Anti-virus

caramel08

Hi,
My current subscription to Mcafee Total protection is up soon and just want to get some advice on a good anti-virus. I have windows vista on an old laptop at home so don't want anything too expensive. IF anyone knows of any good free software, that's even better.

Thanks

Big Lar

Microsoft Security Essentials does the trick for me and its free.

AntiRip

Been using MSE for years without a problem. Use it in conjunction with Malwarebytes and you should have no issues.

portumnadaz

use avast its free and has a boot time scan option, ive never had a virus with it

uncle_sam_ie

Big Lar wrote: »

Microsoft Security Essentials does the trick for me and its free.

+1, there is no need to pay for an anti-virus these days.

johndoe99

i used Mcafee for 4 years, and when the time came to renew again, i could no longer afford it. For years I heard AVG Free was good and others told me it was bad. I bit the bullet and installed it, that was 2 years ago and i have never regretted it.

Always detects viruses and spyware that wants to do the PC harm, it updates daily. To this day i still can't believe they give it freely.

Give it a try.

PogMoThoin

Avoid AVG, it was great 2 years ago, but it's a bloated POS these days. As suggested use Microsoft Security Essentials or Avast (Avast gives popups, MSE is less annoying for this reason) both are better. To remove McAfee can sometimes be troublesome, use the removal tool to remove all traces.

caramel08

Hi everyone, that's great, thanks for all those suggestions.

T-Bird

MSE is not as good as it was when it first came out. In the past year I have repaired three pc's where a "false" virus suite managed to install itself and completly overun MSE. That problem might have been fixed now, but I am not as big on MSE as I was when it first came out.

uncle_sam_ie

thundermuppet wrote: »

MSE is not as good as it was when it first came out. In the past year I have repaired three pc's where a "false" virus suite managed to install itself and completly overun MSE. That problem might have been fixed now, but I am not as big on MSE as I was when it first came out.

Wait a minute, it manages to get installed because the user gets fooled into installing it. No anti virus will protect a PC from the user getting tricked.

yoyo

thundermuppet wrote: »

MSE is not as good as it was when it first came out. In the past year I have repaired three pc's where a "false" virus suite managed to install itself and completly overun MSE. That problem might have been fixed now, but I am not as big on MSE as I was when it first came out.

No AV software will provide detection for all 0 day exploits, this would be impossible

Nick

T-Bird

uncle_sam_ie wrote: »

Wait a minute, it manages to get installed because the user gets fooled into installing it. No anti virus will protect a PC from the user getting tricked.

Sorry my mistake, wrong word, it does not "install" as such. I should have worded it differently. As per link, it starts off as a Trojan mimicking MSE, it pretends to do a sweep of the drives, shows that it has been infected and then directs you to a place where you can purchase the software for you to fix. You then purchase the software and install the false software.

The only way I found out how to repair was by installing Malwarebytes and get it to scan in safe mode.

I have only come across this when MSE was installed.

All three pcs had torrent software installed on them...

T-Bird

Just found this on youtube, hope it explains it better.

LINK

Rabidlamb

thundermuppet wrote: »

Sorry my mistake, wrong word, it does not "install" as such. I should have worded it differently. As per link, it starts off as a Trojan mimicking MSE, it pretends to do a sweep of the drives, shows that it has been infected and then directs you to a place where you can purchase the software for you to fix. You then purchase the software and install the false software.

The only way I found out how to repair was by installing Malwarebytes and get it to scan in safe mode.

I have only come across this when MSE was installed.

All three pcs had torrent software installed on them...

As recommended above MSE + Malwarebytes & you're good.

AntiRip wrote: »

Been using MSE for years without a problem. Use it in conjunction with Malwarebytes and you should have no issues.

There's loads of those fakeware programs you describe going around, normally called Windows something or other to gain your trust.
Update Malwarebytes & run a scan to kill them.

Duggy747

I generally put on MSE + MalwareBytes on people's machines instead of the other crap free anti-virus software they have. AVG is a hog on resources for lower end machines.

I detest Avast, I see that software screw up more machines than any other AV and does be tedious to clean up the mess it makes to the OS.

coylemj

thundermuppet wrote: »

Sorry my mistake, wrong word, it does not "install" as such. I should have worded it differently. As per link, it starts off as a Trojan mimicking MSE, it pretends to do a sweep of the drives, shows that it has been infected and then directs you to a place where you can purchase the software for you to fix. You then purchase the software and install the false software.

I have no sympathy for anyone who gives their credit card details in response to a popup screen. No AV s/w is going to protect the gullible from themselves.

ScumLord

I've switched from MSE and malwarebytes to Avast and superantispyware. I got a virus that crippled my PC and I've no clue how it got in, I had to reinstall windows to get a working PC again.

At work I'm using Kaspersky and find it excellent, I never hear from it one day to the next until it's actually found something. Very unobtrusive.

katie21

So maybe I am not the best with computers but it is quite simple to download MSE and malwarebytes to a new computer. If anyone has any tips it would be great.

Bosh

Also use SpyBot along with MSE & Malwarebytes, small overhead & very useful in nasty removal.

ScumLord

katie21 wrote: »

So maybe I am not the best with computers but it is quite simple to download MSE and malwarebytes to a new computer. If anyone has any tips it would be great.

It's very easy, just search for "Microsoft security essentials download", download and install, there's nothing more that needs to be done with them.

mobyfitz20

MSE works pretty good. have never had any problems and has been using it for over 2 years now

200motels

I didn't think you could run Malwarebytes with Security Essentials, I maybe wrong on this but a bit of digging on the web confirmed this. http://forums.malwarebytes.org/index.php?showtopic=62974

yoyo

200motels wrote: »

I didn't think you could run Malwarebytes with Security Essentials, I maybe wrong on this but a bit of digging on the web confirmed this. http://forums.malwarebytes.org/index.php?showtopic=62974

You can run a Anti virus and multiple Anti Malware scanners usually ok. The only issue is when you have two anti virus scanners running. I'm not sure if the paid mbam is different, but with the free one it just acts as a scanner, no realtime protection engine gets loaded. Even with the paid mbam running both on your computer should not cause problems

Nick

200motels

yoyo wrote: »

You can run a Anti virus and multiple Anti Malware scanners usually ok. The only issue is when you have two anti virus scanners running. I'm not sure if the paid mbam is different, but with the free one it just acts as a scanner, no realtime protection engine gets loaded. Even with the paid mbam running both on your computer should not cause problems

Nick

Yeah fair enough, I'm going to try and run the free mbam with security essentials.

RUCKING FETARD

Where is mbam hiding the file it uses to make sure you can't just delete and reinstall for another free month??

Hide and seeeeeeek...

Torqay

RUCKING FETARD wrote: »

Where is mbam hiding the file it uses to make sure you can't just delete and reinstall for another free month??

Hide and seeeeeeek...

If the trial period has expired, you'll have to pay for the software if you want to enjoy all features of the paid version. End of story.

You can reinstall the software, disable the "trial version" at the first start and use limited free protection instead.