Symantec question

Since ditching NOD32 several weeks ago I've tried several AV programs - KIS7, F-Secure and Symantec (Corporate Edition).

I liked KIS7 but it did make my browsing extremely slow. I did, however, 'feel' very safe with it.

F-Secure seemed ok, but it didn't seem too customizable.

Symantec, however, surprised me. It's interface is pretty hideous, but after reading lots of bad press about machine slowdowns, etc, I was surprised to see that I noticed no notable slowdowns at all.

My question is - why, when Symantec seems to always figure at the very top end of the AV tests (with Kaspersky), does hardly anyone use it? Is it a slowdown issue? Is it because it is ugly to look at? Surely the detection rates speak for themselves?

After having it installed for a couple of days it seems pretty impressive. I'm just curious as to why it's rarely mentioned here, apart from being associated with Norton (remember, I have Symantec Corporate, not NAV 2007 installed).

Is it really a 'bad' AV? Should I dump it for Kaspersky (and the agonizingly slow browsing with Firefox that I don't have with Symantec).

Your valued opinions are extremely welcome.

 

I think generally, people on the forum have a favorable impression of Norton. It has scored very well on both Av-Comparative and Av-Test tests. I think the main issue people had in the past was its bloat and system performance. It seems these issues have been resolved with the 2007 version.

 

I think you're right Thankful - the version I am using certainly doesn't seem heavy. The last time I tried Norton it was awful. The Symantec Corporate version (no idea if it's the same thing as Norton, better than Norton, or just a stripped down, no-frills version for the business user instead of the home user) seems much better.

 

Actually a lot of people use SAV/NAV. SAV is the most used enterprise AV and bunches of new PC's are shipped with NAV 90 day trial versions. What you see in this forum (or any internet forum on nearly any subject) is not representative of the world as a whole. For starters, you will hear a lot about Nod32 because its support forum is here. Also, users of various exotic AV's abound because in many cases there is no other forum (or English language forum) for their chosen product, and they tend to be more vocal than those who stick to the mainstream.

Personally, I would stay away from beta AV's at least until they reach the RC stage.

 

the main reason people hate symantec is the fact that the 2003/2004/2005/2006 versions where resouce hogs and very hard to remove.
the last norton version i used was the 2003 version.
i had the problems as discriped above plus the live update would brake a few times every month.
2007 version has ironed out most of those problems.
but i still dont like the nannyness of it.
if you turn off automatic updates it nags you about it all the time.
and there arent many options to change.
if someone where to give me SAV i would use it.
they should forgot the home user products and sell SAV to home users.
lodore

 

I tried NAV 2007 for a while and found it pretty good overall. Startup and shutdown of the PC was considerably slower than without it, so it is perhaps a little "heavy" for this older 1 gig cpu here. But aside from that, it seemed fine. In spite of recent improvements, I still think that it is generally pretty heavy and makes quite a few registry entries, compared to others. But overall, I would rate it a good product..

 

Fair point Diver. I've always been the sort of person who will go against anything corporate out of principle, but if the software does what it does well, then I certainly don't mind using it.

Although I did like KIS7 very much, and it is still in beta/RC form, I also found it caused many more slowdowns than the version of Symantec I am trying out.

 

most people have found kis7.0 faster in proformance than most av's
but all computers are different.
lodore

 

Yep, so far so good for me. I'll give it another few days and if it keeps running well I might well keep it (never thought I'd say that).

It was only really the browsing with Firefox that was a nightmare. With Opera and even IE, it was fine. Since trying out SAV, Firefox is fine again - no slowdowns. I think I had KIS set to scan web traffic, but it did make browsing considerably slower. Otherwise, I liked it a lot and look forward to trying out the final version.

Yes, I have certainly noticed shutting down takes a little longer.

 

@mrfargoreed,
do you happern to use any network tweaks for firefox?
such as using fasterfox?
webav doesnt like the network tweaks in firefox.
if so thats why the internet would of have been slower with firefox and not IE or opera.
lodore

 

No mate - no tweaks at all.

 

Just like the OP after years of using it I decided to give something other than Nod a try since I am somewhat upset by its detection capabilities. Also I want to have a product that includes a decent firewall. The new ESS looks promising but there are still so many problems I doubt it will be released soon if it ought to be as reliable as Nod used to be. And still you would have only average detection capabilities.

So I tried KIS several times. But I just don't like it, I don't like iSwift and iChecker, I don't like decrease in web speed, I don't like its noticable impact on system perfomance even on my dual core, I would not even dare to think of installing it on my 1 Ghz laptop.

So on to Avira. Maybe the best single engine antirus product at the moment. But its Security Suite is .. modest. The firewall is just bad, you don't have different zones, so you cannot distuingish between home network and internet traffic. I could also not get the ports stealthed. Plus even during my few days testing I had the famous update problems. System impact is not much more then Nod, though. Still it didn't satisfy me, I want a single product, so I can see at a glance that my security status is ok (and no I don't trust Windows security center - it kept telling me Avira was taking care of spyware and ESS firewall was installed although both products were long gone ...)

I read so many good comments on NIS2007 and actually no real complaints. No one seems to have problems with the suite and detection is very good judging from latest test, reaching up to products like KIS. So I installed the trial - and well, the installation is a pain compared to other products, it just won't end. I think it really burries deep into the system. But ok, you only install once ideally. Then, startups are indeed slower than with other products. But again, you don't restart every ten minutes. But apart from that I'm very content with the system perfomance. It does not "feel" slower, there is no extensive hdd activity like with KIS, programs pop up just like they did with Nod. I can see the CPU time it takes and it is higher than Nod or Avira, but not much, and still much less than KIS. Updates take quite a long time, and I'm not sure how often it updates, you cannot set that. But there are many ways in which the program can be adjusted to you needs, e.g. the notification if Windows Auto Update is disabled can be turned off. The firewall is just what I need and gives extra protection for the home network since you have to approve the network and second the computer (although it took me quite some time to figure that out). I also got true stealth on grc.com. Furthermore I am surprised the suite is kept quite clean, no unneccessary things like ad blockers, anti spam or parental control, but they can be downloaded as an addon for who thinks needs it. It scans mail and checks some general security settings on your PC. And that's it. I bought it now.

I'm tired of worrying about my security apps and trying out yet another product or beta version. I will see how it goes and if there are no serious problems arising I will keep NIS as it got all I need. Oh yeah, I bought a students license, so buying it didn't really hurt

 

Norton has gone from one of the most intrusive AV to one of the least intrusive for me. Looking into the logs is the only way I know it is working (except for a few trojan alerts). I think however that since I run as Standard User is that I don't get the popups. I was in the admin account once and saw the firewall popup for the first time.

It quick scans in the background at certain times. Once I was playing COD2 and later after finishing playing I was looking into the logs and was surprised that a Quick Scan was performed during gameplay. I didn't remember any slowdowns at all.

In other forums Norton still gets bashed even though it has improved much since the Bloat Era ('03-'06). I have stopped trying to argue with these narrow-minded people. I don't care if they use it or not, just drop the bloatware label.

This is a new era.

 

From what I can make up the firewall is set to non-interaction by default. I set it to ask me whenever there is an application it does not know, though.

Quick scan is performed after signatures have been updated, but you could turn it off if you'd wanted to.

 

i can drop the bloatware label but i cant drop the nannyness of it.
and the little amount of options.
also the interface is still horrible.
basically its fine for housewifes who just wanna use there pc in peace.
but its not for people who turn off unneeded stuff in windows since it keeps imforming you they are turned off and is annoying.
and symantec should sell sav to home users.
they would make more money that way and have happier users.
lodore

 

I am not a "housewife", but I prefer a solution that works out of the box. I haven't used Symantec products for at least 7 years so I am pretty much unbiased I think. I could not observe so much nannyness. You can turn off notifications you don't like, for some users I could imagine it is useful to be reminded of turning Windows Update on I could imagine.

 

I do not understand this "nannyness" myself. I do not turn off UAC and Windows Updates so I haven't seen any Windows related notifications from NIS. I rather have security than speediness anyday as I do not like performing reinstalls.

When I turn off Auto-Protect, the systray icons look like this:

http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/3197/systray2jf5.jpg

Other than the window which asks you for how long AutoProtect should be off, I see no other "pop-up" warnings except for this when I fire up IE7:

http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/1921/ietoolbaris6.th.jpg

The Phishing bar also acts as an indicator to let you know when AutoProtect is off. Personally I like this as one time I had disabled AP to play a game and forgot to turn it back on afterwards. I went online and saw this warning in which I promptly turned AP back on.

The only other warning I could think of that could "nag" you is when you turn LiveUpdate off. But why would someone want to do that?

As far as the interface goes, it does not bother me that much. There is a whole lot less "yellowness" than in past versions. Where I can see the yellow systray icons striking a contrast against a blue, silver, or green taskbar it does not look too bad against a black opaque background

 

I have been using Nav 2007 for quite a while now and like it a lot. Like others, I didn't like versions previous to 2007 and had been using other AV's. After seeing some favorable comments from people on this and other forums on Nav 2007 I decided to give it a try and have been using it ever since.

 

I am waiting for its new client security suite which is supposed to be vista compatible and with more features. I hope we get more improved version in this June.

 

Some interesting comments here. I am having hardly any messages from SAV - in fact, the only one I had was an infected .rar file I downloaded as a test (hoping it would be infected). As for it's 'nannyness' (lodore) - perhaps this happens with Norton, but with SAV I really can't 'feel' it (that's not saying it isn't 'nannying'). When I tried NAV/NIS last, it took an age to install and setup.

SAV didn't take long to install, I wasn't asked hundreds of ridiculous questions on setup, it's fairly simple to configure, I'm running the heuristics on full - it seems a totally different product (checks label on CD to make certain it IS SAV).

And to be honest, it's quite nice having an AV that just does it's job well without giving warnings every few minutes. Another couple of days testing, but so far I'm very impressed.

 

That's why I like it. No need to go into the program to enable a whole lot of other settings to get it to do something or no need to go into the program to disable a bunch of settings to get your computer to run faster. Just install it and let it run on its own.

 

Sav is great AV.
i would be happy to use sav.
but wouldnt touch there home products.
the nannyness is in the norton products and not in sav.
where did you get sav from?
i want to give it a trial upstairs but not been able to find a trial....
lodore

 

I got it from a friend of mine who works in I.T. Not sure if he was supposed to let me try it out or not, but I asked him what AV he puts on all his machines for work and he said SAV. I, like many others, mocked that I hated Norton products, but he assured me that this was a different baby to NAV. I think he got bored with me complaining about not being able to settle with an AV that suited my machine, and suggested I try SAV. I think he did it to keep me quiet, and I think he has succeeded.

One other little thing that I noted with SAV is that it has also been the first AV I have used that actually ensures it is the first thing to appear in my system tray at startup (apart from FDISR). NOD32, KIS and others just appear when they are ready - often after many other apps have started. Seeing that SAV icon in my tray just makes me feel safer. I know it's protecting me from as soon as my machine starts. Sounds daft, but it all helps make me 'feel' secure.

 

The icon in the tray has nothing to do with when protection starts, it always starts way before you even have a chance to see any icon's, i'm pretty sure it's the same with Nod or any other AV worth it's salt.

 

I'd certainly hope so Don Pelotas - can't imagine an antivirus starting after everything else, but just seeing it there immediately makes me feel protected. I know it's psychological, but I find that little icon reassuring.