antivirus and limited user

so basically, some people are not using an antivirus, and putting their faith in microsoft.

NEVER!!!!!

 

Yeah, I have also read in posts in some Vista forums where the user don't run any AV on their machine. Much as I like Vista I do not trust it that much. Besides in the past few months there have been more and more malware directed at Vista. Whether it will infect an UAC protected machine I don't know but better safe than sorry.

When I first installed Vista I did have myself setup as a limited user with a separate Admin account. But later on I noticed that the only difference in LU is that when UAC comes up you type in the Admin password instead of clicking on "continue" in the regular account. Since I am the only user on this computer I decided to turn myself into regular account. If you have several people that use the computer then LU is the way to go. It has a much better implementation in Vista than in XP.

 

Good point on the insurance! Second, I don't use LUA much because of just what you describe. I agree.

 

Actually, no. ThreatFire fails horrendously at that.

The answer to the question should be http://www.syssafety.com

 

So I guess you must be running DrWeb on Linux... right?

 

i use vista, but 'with an antivirus'

linux, no thanks... none of my paid software would work on it

 

The problem with relying completely on UAC is the possibility for error. UAC is a lot more active than it ought to be, so users can be lulled into clicking when they should not. Its also possible to write to the startup folder and other user areas without a UAC prompt allowing the installation of user mode malware.

Because Vista's market penetration is relatively low, its users are enjoying sort of a honeymoon before the malware authors really get after it. That will be followed by patches from Microsoft and new security products. It seems that the present generation of security products is XP based with compatibility fixes for Vista. Over time that will change.

 

Another problem with LU (in my case anyway) was that for some reason I wasn't getting firewall alerts in NIS '07. This could now be fixed in '08 but I am staying with the current setup since I am the only user. I understand how someone can be lulled but I try to be careful in my day to day computing.

One of the good things about UAC is that it can help in "Homer moments". Back when I was using Win98 I clicked on a .vbs file one night. As soon as I released the mouse button I knew I had screwed up and sure enough everything was deleted on my hard drive. If I had UAC back then it would have prevented it.