One year of McAfee

Discussion in 'other anti-virus software' started by Daveski17, Apr 7, 2010.

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  1. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    Tomorrow at three pm BST it will be exactly one year since I installed NetProtect Plus (McAfee) that is provided by my ISP (British Telecom). I know McAfee is not a very fashionable AV & seems to provoke reams of invective & histrionics on some forums. I however, have had no problems with it whatsoever. That is more than I can say about Norton. Before that I had Bullguard, which is a Bit Defender variant, & they have had a few problems recently from what I can gather. I have had no false-positives or any problems at all.

    I will admit that McAfee is a little heavy & can be a resource hog but it seems to run better than Norton & compares well with Bullguard. Its daily DAT updates are less intrusive than Norton’s weekly theatrical updates were & don’t freeze my computer if I am in a slow server like Norton did. The firewall & its functionality on McAfee is very good in my opinion & compares well with many others that I have seen. Although to be fair to Norton most of the problems were minor irritations & I believe the new Norton has been considerably improved.

    You would not believe all of the people who hounded me about deciding to download McAfee on some forums (the Spyware Warrior forum for one) & I am sure they can all find tons of malware that would infect my badly defended computer. Although I would like to point out that I have multi-layered security including a hardware firewall, SpywareBlaster, Windows Defender, SUPERAntiSpyware, WOT & Site Advisor!

    At the end of the day, after installing McAfee, the world didn’t end in an apocalyptic inferno & McAfee didn’t eat my computer or any of my internal organs. Neither did zombie flesh-eating aliens or flying monkeys appear in the sky hell-bent on some McAfee inspired mischief.

    McAfee is not a fashionable AV & is probably not the best in the world either. Friends of mine have had problems with Norton, AVG, Avast! & Bit Defender of late while I have had none. I get McAfee free from BT & it seems to be working fine. I am quite satisfied with it. I don’t know how I’d have fared with Avast!, MSE or any of the other freeware programs.

    It sort of reminds me about the controversies surrounding Windows Vista. It's almost like everyone claims that it is complete rubbish, yet it is far more secure than XP, it looks far better than XP, & in my experience far less problematical. In fact in the two years I’ve been running Vista I have had virtually no trouble with it. I had far more problems with XP which I personally did not like, yet for some XP seems considered to be almost perfect. I like Vista enough not to be too bothered about upgrading yet. I liked it right from the first time I saw it!

    So it's all a case of De gustibus non est disputandum as they said in Rome once upon a time or somewhere warmer than where I live!
     
  2. Watasha

    Watasha Registered Member

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    I'm personally not a big fan but if it works for you...:thumb:
     
  3. JasSolo

    JasSolo Registered Member

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    Glad that You're happy with McAfee. Just one thing have caught some extra attention, here at my home. It must be a VERY old version of Norton, You're referring to, since You're speaking about weekly updates. To my knowledge, Norton is using pulse updates (every 5-15 min.) and have been doing that, for nearly 2 years. Before that, they used DAILY updates, but maybe You have been using the 1995 version or something like that?! :D
    Anyways, I'm getting off topic here. Congrats with your happy experience, with McAfee :)


    Cheers
     
  4. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    Again, it was the British Telecom version of Norton 360 (I think). It was only a year ago I was using Norton & I used it for about 8 months before changing to McAfee.

    I just remember the updates every Friday. Maybe Symantec sold a very old version of Norton 360 to BT. I wouldn't put it past either of them! :eek:
     
  5. Cudni

    Cudni Global Moderator

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    although not the latest 2010 version but the prior suite it still protects well and a good one to have especially free. It would be nice if BT updated to latest offering though
     
  6. DavidCo

    DavidCo Registered Member

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    I have had no problems with Vista at all but many years ago I had a nightmare with McAfee and never went back.

    I do have a problem with Windows 7 though, 2 of my major programs will not run at all with it (not even compatibility mode etc)
    It would cost me £1500 to upgrade my CAD programs for windows 7:mad:
    It's the extra reg hive that does it
     
  7. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    I've read that the 2010 version suffers from false-positives a bit. Maybe when some of the bugs have been fixed BT might upgrade.
     
  8. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    I can understand that if you have a bad experience it can be a bit off-putting. I had a bad Spybot S&D experience once. I'll never use it again but I am sure it has its positive side.
     
  9. TrojanHunter

    TrojanHunter Registered Member

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    I was using Mcafee Internet security 2009 for a while sometime back, which came free with my ISP. It liked more memory than others that I have used, but it never slowed my Computer down. The Active protection feature has improved their detection rates quiet a lot, however I would like to see Mcafee implement more proactive features like some of their rivals have. Mcafee is Ok, but in my opinion they're behind the competition.
     
  10. ALiasEX

    ALiasEX Registered Member

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    I wasn't planning on posting but because Norton still gets so much stick from certain people I decided to.

    :thumb: It's nice to hear about your (good) experience with McAfee. It gets just as much stick.

    Norton here is using 0 CPU and 6-9MB RAM.
     
  11. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    That's an interesting point, could you be a bit more specific about 'proactive' features. Pretend you're explaining it to an idiot LOL. :D
     
  12. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    Most of the problems I had with Norton were minor inconveniences & I've heard a lot of good reports about the newer version. It has been suggested to me that McAfee & Norton get the most stick because they are widely pre-installed on computers in the continental United States. These are often purchased by first time buyers who are new to computers. In the UK Norton, Sophos & Bullguard tend to be more likely to be pre-installed. As far as I know McAfee isn't pre-installed so much & doesn't have a particularly bad reputation in England. I must say that I am quite satisfied with it. It even defrags my computer for me!
     
  13. TrojanHunter

    TrojanHunter Registered Member

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    Just a few brainstorms that I can think of. I would like to see at least some of the following in Mcafee - A Sandbox, HIPS (Perhaps like Kasperskys Application control), Download protection similar to Nortons or maybe some kind of Isolation like Geswall.
     
  14. Daveski17

    Daveski17 Registered Member

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    I see. GeSWALL looks quite interesting. I can't remember if there was any download protection in the version of Norton that I used. I tend to download everything that can be run as an .exe in Firefox because it scans the installer automatically. Plus I like the download manager in Firefox. I should probably surf with it more often LOL!
     
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