Virus Scanners

Right now I'm using AVG 7.5 which is free one available from here: http://free.avg.com/

I'm happy with it but they came out with Version 8 and from some of the revies I've read lots of people not too happy with it. Any suggestions?

While on the topic I came across this excellent site for scanning individual files: http://www.virustotal.com/

What's nice about this is you can upload an individual file. If you get something as an attachment from a friend that *shouldn't* be infected you can upload it there to determine if it is. False positives are not all that uncommon. That site scans it with multiple programs and gives you the results for each program.

I know if you have Comcast you can get the McAfee Security Suite for free.

McAfee do not like it.
AVG 8 has a few switches in a batch file like install you can run to turn off the extra crap that generates the hatred towards 8 like the web link checker...
Google it to get all the switches
Aw shucks The Mayor cleaned up a mess partially made by myself but I had help so...
Here is a link http://www.mydigitallife.info/2008/07/1 ... nt-switch/ Thanks Mayor, sorry about the messy room
Other good programs to help out....
SuperAntiSpyware http://www.superantispyware.com/download.html
Spybot Search and Destroy http://www.filehippo.com/download_spybo ... h_destroy/
CCleaner and Defraggler http://www.filehippo.com/search?q=CCLeaner
FileHippo good.....

If you do not know what you are doing....
Do not use them unsupervised.
As always backup frequently.
A good image is a lifesaver when Mr. Murphy pays a visit!

I've bin running NOD32 http://www.eset.com/ for 2 years now and with no problems. i do alot of d/ling (not porn)well a little maybe and got my share of virus and it allways catches them. i useta run Notorn it was a good pogram years ago then it became aBIG processor & memory hog so i started useing Nod32 it's a small program and you don't know its even running just dose it's job.

CapeCoaler wrote:to turn off the extra crap that generates the hatred towards 8 like the web link checker...

They have either disabled that "feature" or implemented it in another way.

The original implementation was a nightmare for webmasters like myself and useless to boot. That downloaded pages and cloaked itself using a IE user agent. .eg. when it requested a page from a site it said it was IE which itself is a no-no. All those downloads not only greatly slowed down the users surfing but of course had the potential to greatly increase server resources used for nothing. Imagine if you're a site that is top links for search engine for really popular search. You're getting massive hits on your site for pages the user is never going to view.

As I mentioned it was useless, not only useless but potentially harmful to the person using it. The cloaked user agent that was used had a typo. If a site with malicious content wanted they could sniff this out and send a normal page to the link checker. If the user clicked the link they get whacked with a virus.

Razzler wrote:I've bin running NOD32 http://www.eset.com/ for 2 years now and with no problems

I've heard good things about NOD32.

Razzler wrote:I've bin running NOD32 http://www.eset.com/ for 2 years now and with no problems. i do alot of d/ling (not porn)well a little maybe and got my share of virus and it allways catches them. i useta run Notorn it was a good pogram years ago then it became aBIG processor & memory hog so i started useing Nod32 it's a small program and you don't know its even running just dose it's job.

Same here. Running it for a few years now with no problems. Doesn't slow me down like Norton did and caught every virus so far.

Terry

I have had great results with Avast antivirus, which is free for home use.

I run Linux... no virii, ever. The permissions won't allow anything to impact the root unless you tell it to. Bottom line, Penguins don't get sick.

On my Windows machine I use AVG's freeware. Been using it for years, liked it much more in the past. The new version of their freeware doesn't have the auto-update capabilities of the old version, but it still catches everything.

Mike Wilson wrote:I run Linux... no virii, ever. The permissions won't allow anything to impact the root unless you tell it to. Bottom line, Penguins don't get sick.

That's false sense of security, and it also applies to the Mac, alternative browsers like Firefox...etc. Linux OS's in a home environment don't get viruses because they make up a relatively small amount of the people using them worldwide. People writing Viruses target software that will make the largest impact. Linux distributions on servers on the other hand which make up a very large percentage of the servers worldwide can and do get exploited all the time.

I work on the Mac platform also and the owners all think they are 'bulletproof' in regards to virus and other forms of attack.
Here was/is one http://www1.cs.columbia.edu/~aaron/files/widgets/
While the percentage of Mac owners is fairly low, but growing!
The number of unprotected machines is very high!
A target rich environment waiting to be exploited.
A Sasser type networked worm for the Mac would be devastating....

Richard S. wrote:That's false sense of security, and it also applies to the Mac, alternative browsers like Firefox...etc. Linux OS's in a home environment don't get viruses because they make up a relatively small amount of the people using them worldwide. People writing Viruses target software that will make the largest impact. Linux distributions on servers on the other hand which make up a very large percentage of the servers worldwide can and do get exploited all the time.

Yes, it's a generalization... buy while the "numbers" argument is valid, and statistically offers protection to Linux users, it was not the point. In order for a virus to have any negative impact on a Linux system, the executable must be given root access. You know the deal, that root access is granted, or not, by the user. The executable, on it's own, is powerless without some affirmative action by the user. In order to get control over a Linux system or cause any serious damage to the system, the virus would have to gain root access to the system... if it can't get to the root, so it can't do any damage. Most Linux users are competent enough not to grant that permission. Plus, Linux software is all up on repositories, which are (generally)well maintained and scanned. So, are there viuses for Linux, yes. Practically, are they around, no. Plus, if you download one, you have to give it a permission yourself. Overall, after using various distributions since 96, and UNIX prior to that, I've never had a virus infect a machine, and don't know anyone who has. Foolproof, no... but I don't find myself worrying nearly as much about my Linux machine as my Win-Doze machine. Now when my iPhone gets a virus.. then I'm giving up all hope.

nod32

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I have been using NOD32 since my last Norton subscription expired. I like it. Cheaper than Norton and I heard good reviews about it so I figured I would give it a try.

I use Avast 7. It's free.

I think it's important to break out the "free" from "paid" antivirus offerings. The few times I've had an issue with AVG 8 on a paid-for copy their support has been excellent, replies within 15-20 minutes, which I'll take over a nice chat with India any day. I can't say anything about their Free support since the one time I had a problem an R&R fixed it.

We have close to 500 machines running AVG 8.0 in various corporate environments ranging from 5 to 150 users. Just leave out all the add-on BS link scanner, toolbar, firewall, etc and it works fine.

I've used 7.5/8.0 AVG free on many personal machines with no issues. AVG still hasn't stopped delivering 7.5 updates - machine I'm on still has 7.5 and still autoupdates. They say a mechanic's car is the worst maintained vehicle

FWIW we were a Symantec A/V shop for a long time. When they decided ad/spyware wasn't a "virus" and we had to resort to installing a demo of AVG/NOD32/Avast to remove a problem, or it couldn't delete an infected file that we could by using Explorer without upgrading the version, we knew it was time to move on. The licensing routines on Symantec's Corp. version is still fundamentally broken, machines drop the license and have to be manually installed. The amount of crap AVG finds that Symantec leaves behind is somewhat shocking.

Our choice of AVG was due to the least amount of trouble doing managed installs, least workstation performance impact, and a good reseller program.