Depends. I can live with or without it but if and when I choose to run it, I'd prefer running one that's very light and basic simply as a supplement. My 1st line of defense is something else...
I voted yes, and the reason is quite simple: I see no difference in system performance, both when booting and working, between having and not having it, and therefore I don't see why not make use of it. Why should I want to perform on-demanding scans? Everything get's killed either by trying to enter the system through the web browser (which by itself won't allow any downloads, unless I manually start them), or via CDs, DVDs, USB devices. I also got white-listing, so it makes the right combination. I'm not 100% immune of making mistakes. I also do not have the time to be always verifying the system by myself if something came through. I have no wishes of being a slave of "Oh, my system is not infected. Oh, I think it is, not sure though, better re-image"; "Wait, could it be that any of those snapshots/images I made behind are also infected and that the on-demand stuff I use can't just detect it?"; "Hmmm... What if right now the on-demand stuff says it's clean, and it is, but days ago it could had not been clean and malware could had sent info to its creator, and then just got deleted.... Could it be?" I also monitor the behaviors of the processes that are or that will become part of the operating system/apps.
I still haven't formatted PC to x64 so it's quite fun to try new software (Not really new, but i used a setup for like 6 months and it got too boring)
I'm curious as to why someone would choose the 3rd option: Yes but not always enabled. Would it be because of wanting to save resources? I'm just curious.
No, just on demand (As on demand AV scanner I use Dr.Web CureIt! - doesn't need installation on my system. I don't need scanner from 1st places from famous AV tests since on my system the most important layer of protection is prevention not detection).
Yes, but just superlight, cloud based, small, strong, without bugs...do I have to say name o.k. maybe there are few realtime scanners that can have all this
Not using MSE anymore, neither NIS2011 (in this old laptop). Currently using only on-demand scanners.
Yes I always use real-time protection on my systems. Why you might ask, since I'm am an advanced user do I really need real-time since I know what to do and not to do to avoid infections. 1. Many AV's are so light on the system that you don't sacrifice any system performance. (Avira, Avast, Nod32, Microsoft Security Essentials, Norton). So does it really hurt to use real-time? Better safe than sorry. 2. There are an excellent selection of free AV products to use, so if you can't afford to buy an AV, there really isn't any reason why you can't have real-time protection. 3. There has been known malware that can bypass HIPS and sandboxing. Just remember malware in general is always a step ahead of any type of security protection. NO solution will detect everything. Just remember your application can only block known methods used to infect. That's why HIPS and sandboxing continue to update their components to detect new methods. 4. Most HIPS and sandboxing applications have major issues and bugs that can allow vulnerabilities. Sometimes they can lock up Windows, block trusted processes that you need to run, cause system to be unstable, etc. What happens if a malware tries to infect your system and your HIPS or sandbox locks up Windows or causes Windows to crash? 5. For those who don't any any AV's period, then how do you know for sure that you don't have some hidden malwares, rootkits, etc.? Malware continues to get more advanced, some can run quietly in your system's background undetected by process managers. So if you don't scan or use real-time, then you don't know for certain that your system is clean? I have a friend who is an expert user and he bragged about not using an AV period for years. So one day I ask him to do a simple scan with several different AV products just to be sure his system was clean. To his surprise, he had a rootkit and several other types of malwares. I check them myself to make sure that they were not false positives and they were all real malwares. Since then he now uses real-time protection. Thanks.
littlebits, On old machines, any modern AV with realtime protection enabled hurts performance a lot. But I agree with all your points and already defended them in other discussions on this forum. Sadly, we even have a moderator who holds the opinion that AVs are useless..............
I use programs that I consider superior to AV but I still use a real-time AV. I would never say they are useless. Who knows they may just be the layer in your setup that saves you one day.
