Question about Avira Suite

Discussion in 'other firewalls' started by Cherub, Sep 21, 2009.

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  1. Cherub

    Cherub Registered Member

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    I was thinking of purchasing the Avira Premium Security Suite(especially with the 10 month free offer they have right now) and was wondering if anyone had any experience with it. My present Suite license is about to run out(I won't name the vendor) and was looking for alternatives before I re-up with them.

    I notice that Avira gets good marks from a lot of posters on the anti-virus portion, but was wondering if anyone had experience with the overall suite. I'm not the most security savvy person, so I like the suite in order to protect my system.

    I'm running Vista 64 bit and will be running paid Prevx and WinPatrol at the same time. With A-squared,MBAM and SAS on demand.

    Appreciate any feedback.
     
  2. JohnnyDollar

    JohnnyDollar Guest

    A had a free 6mo license to it last year and I thought the firewall worked fine. Regardless of what anyone here tells you, I would advise you to trial it yourself. IMO don't ever purchase software online without trialing it first.
     
  3. Fly

    Fly Registered Member

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    I have experience with the suite.
    I use 'expert mode', and made some tweaks. I can't comment on the default settings.

    The firewall is good, no problems.
    Spam and phishing filter is a bit slow.
    Strong antivirus, but on the other hand, I usually don't get infected. :p
    Updates are quick.
    IMO, the webguard can slow down browsing. I only enable it when I visit untrusted sites.
    There is a bug, though. If you set the heuristics to high, and scan from the main page of the GUI, Avira will use its default settings (medium). If you go to 'local protection', and select your harddive (C:\ ?) it will scan it using the heuristics you selected.

    I haven't had ANY false positives.

    I have no experience with Vista, or 64 bit.
    Prevx and Windpatrol in addition to this suite seems overkill, I can't comment if it would work out. I just use the suite and some tweaks of IE 7.
     
  4. Cherub

    Cherub Registered Member

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    Thanks. I'll definitely trial it before I buy.

    I got another question. I've been using a suite for as long as I have had my computer. Since I found this site, I've seen different things I could use instead of a suite. I've just always liked the all encompassing aspect of a suite since I'm not particuarly confident in making security decisions on separate software.

    That said, if I was to go to a individual applications, what I would need to replace a suite with different stand alone applications.

    If I replaced my suite with Avira or Avast anti virus, what firewall would be good to use. (I mean, that wouldn't conflict...or have any known conflicts) The firewall aspect is the one I am least confident in that I could configure it adequately. So, I would need one that was somewhat easy to configure.

    Finally, if I got a anti-virus application, stand alone firewall with my Prevx and paid SAS, would that be a good security set up?
     
  5. s4u

    s4u Registered Member

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    What 10 month offer are you talking about?
     
  6. Cherub

    Cherub Registered Member

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    On their main page, it says they will add 10 months to the subscription if you buy within the next 5 days. So, instead of a year license, it will be for 22 months.

    I asked this on another thread, but would Avira Prem. Anti-Virus and Outpost Firewall Pro give me the same type of security that is found in a suite?
     
  7. Fly

    Fly Registered Member

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    I don't know. Outpost used (still?) to have a good reputation.

    I just checked the website: http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/index.php

    It mentions antispyware protection. I'm not sure how well that would work with Avira and your other security applications. There was a time when the Outpost firewall was just a firewall.

    Maybe someone else can give you better information.
    Anyway, I suggest you try it before you buy.
     
  8. bugsy_pal

    bugsy_pal Registered Member

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    Hi,

    I've been trialling the Avira Suite for a couple of months. Prior to that I had used Avira Premium with Comodo Firewall. I found very little difference with the two setups. The Avira Firewall is fairly unobtrusive. I disabled the Web Guard for general browsing. The mailGuard works well, although it has flagged a few false positives as phishing emails - but not many.

    I took up the 12-month +10 subscription offer yesterday, and went for Avira Premium rather than the suite. I have gone back to Comodo Firewall. The main reason was the cost - I couldn't justify spending the extra just to get the firewall, when a good free option was available.
     
  9. King Grub

    King Grub Registered Member

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    Yes, and they work fine together. I use Avira Premium and Outpost Firewall Pro together right now, and there are no conflicts or slowdowns (also with Vista 64) here. If Avira is installed first, Outpost recognizes that Avira is installed when you install Outpost, and disables the parts of itself that could cause conflict (spyware module, web control). And I've never noticed any slow-downs browsing with Avira's web-guard enabled, either.
     
  10. Subgud

    Subgud Registered Member

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    I have a license for Avira Premium Security. I find the firewall a bit lagging. When I open a program thats not in the list of trusted programs, the firewall will ask me for permissions. And that is not a problem.

    But when you start a new program it normally should ask for your permission the second the program start, but in my case, it will take 3-10 seconds before it pop up asking you about the program. And that is really annoying!
     
  11. Cherub

    Cherub Registered Member

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    I tried it out last night and so far, so good.

    King Grub, luckily that is how I installed them so that helped me in the set up. Like I mentioned my biggest problem is sometimes not knowing what to allow/not allow. I've learned quite a bit from this forum, but I would still say I'm a novice at most of this.

    If all continues, I think I will stay with the Avira Prem.AV/Outpost Firewall combo. If I buy Avira by the end of the week, I can get that extra 10 months on the sub, and it seems Outpost is a lifetime buy until October 31. So, that combined will save me a little money rather than re-upping the security suite license I have.

    King, how do you like the Outpost firewall? Does it still work well? Seems fine to me, but I probably wouldn't know if it wasn't. lol

    I'm a little bit confused on this "two way" firewall. Do I have to enable anything, or is the basic config. adequate?
     
  12. King Grub

    King Grub Registered Member

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    If you are sure your system is malware free, you can let Outpost enter Auto-learn mode (right-click on the icon and select it), which allows it to automatically create rules for applications that need rules. When you have "trained" the firewall, you can disable Auto-learn mode again.

    You are still protected from incoming traffic during this time, and with a clean system, there shouldn't be any security risks.

    All operating system-specific rules should already be there from the start.

    The basic configuration is adequate for the average user. The advanced user can select more more advanced options, where all system activity is monitored, but this will lead to many more pop-ups asking for your permission for everything, and for someone who isn't an advanced user, this could cause more irritation and problems deiciding what to choose rather than offer better protection. The "optimal" host protection level in the main settings view is fine for normal use.
     
  13. thathagat

    thathagat Guest

    avira suite firewall when asking for permission for programmes has a setting "previleged" don't forget to un-check that for it does not filter that app which is given a previleged connection.
     
  14. Cherub

    Cherub Registered Member

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    Thanks. I will do that tonight.

    Just to calm my nerves, here would be my whole setup.

    Avira Prem. Anti-Virus
    Outpost Firewall
    Prevx (Paid)
    Malwarebytes (paid)
    WinPatrol

    and Then on demand, I have
    Hitman Pro
    SAS (paid but not using real time)
    A Squared
    Macrium Reflect

    That would be pretty good protection, correct?

    As always, appreciate all the info guys. This site is absolutely terrific for someone like me.
     
  15. Ronin12

    Ronin12 Registered Member

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    You have a couple of applications that may at times wish to do the same thing. If you are not having any conflicts on your system then it is fine for now. If you can add exclusions for the other programs within each application that is actively running then go ahead and do so. Not to confuse you any more, but another excellent firewall that you may wish to consider is Online Armor (by Tall Emu). Some of the main differences between the paid version and the free version are the mail shield and the web shield. You would not want to use both web shields so if you chose this version I would disable the one in Avira or the one in Online Armor. I think the free version would work for you just fine. Since you have time with the firewall applications you can trial either one and see which one suits you more. Just completely uninstall the previous firewall before installing a new one. Since the Avira promotion is expiring soon I would determine if it is running fine on your system and if it is then I would highly recommend it. It is one of the top antivirus softwares around. Hope this helps.
     
    Last edited: Sep 22, 2009
  16. bugsy_pal

    bugsy_pal Registered Member

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    BTW, when I purchased my 12-month+10 month promotional license fro Avira premium, I actually got a full 2 years of licensing, up to Sept 2011! Good deal!
     
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