AVG anti-virus (free). Opinions plz.

Hendrix89

Right now I use Kaspersky anti-virus and it does an excellent job of protecting my PC but I have to pay for it. And on top of that everytime I do a re-install of windows I have to buy it again... I am starting to consider a free anti-virus but I am really cautious about it letting viruses get by, and thats not good for playing games!! AVG is the one im looking at. I would like opinions on it from people who use it and is it safe? Is it as good as the ones you pay for? Thanks.

Nightwish

I've been using it for the past six months, and I've had no hassle with it. However my free trial is expiring next week, and I'm not sure if I can get another free 6 months.

Mossy Monk

AVG works a treat

i thought i had trouble with it in the past but that was a PC issue and all is working well

godtabh

Nightwish wrote:

I've been using it for the past six months, and I've had no hassle with it. However my free trial is expiring next week, and I'm not sure if I can get another free 6 months.

its not expiring you have to upgrade to version 7.5 or what ever the current one is as the older version wont be updated

bubonicus

AVG is a great anti virus, but the company will not be supporting it anymore after this month.

You should get AVAST anti virus, a great free programme and it's equal to if not better than any anti virus progamme you would pay for.

check the essential free software sticky.

Hendrix89

bubonicus wrote:

AVG is a great anti virus, but the company will not be supporting it anymore after this month.

You should get AVAST anti virus, a great free programme and it's equal to if not better than any anti virus progamme you would pay for.

check the essential free software sticky.

Thanks, i have heard of that but it slipped my mind. I'll look into it also.

irlrobins

bubonicus wrote:

AVG is a great anti virus, but the company will not be supporting it anymore after this month.

Not true, just not supporting the old version (7.1). The new version 7.5 will be supported in the same fashion as before.

is_that_so

Surprised that you have to pay again on reinstall. Did Kaspersky not give you a key? I have used Kaspersky in the past and found it really good. My new machine came with McAfee which I find also does the job.

bubonicus

irlrobins wrote:

Not true, just not supporting the old version (7.1). The new version 7.5 will be supported in the same fashion as before.

my bad

do you have to pay for 7.5?

Redisle

bubonicus wrote:

my bad

do you have to pay for 7.5?

no.. as always they have a free edition of 7.5 and they also have pay versions for companies etc but free does just fine.

get it here... that is a direct link to the new avg free antivirus.

godtabh

bubonicus wrote:

my bad

do you have to pay for 7.5?

Its free. Just check out the webiste for details

Ruu_Old

I used the free version up until sometime last year and found it excellent, now using Avira Anti-Vir which I find very good also.

cianr

ab_cork wrote:

no.. as always they have a free edition of 7.5 and they also have pay versions for companies etc but free does just fine.

get it here... that is a direct link to the new avg free antivirus.

Thanks for the link!

eamon234

It is great - but I would recommend using it with AVG Anti Spyware (also free) as I've found it picks up on some more stuff like trojans and loggers (which to me are pretty dangerous)

Sully

I was always full of praise for AVG anti-virus until I noticed strange files appearing on my system and the factthat AVG couldnt pick it up. Eventualy, it picked up viruses but was never able to remove them. I always kept my AV up-to-date and often or not there servers were down so I couldnt get the updates.

Anyway, after a while I got fed up and did a test on two PCs which had the scanner. I removed it, and installed a trial version of NOD32. Not only did it pick up the same viruses but more - and it removed them for me no hassle. NOD32 was a little hard to use, and its not the most user friendly so I switched over to Kaspersky recently and am trying that out (tho, as much as id love to pay - they dont accept PayPal so im undecided). Kaspersky is good and didnt find any viruses but I assumed that would be the case as NOD32 did regular scans for me anyway and always kept me protected - even in emails.

So I refuse to use AVG, and have switched to using paid options instead. I just couldnt trust the product after it let me down twice!

hargo

I have AVG free and also Mcfee trial version which came with Dell and is now out of date. Should I remove the Mcfee?

irlrobins

Yep. and you shouldn't have two anti virus programs installed, that would seriously slow your pc down.

Hendrix89

I decided to stick with Kaspersky as I just don't want the risk. I found out how to renew my license so all is fine now and I only have to pay once for a year.

kmick

Been using AVG free for years. Always install it on friends PC's that i fix. As previuosly mentioned make sure all other AntiVirus programs are uninstalled. Its not so much that AVG wont work but the the other AV programs contend very badly. Some of them are very hard to remove as well. Symantec sprongs to mind. You can buy third party uninstallers for most of the popular ones. Two thumbs up!

aidan_walsh

irlrobins wrote:

Yep. and you shouldn't have two anti virus programs installed, that would seriously slow your pc down.

Not to mention the false positives of one AV scanning another quarantine folder.

Malice

bubonicus wrote:

You should get AVAST anti virus, a great free programme and it's equal to if not better than any anti virus progamme you would pay for.

I've used AVG in the past but I switched to Avast a few years ago. I have installed it on a large number of machines in that time and have never run into any issues with it so I would agree with Bubonicus and recommend it!

thebman

Also use Avast on parents Pc and my own Laptop and never had any problems.

Avast is really good for a free AV. You don't really need to pay for an AV as a home user IMO. If it was a business, you might want that kind of support but for home use, Avast is fine.

I recommend changing to the KDE skin as the default makes it look like a media player and its impossible to find anything.

byte

I've been using AVG for a few years, but today I am now using Avast! I figured I'd give it a try before updating AVG to v7.5.

I did notice after installation, that Avast! does not work with ZoneAlarm, so I had to remove that. Though I believe ZoneAlarm is probably one of the worst free firewalls out there? Must look for an alternative

Avast! seems good, though I agree with brim4brim on the poor default skin. Must look about changing it.

Bateman

I have always used AVG, no reason to change. Another thumbs up.