleans up anything else.

Worse antivirus is Norton and Macafee. <they detect nothing>
Far as I can tell there are some commercial Virus that these products deliberately don't detect.
That's the only excuse I have for them not detecting some virus code that I extracted from a application
I was "stetting". I even made a request that they add detection for the code and sent the a the samples on a
cd. that was 8 years ago.. They sill don't detect it.

If you have downloaded a file and your don't trust the source.
Always send it to Virus total. https://www.virustotal.com/

Very often, keygens, and some Pay DVD Video player applications.
Send out "delibertly infected files they constantly change the virus Signature to evade detection.

[bmh67wa]

Microsoft Security Essentials and Malwarebytes is all I use.

[HouseCrowd]

Microsoft Security Essentials and Malwarebytes is all I use.

Same here, mostly. MSE for 'realtime' protection and Malwarebytes for removal/clean-up.



For the stuff that Malwarebytes misses there's also the free version of SuperAntiSpyware - running both will usually remove the majority of the crap.

For the stubborn stuff (eg rootkits), I usually either remove them manually, remove the HDD and scan it from a 'clean' PC (where possible) or use the Dr Web Live CD. Dr Web can be quite aggressive though, so it's best to backup the hard drive first.

[craftycorner]

Viruses are a pain in the ass. It got so bad I went Linux with a side of Clam.

[couger25]

if only i could play all my games on linux... then i would be there

[HouseCrowd]

if only i could play all my games on linux... then i would be there

You could always dual-boot and/or run windows as a Virtual Machine.

I triple-boot some of my machines (XP/Win7/Linux). If you want to dual-boot an existing Windows installation, without re-installing, you can use software like Wubi (to boot Ubuntu, Xubuntu, etc) ... or Mint4Win, which is included in some versions of the Linux Mint Live CD.

[piglets222]

i've heard of bad things happening in the last year or so with both free and pay versions of AVG. i stopped recommending them as a result.

yuh i had avg on 4 computers.. last years fucked about with the updating version and failed so

im using MSE on 3 now: Microsoft Security Essentials

only annoying thing is its gonna turn on all the m$ stuff, firewall, automatic updates and reporting
and Malwarebytes is awesome

[craftycorner]

Linux offers Clam to the beleagered Windows user.