Avast! ?

I need a free AV for my nephews computer. Avast any good?
(I use NOD32 and Norton on my 2 computers) Appreciate any put.
When I saw their computer it was barely running - I think between spyware, adware and virus. Need to help them get it back and running.

 

Yes, Avast is excellent. Make sure they register it, otherwise it'll stop working after 60 days and then you'll have to go back to sort them out again...

 

Yes avast! is a good free av to use. You should probably run some of these online virus scans on his computer to clear up some of the nasties:

• Trend Micro's Free Online Virus Scan

• BitDefender <-- just agree to the licence

• RavAntivirus <-- select auto clean, then scan

World Industries

 

I am not happy with Avast at all!

It missed bunch of spywares in friends PC.

That ISTSVC.exe and WTOOLSA.exe doing what they want while avast just looking at that....

Downloaded NOD and it deleted 218 files... finnaly PC seems to be ok.

That product look nice but it really need more definitions, personally I would never install it again.

 

NOD32 is great but not free.

Yes Avast is pretty good. You may also want to look at AntiVir (however, the free version can't scan in or outbound email - it will scan any attachments if you open them or if you right-click within Windows Explorer and tell it to scan the file).

Try both and see which you like better. Also, follow World Industries' advice and use one of the recommended online scanners as a backup.

 

Add Adaware 1.6, Spybot 1.4 and Microsoft Anti-spy, all for free.

 

Avast is excellent, been running it for the last two years and have had my system scanned with KAV, BD, Anti Vir and nothing found on it. For spyware, run MSAS along with Spybot and AD Aware.

 

I share the same experience except been using avast! 1 year, also agree on the spyware apps

 

I have very recently started using the free version of Avast on my 4 year old son's PC. On my laptop I use NOD32.

In the end it all boils down to your surfing habits and my son is not too "adventerous" when it comes to browsing! He is happy with his 2 dozen sites which he visits often. And then there are no mails to be downloaded on his PC.So far there have been no problems with Avast.

Just add more security softwares as The Hammer has mentioned. Oh yes also add Ewido (free version) and Spyware Blaster to that list and do occasional online scans as suggested by World Industries.

Cheers

Akshay.

 

You can take another layer protections of avast! Web Shield/URL Blocking by prevent intentional/unintentional downloading some certain dangerous file type via browsers and prevent access to rough websites, so this may also proactively prevent some adware/spyware, trojandownloder that attack via browsers (especially IE) and you can set password to prevent unauthorized access to avast! Resident Protection panel.

In my opinion, avast! Home (free) is good as other commercial antivirus or it even better than some commercial products.

 

That is a very interesting configuration, TAP.
I'll implement it myself too.

Thanks

You may also need to add .com .vbs .js and everything at http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:...72/Webtable_01.pdf dangerous file types&hl=en and or http://www.g4tv.com/leolaporte/features/25469/Safe_File_Extensions_pg2.html (Recommended)

 

Thanks TAP.

Cheers

Akshay.

 

Avast is an Antivirus application and does its job extremely well, which is protecting a computer from virus attack. Some antivirus applications also detect some spyware, but their abilities to detect and remove spyware are patchy at best. There are plenty of antispyware applications, many of them free, which can deal with the spyware part of your protection - such as Ad-Aware, Spybot and Microsoft Antispyware.

 

Yup,TAP's config is a good proactive protection. I "invented" this trick almost the same day when Web Shield was released (except those URLs for sex and warez sites...).