CaptSaltyJack
December 14th, 2006, 03:25 PM
Here's my current situation & setup:
I'm running Bitdefender 10. I've been using it since I think version 7 or 8. It seems to have gotten more bloated lately. I've noticed some software conflicts.. specifically, Weather Watches crashes (caused by Bitdefender's sockspy.dll), my professional audio software sometimes misbehaves, and if Sandboxie is running when Bitdefender updates, you're looking at a BSOD.
I don't really like when software conflicts like this. I can understand that for real-time protection, certain OS hooks are needed.. but come on. Crashes and BSODs???? Unacceptable. And Bitdefender support is starting to pull that typical, "It's not our software's fault" BS. The fact is, on a computer without Bitdefender, I experience zero issues with the aforementioned software.
So I'm looking to ditch Bitdefender. My goal is to get another anti-virus app, something that preferably won't conflict with other software. An AV app that plays nice, but still gets the job done.
Also, while I'm at it, other security apps have caught my attention, such as Online Armor, Safe'n'Sec, etc. I don't want to over-do it and install 8 different applications. I'll tell you a bit about how I use my computer and maybe that will determine what I need:
- I surf (duh). A lot. But I'm careful about what sites I go to. I do frequent MySpace, so the QuickSpace worm might've gotten me if I wasn't lucky. I refuse to disable cookies or javascript, as doing so would cripple a fair amount of media rich web sites.
- I do P2P. Again, I'm careful about what I get, but you never know what you might wind up with.
- I email (again, no brainer). I use SpamBayes which takes care of a lot of spam mail (it just moves it to another folder). I sometimes get phishing attacks via email, but they're no brainers for me to spot. Sometimes for a moment it looks official to me, but I'm always careful to check all links and source code in an email before I mess with it.
- I like to try out new software all the time. I routinely browse sourceforge and try stuff out, but I always install it using Sandboxie, so it doesn't leave crap behind on my system when I uninstall it.
Overall, I'm pretty careful about what I install and what I click on. I use Sandboxie if I'm not sure. So I'm just looking for software to catch the non-obvious.. stuff like maybe QuickSpace that I might've missed. What I want is this:
- good anti-virus protection, but WITHOUT the damn conflicts w/ other software on my machine
- good malware protection (worms, trojans, rogue scripts, etc)
I think that's all I need, but I'll take suggestions. Again, I want to keep it as lightweight as possible.. I don't need 10 security apps running. I've got a hardware firewall already, by the way.
Online Armor looks cool but I'm not 100% clear on what exactly it does.. maybe that sounds dumb, they make it seem like their program does it all (does it?). Can it replace anti-virus software?
So, any suggestions? I'd appreciate it. Thanks!
I'm running Bitdefender 10. I've been using it since I think version 7 or 8. It seems to have gotten more bloated lately. I've noticed some software conflicts.. specifically, Weather Watches crashes (caused by Bitdefender's sockspy.dll), my professional audio software sometimes misbehaves, and if Sandboxie is running when Bitdefender updates, you're looking at a BSOD.
I don't really like when software conflicts like this. I can understand that for real-time protection, certain OS hooks are needed.. but come on. Crashes and BSODs???? Unacceptable. And Bitdefender support is starting to pull that typical, "It's not our software's fault" BS. The fact is, on a computer without Bitdefender, I experience zero issues with the aforementioned software.
So I'm looking to ditch Bitdefender. My goal is to get another anti-virus app, something that preferably won't conflict with other software. An AV app that plays nice, but still gets the job done.
Also, while I'm at it, other security apps have caught my attention, such as Online Armor, Safe'n'Sec, etc. I don't want to over-do it and install 8 different applications. I'll tell you a bit about how I use my computer and maybe that will determine what I need:
- I surf (duh). A lot. But I'm careful about what sites I go to. I do frequent MySpace, so the QuickSpace worm might've gotten me if I wasn't lucky. I refuse to disable cookies or javascript, as doing so would cripple a fair amount of media rich web sites.
- I do P2P. Again, I'm careful about what I get, but you never know what you might wind up with.
- I email (again, no brainer). I use SpamBayes which takes care of a lot of spam mail (it just moves it to another folder). I sometimes get phishing attacks via email, but they're no brainers for me to spot. Sometimes for a moment it looks official to me, but I'm always careful to check all links and source code in an email before I mess with it.
- I like to try out new software all the time. I routinely browse sourceforge and try stuff out, but I always install it using Sandboxie, so it doesn't leave crap behind on my system when I uninstall it.
Overall, I'm pretty careful about what I install and what I click on. I use Sandboxie if I'm not sure. So I'm just looking for software to catch the non-obvious.. stuff like maybe QuickSpace that I might've missed. What I want is this:
- good anti-virus protection, but WITHOUT the damn conflicts w/ other software on my machine
- good malware protection (worms, trojans, rogue scripts, etc)
I think that's all I need, but I'll take suggestions. Again, I want to keep it as lightweight as possible.. I don't need 10 security apps running. I've got a hardware firewall already, by the way.
Online Armor looks cool but I'm not 100% clear on what exactly it does.. maybe that sounds dumb, they make it seem like their program does it all (does it?). Can it replace anti-virus software?
So, any suggestions? I'd appreciate it. Thanks!