Bitdefender 7 free

Does anyone have any experience/opinion of this AV? Would appreciate it. I had been using AVG for yonks, now switched to the etrust promo, but am curious about bitdefender as well.

 

BitDefender free is a scanner and updater.
No av monitor included when I tried it recently.

It's more of a second(back up) on-demand scanner.IMO.

 

Hi kyte

As Tester said, BitDefender has no Real Time Monitor continuously checking your files. It has only an on-demand scanner, so it can only be used as a Secondary Backup scanner.

Therefore, you can use the Etrust Server edition as your Primary AV Scanner and if you like the idea of a layered defense, use BitDefender as a backup.

 

blackcat, that's just what I do. I'm running Etrust with InoculateIT as my realtime scanner and Vet as the local this week. Bitdefender is my backup. It's probably overkill and I've only had 2 or 3 virus attempts since 1996. My wife, though, had her computer knocked out by a virus only a couple of months ago. Her AV missed whatever got in and it did a number on the hard drive (thank you AVG). Fortunately she saved her graphics to CD (she does graphics and builds web sites). She's only recently got her software back to where it was when it happened. She also has the free ETrust server edition now. AVG is gone from her computer.

 

Etrust by itself would offer better protection than AVG. So with BitDefender as well this would be a good layered defense system .

 

Thanks for your responses, folks, and I am sorry I didnt get back to see what anyone had said about Bitdefender...sometimes I think my absentmindedness is an excuse for dementia. sighh.

 

Blackcat and Chuck57 say everything...
Having two av at the same computer, even with the residents disable, can cause a lot of trouble. For a second av, just a "backup scanner", try BitDefender 7.0 FREE Edition (see info at http://www.avast.com/forum/index.php?)

More freeware links

 

Installing more than one anti-virus product to be used as an on-demand scanner in order to double check results - sort of a second opinion - not all products will allow their installation if another anti-virus product is detected, whether it is active or not. Sometimes there are ways around this, but sometimes not. If you are able to install more than one product, be sure to keep only one active at any one time while using the additional products for on-demand scanning only. Simultaneous use of anti-virus products will often cause them to work against each other and can produce unpredictable results.

Suggestion, if one wants a 2nd AV opinion, why not do a freebie scan from TrendMicro or Panda, say weekly, to avoid running two AVs on your computer??

 

Speed of connection/scanning and privacy concerns come to mind, on why online scans are inferior to local scanning.

 

When I posted the original question, I was looking for a replacement for AVG. Bitdefender will not fill that need at all, so I intend to give it a miss. I may try etrust again (tried it somewhere between then and now), since it has the inoculateIT engine... Its a hard decision to make when you don't actually do much in the way of attracting virii. I havent had (been affected by...) a virus since 1994..this is not to say they havent arrived attached to email, but since i delete most of that stuff off the server its not a problem.

Anyway, thanks for your help, folks..

 

I really agree with you...
But, JayK is correct too.
Kyte, a good replacement for AVG maybe avast!

 

I tried BitDefFree for a while. As noted earlier in this thread, it is "on-demand" only. It played nicely with F-Prot for Win.

I really liked BD as a second opinion scanner; especially since on-demand is the *perfect* role for a second opinion AV IMHO.

However, I ceased using BD. Why? Because it used 8MB of ram at all times, whether or not I did a scan with it.

To solve the ram usage problem, I disabled BD from start-up. It made no complaint. However, when I updated BD's signatures, it no longer would display the number of signatures in its data base on its main screen [it HAD displayed this number before I messed with it].

Faint heart that I am, I uninstalled BD. However, I feel that someone with computer smarts COULD tinker with BDfree so as to solve BOTH the ram & the display problems. Since BDfree shows a lot of promise, I hope someone has a go at it.

moo goo gai pan.......bell

 

If you have AutoIt 2.64 you can write an script (or executable) like this:

HideAutoItWin, on
Break, on
SetWinDelay, 2000
RunWait, net start xcommsvr,, hide
RunWait, net start bdss,, hide
Run, C:\\ ... \\BitDefender\\bdmcon.exe
WinActivate, BitDefender Free Edition
WinWaitActive, BitDefender Free Edition,, 2
WinActivate, BitDefender Free Edition
Exit

Have fun your BitDefender will work perfectly (when you need it) and the signatures will appear ok...

 

No offense, Tech, but I wonder if the average user will mess with that sort of thing -- scripts & all. I KNOW that it's far beyond me.

It seems evident that BitDef-Free, even though it is only for on-demand use, does have full-time-running processes, & does use 8mb of ram.

If I disable the real-time monitors of [say] EZ AV, AntiVir PE, or AVG -- so that they, too, run only on-demand -- they will use ZERO ram & have no running processes.

In fact, BitDef-Free uses more ram as an on-demand scanner than any of the named programs use for their respective real-time monitors!

I am NOT challenging your endorsement of BitDef-free. AFIK, it is a great freebie! But I do feel that folks should also be made aware of [as Paul Harvey would say] "the rest of the story."

peace unto all.....bell

 

Ok, I agree with you. Let´s forget the configuration of BitDefender.
Btw, I´m an avast! user and lover (and just a BitDefender student).

 

Good luck kyte with your e trust v7. As it has both Vet and inoculateIT and you have tidy surfing habits you
should find that they are enough .