What Anti-Virus do you Use/Recommend?

[Tripredacus]

You mised out malewarebytes which is much better then any of them above

I think this is because MalwareBytes is just a really robust anti-spyware program. It is good at cleaning out some rootkits but for some reason I just don't see it as an every day anti-virus program.

[Sp0iLedBrAt]

Avira AntiVir Personal. I went through a lot of independent reviews on google, and it seems avast! is its worthy competition in the field of free anti-virus programs. I know for sure AVG Free is not, although it has a bigger download rate on CNET, for example.

I would appreciate your thoughts on this; I'm taking a break from paying for an anti-virus program, but it doesn't mean my search is over.

BTW, a licence for Kaspersky or BitDefender out here costs less than 10 EUR, but my PC never got on well with any of them.

[[deXter]]

Avira AntiVir Personal. I went through a lot of independent reviews on google, and it seems avast! is its worthy competition in the field of free anti-virus programs. I know for sure AVG Free is not, although it has a bigger download rate on CNET, for example.

I would appreciate your thoughts on this; I'm taking a break from paying for an anti-virus program, but it doesn't mean my search is over.

BTW, a licence for Kaspersky or BitDefender out here costs less than 10 EUR, but my PC never got on well with any of them.

Avira is a good choice - it's one of the top AVs out there, regardless of being free. Take a look at the reports on av-comparatives.com for detailed info.

I personally install Avira on every malware-infected PC I fix (must have installed in ~50 PCs so far) and have got good results overall.

[nitroshift]

I don't want to start a flame war, but what's wrong with Microsoft's Security Essentials?

[Sp0iLedBrAt]

Nothing wrong with it, I just don't want to enable Automatic Updates, a prerequisite for its functioning.

[Tripredacus]

Nothing wrong with it, I just don't want to enable Automatic Updates, a prerequisite for its functioning.

After install, it wants you to enable auto updates, yes this is true. But if you change your setting to "download and ask" instead of "install automatically" MSE won't complain. That is how I use it.

[Sp0iLedBrAt]

That's the thing exactly. I choose not to download or install some Office Updates from Microsoft Update, as well as some other things like .NET Framework 1.1, Windows Search 4.0 etc.

Here's the question: Will MSE work if I choose "Notify me, but don't automatically download or install" ? Getting to my point here:

- why download something which I will never install? My PC's pretty old, so I cherish every free space I have (40GB HDD with 11GB on C:\ and the rest on a D:\ partition).

Other than that, I have a very high opinion of MSE, I believe the positive reviews from you guys and plenty of other people on the net and I used its first release for a short time.

Cheers

[Xntryk1]

I have just begun using something called "Deep Freeze" by "Faronics". You will never need anti-virus again, nor will you need more than 1 system backup to hold on to. It makes your computer totally indestructible by any means thru any software virus, malware, spyware, or by any tampering whatsoever by anyone or any website. It works great, and this is NOT a SPAM. Just google it. Acronis Backup uses the technology in its new backup software, and you may all be familiar with Sandboxie"... Well, google it and check out the standard version for single computers. The enterprise version could protect the world of computers, and if Billy Gates had of thought of it, there would be no such thing as malware and viruses today. Just check it out. My PC is indestructable, and yours can be too!.

Faronics - Deep Freeze

Edited November 17, 2010 by Xntryk1

[[deXter]]

I have just begun using something called "Deep Freeze" by "Faronics". You will never need anti-virus again, nor will you need more than 1 system backup to hold on to. It makes your computer totally indestructible by any means thru any software virus, malware, spyware, or by any tampering whatsoever by anyone or any website. It works great, and this is NOT a SPAM. Just google it. Acronis Backup uses the technology in its new backup software, and you may all be familiar with Sandboxie"... Well, google it and check out the standard version for single computers. The enterprise version could protect the world of computers, and if Billy Gates had of thought of it, there would be no such thing as malware and viruses today. Just check it out. My PC is indestructable, and yours can be too!.

Faronics - Deep Freeze

Deep Freeze isn't indestructible. There are a few known hacks for it that still work, and I know for a fact that the author of one of the hacks still works on it and releases new versions regularly. But even if your copy of Deep Freeze remains unhacked, the problem remains that it won't stop a virus from running on your PC and spreading to other media, like USB drives or the network. Of course, when you reboot everything is back to its defaults on *your* PC, but in that session the virus could create havoc - harvest email address and mail itself to your contacts, or in a worst case scenario - log whatever you're doing and silently report it back to its creator (thus capturing your credit card numbers, bank account details, passwords etc). Then there are browser based attacks like XSS, that don't even bother infecting your PC - they would just run in your browser and you would never realize it. The browser itself might have vulnerabilities that might allow thirdparties to access your files. And don't forget Flash - probably one of the most vulnerable piece of software in your PC.

Thus your PC can never be indestructible - and let's not forget two main reasons - 1) You're running Windows. 2) You're human, afterall.

Edited November 20, 2010 by [deXter]

[liberman]

Eset Smart Security complete solution !

[blackskin]

I use old version NOD32

[Sp0iLedBrAt]

(Why I always think what I am using is always better than the others?)

Ain't that the truth with all of us? (In order not to be completely off topic, I switched to Avast! Free 6. The only thing that bothers me is that it gets stuck for about a minute when scanning large folders, e.g. >1GB, even when the option to scan all files is not chosen).

[deen7777]

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Edited September 11, 2011 by deen7777

[Woomera]

I have just begun using something called "Deep Freeze" by "Faronics". You will never need anti-virus again, nor will you need more than 1 system backup to hold on to. It makes your computer totally indestructible by any means thru any software virus, malware, spyware, or by any tampering whatsoever by anyone or any website. It works great, and this is NOT a SPAM. Just google it. Acronis Backup uses the technology in its new backup software, and you may all be familiar with Sandboxie"... Well, google it and check out the standard version for single computers. The enterprise version could protect the world of computers, and if Billy Gates had of thought of it, there would be no such thing as malware and viruses today. Just check it out. My PC is indestructable, and yours can be too!.

Faronics - Deep Freeze

ive been looking into that few days back after i saw many people at Wilderssecurity recommending it, but there's no free version, is there? well at least i didnt see anything about free personal version on their website.

[NATO]

AVAST Free Edition.

Finds corrupt files and viruses with a boot time scan.

Microsoft Security Essentials is good too.

I used to use AVG Free but did not like the latest version which could wreck the registry with its additional tools.