Looking for Free Antispyware Programs that are Vista-Compatible

Well as the title suggests, I'm looking for reliable free antispyware programs that work smoothly with Windows Vista (in specific Windows Vista Home Premium 32bit). I've known a handful over the years since I've experimented with a large variety of free programs, but the problem with this is that all were for Windows XP, and I plan to switch over to Vista.

Anyway, I've gone over a few of the free antispyware programs I've found interest in considering, and was wondering if anyone could offer their opinion on which I should choose and if they've been working great on vista or not (I've searched a few up myself, but found varied results in terms of compatibility). With that being said, I'll list the few that I found and added in a small note that reflects my current opinion on them.

On-Demand Scanning and Other:

SUPERAntispyware -- So far my experience with this program on Windows XP has been great, although there have been varied responses on problems that have occurred with it and Windows Vista that weren't really addressed since no new program updates have come. I've heard that 4.0 will be coming out soon, but have no idea when it will come out (thinking of waiting till it is released).

Spybot S&D -- I haven't been too comfortable with 1.5, as there have been continual problems since it's release. The only fixes provided came at a relatively slow rate, and still all problems have not been finalized out of beta. The main reason for even considering this is the immunization that now includes firefox, but that has also been identified to have some issues.

SpywareBlaster -- For this I haven't heard anything in terms of Vista compatibility with this, and I plan to use this as my primary source of immunization. The only issue I really have with this is its relatively limited amount of firefox protection opposed to Spybot. I've heard that there is an upcoming update for this, and am curious what the estimate time for its release is going to be.


Real-Time Protection:

Spyware Terminator -- This program was initially great when I had it for the short while I did when it was version 1.6.x to 1.9.x. However, there were some problems that occurred with its compatibility with other programs that I've had in the past, and the recent 2.X version has been filled with glitches as well as an overall slow progress in fixes. My chances of using this in Vista are a bit slim at the moment due to the existing problems which haven't been fixed yet.

Windows Defender -- I know that this program tends to be very inflexible and not the best in comparison to other antispyware programs in terms of quality, protection offered and detection, but it's basically the only program I know of that works perfectly with Vista and doesn't have any major conflicting issues. I am debating if I should use this if I can't find a suitable real-time protection program for spyware.

Comodo BOClean -- This program I don't know much about, and I'd like to hear everyone's opinion on this one. All I really have is a vague conception of what this program is like and how it looks.

Spyware Doctor Standard (Google Pack version) -- I just recently heard about this one, and don't know much about it except for the fact that it tends to have a lot of false positives. I looked into it a bit and found that it lacked some important real-time features in spite of its "standard protection".



Well that's my list which doesn't appear to have much. If you're wondering why I chose not to include AVG AS, A-squared, or Ad-aware 2007, it's because they all include an extra process running in the background (AVG AS's is possible to be disabled but it is a rather clunky program that has caused me problems before).

If anyone else has more suggestions for free on-demand and/or real-time antispyware for Vista, I'd be grateful if you could share it with me. Thanks to those who help me out on this one as it has been a rather tough decision for me so far.

 

Hi,

The current version of SpywareBlaster is indeed compatible with Windows Vista.

Depending on how your system is set up (i.e. because of User Account Control and some other profile choices), there may be a few quirks with the additional Tools, and there have been a few cases where it doesn't detect the Firefox profiles, but the majority of the protection works just fine.

The upcoming release will fix these quirks, as well as add some neat new features. (But don't let that stop you from using the current version today. ) Although I don't provide estimated release dates as a rule, I can say that the new version is being actively worked on, and we hope to have it out as soon as possible.

Best regards,

-Javacool

 

Thanks for the fast input on SpywareBlaster! The way I see things it will stick with me on my transition to Vista. I'll consider using the current version for it, but I personally can't wait to see what new things it will have to offer in the upcoming update.

 

When I tried SAS on Vista it worked fairly well. My next suggestions wouldve been AVG AS and a-squared but youre not interested.

As for Comodo BOClean, its a real-time only anti-malware. Its runs light and monitors the memory waiting for malware to execute.

 

FWIW- I am using SAS with Vista HP without issue. Also am using SB but had to exclude it in DEP for it to load properly. Same with SAS.

 

Sandboxie and Returnil here with both working fine.

 

Well I haven't been looking into Sandbox's or Virtual Machines just yet, but thanks for listing a few (the more I know, the merrier!). For now I hope more people can contribute in terms of helping me decide, as I find the need for some extra real-time protection after witnessing a "safe site" getting hacked and not detecting anything (I suppose I just want to make sure I'm well-protected to avoid questionable cases like that).

Moving back, for BOClean I've heard there have been some problems with it in terms of support and the versions, could anyone give me any feedback on this? I've also found that it's rather simplistic and quiet opposed to other real-time antispyware/antimalware applications which tend to offer a scanning feature, detailed GUI, and the like. These issues are mainly what's making me think of using it or not, although I really hope more suggestions can be made for other programs.

 

i moved Windows Defender to on-demand mode...i have a laptop
computer and it was using up quite a bit of resources

 

I'm a SpywareTerminator user, and a won't-use-Vista-ever user. (XP)
A lot of the problems related to SpywareTerminator seem to be associated with the (optional) Clam AV integration, and the Web Security Guard, (A bit like SiteAdvisor) for which the Crawler toolbar is a required install. Of course, you can (as I did) download the basic ST program without those extras. I've had no problems with it at all.
Another problem that has been reported is that the resource use of the realtime shield seems to increase with time, and ongoing-ly so, it seems as more def's are added. Currently mine is using 43K in taskmanager, which is no problem, but I've read about it going as high as 100K, and there is no sign of a fix for users with that issue, yet.
I'd suggest to try it - download the bottom download on the download page here (4.3mb) and see how it runs.
I'm also using Avast with no compatibility problems (Avast seems to run well with almost anything, though) and Comodo firewall 2.4.18.184.