A/V and Firewall products

[rangerider]

After using freeware for quite awhile, it's become apparent that I need to update to better A/V/firewall protection. Looked at the ratings on the more common ones. Downloaded a trial copy of BitDefender-2010 and it sure helped my connection speed and rooted out several problems hidden in files; installation was a pain but worked well since.

Would enjoy hearing opinions on any other products that seem to work well for people before I order something.

[Parks]

We use Trend Micro at work, and it has been pretty thorough. I use Norton at home and I think it has slowed my PC terribly with all of it's "scanning". There are lots of processes running and many "hints" about password protections and updates. It used to be far less intrusive.

[Bofinn]

Originally Posted by rangerider

After using freeware for quite awhile, it's become apparent that I need to update to better A/V/firewall protection.

What was apparent?

I use AVG anti-virus, ZoneAlarm firewall, and SpyBot Search and Destroy.

My system has been rock solid safe for many moons now. The wife's system got nailed last month, but it doesn't get updated as often as mine, and two teenage girls don't help either...

[rangerider]

Originally Posted by Bofinn

What was apparent?

I use AVG anti-virus, ZoneAlarm firewall, and SpyBot Search and Destroy.

My system has been rock solid safe for many moons now. The wife's system got nailed last month, but it doesn't get updated as often as mine, and two teenage girls don't help either...

Mostly the speed; I have an iffy wireless connection due to topography and weather. Have been using AVG, Comodo, and Spybot for some time also but even after renewing my service to 2Meg down/1 up a few months ago things were slow to the point of not working. Had some weirdness happen on uploads, boot times were off the chart, and several sites just didn't like me but I could access them fine from other computers and so could others. And apparently COMODO and AVG let slip a few nasties into my drives...

I installed a trial copy of BitDefender 2010 to see if there was a difference and wow! All of a sudden it's like I have real internet service; no timed out connections, things load about where they should for the service speed, and it found two trojans and 5 rootkits. After everything was cleaned up and I re-defragged the system I have an impressive performance gain whether working online or off.

I've been fairly conscientious about routine maintenance on this desktop so I have to assume that AVG/COMODO was largely the cause of my woes. Like a lot of things, it may have been conflicts between apps and my system, and on a speedy internet connection a person might have not noticed the difference.

But my CPU and I are now much happier, and I'm thinking either BitDefender or something similar might be in order. Would be worth a few bucks a month to have some speed and security.

[CDouthitt]

You guys and your PC firewall spy bot crap...



I suspect Ed will be along soon...

[Bone Stockman]

I've got McAffee on my Gateway, but the damn thing runs like crap. I'm sure I've picked up God-knows on it, but McAffee shows it being clean.

I know that I can turn my Mac on, check my email and the weather, and power it back off before the Gateway boots up.

[ms_tapestry]

Originally Posted by Bofinn

and two teenage girls don't help either...

My son downloading music used to kill mine. . .lots and lots of viruses. . .

[Serg06]

I use...................






















Oh wait, I have a Mac never mind.

[huckinfog]

I use Norton av, one of the upgraded pacs. I hate McAfee. I also run Malwarebytes' and Ad-Aware, usually update & scan every 7-10 days. They've caught and removed a lot of cyber critters. My ISP catches a lot of bugs as well. Don't forget to check your mail providor, if you are on something other than a host like yahoo.

[orbit]

I use Kaspersky Internet Security.

Runs nicely in the background.

On scans, it issues warnings, with links for repairs, on possible intrusion points on the various software packages I use.

I ain't had one problem with it, been using it for three or four years now.

I run AVG Free and Zone Alarm on my wife's computer.