Best Antivirus?

Which do you think better,Kaspersky or Microsoft Security Essentials or others?

gm

We're using Microsoft security essentials with no problems. But we avoid some of those more marginal sites and we are very careful about what we download.

I was using Security Essentials when they wanted payment for it and I was always pleased with it. I'm more pleased now that it's offered for no cost.

I use McAfee. Yes you have to pay for it. About $40 per year but well worth it. IMO

Avast! Free and excellent.

Free version of AVG 2012. It does not slow your computer down like many other programs. Go to http://free.avg.com/us-en/homepage. Just be sure and don't select any of the optional toolbars. Winner of many computer magazine awards. Used by several IT professionals I work with on their own home systems.

Avast or AVG are both very good and free.
In combination with Firefox or Chrome and you're pretty safe.

Another vote for Avast but I did upgrade to the pay version since it had additional features.

I'll have to give that one a go.

I've tried multiple antivirus solutions over the years.
A guy I worked with in the IT department recommended Avast or AVG and said he was very pleased. I've run it on our computers for the last 3 years, 3 with Avast & 1 with AVG.
No problems at all, but I don't run IE for a browser and I only download from what I consider safe sites.
Saved me a bunch of $ over the past several years.

Folks the days of McAfee and Norton Anti Virus being the best sure thing to
use are gone. I suggest for most people Microsoft Essentials and Spybot
for weekly spyware cleaning. Both are free and easy to install. Avast is also
good as someone suggested. Remember your browser (as someone pointed
out with the chrome reference) needs to be updated and kept current. I use
MS IE9 and Google Chrome. Older versions of MS IE are not that secure
compared to newer versions. XP is also part of the problem as it is not the
most secure operating system out there. I have recently updated skipping
Vista and going right to Windows 7. Do be aware that Windows 8 will
be around in not that long of a time and avoid it until MS comes out with Servicepac 1
. AVG is a good virus program also. To stay current on MS
products do the following.

Keep Microsoft update running to keep your system files updated.

Run a virus checker. (The stuff we talked about above this post)

Backup your computer (if your hard drive dies do you want to lose everything)

Run Spybot (free version) once a week to kill spyware

Try over the next year or two to get to Windows 7 and dump XP.

If updating Skip Vista. Might be a good time to get new computers and
donate old ones to students or charity. Newer operating system take
more memory. I wouldn't run vista/ windows 7 with anything less than
two to four megabyte memory and preferably four.


Get help from an expert if you don't know what you are doing. Ask around
you probably have some friends that know this techy crap.

Last but most important don't update/change/ whatever your system unless
you have it backed up somewhere. Doing this kinda work can break things
and sometimes older software doesn't like newer systems. Sometimes best
to leave things alone but eventually you have to update for many reasons.

Good Luck

Z

Have been using Avast for a few years now, upgraded to the paid version about a year ago, never have had a problem.

If you want to make your browsing much more secure (regardless of your antivirus and spyware removers) download the following:

Remove Admin

This program will disable administrator rights while browsing with IE or Firefox, thereby denying access to any malware that tries to write to system and windows directories.

Free and indispensable.

I will weigh in also on not using IE. Use Chrome or Firefox with AVG. I have used many products over the years at work and at home. I find the free version of AVG works very well. Always have two browsers on your computer, if you get corruption in one browser you have access to another browser to download fixes or updates. AVG has bot removers but I always install the free version of spybot. I create a mail account that I only plan on using for signing up for forums, yahoo groups etc. I have another for signing up for "free offers" or making internet purchases. If an email account gets hijacked or you start getting a bunch of junk mail on it simply delete the account and create a new one. My preference is Gmail which is really good at catching junk emails and placing them in a spam folder. As you can see I am a Google fan. If making purchases online always use paypal when you have the option don't use your credit card online unless you have no other choice. 99% of the time you won't have any problem using your credit card/debit card on encrypted sites but Paypal will an additional layer of protection. Here in the States we have purchased items online for years to avoid sales tax or just because there are better deals than we are being offered locally. We have yet to have any problems other than getting spam. Use another email address for your bank account transactions. We have a paypal account set up for bank transactions so that I can transfer funds from one bank to another without charges (some reasonable charges if you are dealing with international bank accounts). The transfers however are not automatic and will take a few days.

All the advice after my post is good stuff but remember we computer
geeks have differences of opinion. I am easier on IE than most geeks
but than I supported it so I am not free of conflict of interests. Two
people now are telling you to use spybot so do so! It is very interesting
to find out what your computer is doing that you don't know about.

Z

I have been using Spybot for years. It is scheduled to scan and clean every week.

CanuckBob wrote:I have been using Spybot for years. It is scheduled to scan and clean every week.

Thats a good idea. I just run it every couple of weeks after updating. Can you schedule spybot to update frist than run scan automatically?

Z

What does Spybot do that Security Essentials doesn't? I'm under the impression that the latter scans for viruses and spyware both.

Zedinmexico wrote:

CanuckBob wrote:I have been using Spybot for years. It is scheduled to scan and clean every week.

Thats a good idea. I just run it every couple of weeks after updating. Can you schedule spybot to update frist than run scan automatically?

Z

That's a good question. I'm not sure if it has been updating itself. I'll have to check it out.

CanuckBob wrote:

Zedinmexico wrote:

CanuckBob wrote:I have been using Spybot for years. It is scheduled to scan and clean every week.

Thats a good idea. I just run it every couple of weeks after updating. Can you schedule spybot to update frist than run scan automatically?

Z

That's a good question. I'm not sure if it has been updating itself. I'll have to check it out.

Okay, at the risk of becoming a PITA (thanks, Lizzy), I will tell you that Microsoft Security Essentials provides an option for the user to schedule an update prior to scanning the computer.
(Works for me.)

For those who are using MS Security Essentials and IE, it is your choice to make but I personally try to minimize the Microsoft control over my habit. Firefox (90% of the time) and Chrome the rest. Admittedly, I have been lazy about becoming familiar with Chrome but since we added a Google TV box to our TV system, understanding Chrome has been more of a necessity.

CheenaGringo wrote:For those who are using MS Security Essentials and IE, it is your choice to make but I personally try to minimize the Microsoft control over my habit. Firefox (90% of the time) and Chrome the rest.

I see that I failed to state that my preferred browser is Firefox; I seldom use Internet Explorer and use it only as a backup. I can't get myself to use Google Chrome, because my preferred is so reliable. That's just my personal choice.

Lehrer wrote:What does Spybot do that Security Essentials doesn't? I'm under the impression that the latter scans for viruses and spyware both.

It is just a deeper and second source to Security Essentials. It does allow you to see for example software the marketeers have installed on your computer
to send info back home. Security Essentials won't do that. Try it most computer people in the know use two solutions a virus checker and a spyware trojan
detector like spybot. Microsoft does a good quality virus checker. Spybot does a better job of looking for certain things. Both programs are compatible and
not a waste of effort to do both.

Yes I know Security Essentials can be scheduled. I want to know if spybot can be scheduled but only after it does an update because I want the latest
definition files.

Z

Lehrer wrote:

CheenaGringo wrote:For those who are using MS Security Essentials and IE, it is your choice to make but I personally try to minimize the Microsoft control over my habit. Firefox (90% of the time) and Chrome the rest.

I see that I failed to state that my preferred browser is Firefox; I seldom use Internet Explorer and use it only as a backup. I can't get myself to use Google Chrome, because my preferred is so reliable. That's just my personal choice.

I find all the browsers reliable these days. I find IE, Chrome,Firefox and Opera to be reliable so why not use IE? I think I understand the don't use Microsoft argument
but don't see any reason for me personally to waste time learning a new browser. I find Apple consumer wise to be a far more dangerous company than Microsoft
in my humble opinion. Everybody loves Apple but they don't understand how expensive it is and how closed off Apple is but MS is the big evil?? Not buying it personally.
Maybe everything is evil these days and I am being naive.

Z

PS Yes I know Apple products are beautiful elegants products and I understand the attraction I don't see how my MS computer does any less work.

It really has nothing to do with the power of Microsoft or Apple or as far as that goes Google. It has to do with the number of talented individuals out there that just love to hack and get a kick out creating viruses. Most of them pick Microsoft IE as their target just because of it wider customer base....that is all. Looking at it from that perspective Firefox Mozilla is probably the safest bet but I choose to use all three and there is really little difference in how they operate. I prefer Google Chrome because it just is faster for me and that is a personal preference. Like I said I have really not had any problems at all (except with other people computers). Common since not paranoia is the recipe that avoids most problems. Trying to get free material through services like Limewire is usually the culprit for most people that develop serious problems. I am sure most of us don't have to worry about that. Happy surfing and "Tenga cuidado."
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