Comming from 8 years of Linux - Need advice on Free Security Products

That's what most people think, because they assume that what they read on the internet is 100% true.

Conflicts rarely happen. I've tested tens of AV's at the same time once, with no conflict whatsoever, didn't even need to put them into each other's exclusions while testing hundreds of malicious links.
Sure, conflicts can happen, but please don't say they are common, because they're not. I read stories everyday about how if you mix two antivirus together you'll get a conflict and the world will blow up, but the vast majority of people who say so don't even know where they heard that from and they keep and keep repeating the same stuff, and newcomers will also keep reading and spreading this nonsense without even testing to see if it's true. It's a vicious cycle, unfortunately. The only time I had a conflict was when Kaspersky alerted about Avira (if I remember correctly), and all I had to do was to put Avira in Kaspersky's exclusion.But nothing except a warning happened.
Of course, excluding one AV from another is a "better safe than sorry" practice for someone using more than one security solution at the same time.
I never experienced and never seen one antivirus blocking another.

Less security? Yeah, because it's not common for security solutions to use more than one engine. Right?

Also, it doesn't surprise me that these two gave much better results on performance than Comodo or Kaspersky alone, not to mention it's possible that they together deliver a better detection rate than when using Comodo or Kaspersky. But I'm not sure, I'll test that this week.

 

They must be disigned to co-exist (e.g. WSA, or multiple engines into one product), your combination is not. So, just not to reivent the wheel your setup will create problems. Problems you do not necessarily seen as they happen at kernel level. This has been discussed plenty of times in here before... so... as they say "forewarned is forearmed"

 

Usually kernel conflicts result in BSOD, but it's possible for a conflict to be "silent".
I hope it's not another FUD
I'll do some research on it.

 

Not necessarily ending into BSOD but resulting in troubles especially at the time when the AV is most needed. i.e. at the time of infections.
And it will not be enough to exclude one AV from the other as hooking will not change. Also windows kernel is simply not designed to keep up with multiple hooking. I have seen myself many users with multiple AVs getting infected with malware as the system collapses under this security "piling up" strategy.

Keep it simple and master what you install. I don't need to insist on this as you will realise it in some years (normally) as I did.

 

I'd ask for evidence of such claims, but it won't be needed. I convinced my contractor of letting me use Blender instead of Rhinoceros for my next job I'm used to both, and even though I rather model in NURBS Linux will always come first than Windows.

Oh, I feel like getting back home.

 

fax is right re multiple antivirus programs. This is due to how system calls are intercepted.

In Windows XP and later, API functions begin with 7 bytes of no-op instructions (i.e. "ignore this instruction and go on to the next one"). Realtime antivirus software would typically overwrite that empty space with jumps to its own functions, which would eventually jump back to where the function actually begins - or not, if malware is detected.

But if you have two AVs running and overwriting the same no-op instructions, only one can actually work. You don't know which one, that depends on what order they start in when you boot up (i.e. a race condition). You might get each AV intercepting a different set of functions if the drivers load concurrently. This could lead to all kinds of bad stuff.

 

I've never run two real-time AVs at the same time, except when one was created to be run next to others (WSA, MBAM). Once I did get a laptop from my friend that had ESET and Norton installed at the same time. She brought it to me saying there was something wrong with computer and that it was infected. After I boot it up I was bombarded with popups from both AVs trying to quarantine the same file. Popups were really fast and I couldn't close them fast enough. Each popup also took the focus from my mouse so I had really hard time trying to disable ESET's real-time protection. After Norton uninstall everything went back to normal. Now I never recommend running two AVs at the same time.

Also IMO benefits from running second AV are small and are not worth the risk they are introducing to system. If I make up some numbers I would say: 1 AV will detect 95% of malware, two of them will detect 97%. Is running second AV worth additional 2% of detection?

 

I also have experience (from other peoples PCs) of
conflicts,
slow downs,
crashes,
related to using more than one AV at a given time

 

Using to AV's at the same time is never a good idea period.

Don't believe everything you read on the Internet? Of course not....

But you clearly believe those that says it works fine using 2 AVs at the same time. Only because they haven't experienced any problems...yet.

 

I would agree, the majority of the time. There are quite a few people who have run Webroot with other AV's and never had an issue. I'm not saying I recommend or condone it, but Webroot even says its designed to work with other programs.

 

Many of them are discontinued. Only stayed Clam and Comodo as free for linux. I don't know how long I can use AVG free Scanner for linux which is from 2013, because WIndows' license is for one year, in linux I didn't find any limitations.It's not bad if you can find GUI,but it's so hard to find for download,but it's still on official site! so hurry up!