Bad antivirus software

hi community,

just wondering why sometimes i read other AVs being slammed, i.e CA antivirus, being called "bad" correct me if i'm wrong but dont these companies have among their ranks some of the worlds leading antivirus experts and is it really true that they would develop inferior products on purpose? this is not just here on the forums but i read all over the net that some "good" antivirus are slammed as well.

just curious

arnee



my "fortress"
bitdefender 10 standard (realtime)
avg free (on demand)
superantispyware pro(realtime off)
ad aware SE pro(realtime on)
trend micro AS (bitdefender told me to remove it though but what the heck)
AVG antispyware free
spyware blaster
comodo firewall pro

 

You have an excellent security set-up. As to people slamming most or all A/V, F/W products, it's just a matter of personal opinion. CA, Norton, McAfee get slammed constantly but are very effective products. I have found that using the 30-day trials a very good way to decide if you really like the product and I mean not just a couple of days and say "this is great, I'll buy it", but at least 3 weeks of the trial to get a "feel" for it, you may discover some quirks that you do not like about it and then try something else. I used Norton 2003 for years with no problems, switched to Norton 2005 and discovered some quirks that I didn't like, tried BitDefender 9.5 which I liked, tried BitD 10 and had some issues with CPU usage that was not apparent in BitD 9.5. I now use Nod32 and find it an excellent product. I find that most people are just "nickel and diming" when slamming because it is a personal opinion. It's sort of like the NY Yankees and Boston Red Sox, you may like/hate one of the teams, but they're both good teams.

 

arnee,

The short answer is that many folks have a hard time getting their mind around the concept that the product they've chosen to use can be good, even great, without every other product in the same market category being labelled as worthless spawn of the devil incarnate.

Their are plenty of suitable AV products out their, some slightly more up to the task for high risk surfers, virtually all up to the task for ordinary risk users. As for your fortress, it's more than fine. If you were asking for specific comment, my personal preference is to handle any AS category products as demand only if installed and focus on good configuration and use of an router/decent AV (BD is fine)/firewall if desired. There are many paths to an approrpriate solution, and this is just one of them.

Blue

 

wow you made that very clear, thanks for the reply...oh well sometimes i have issues with other security apps but i found that most of them provide the needed protection, i'm the type who would rather sacrifice some performance in exchange for rock solid protection, malware authors are ever evolving so that means security providers NEED to make more robust apps, i think almost all the '"name" companies ARE reliable and that makes them effective IMHO.

so when i read NORTON s**** MCAFEE su*k*....uhmmmm arent they among the pioneers? i may be wrong but these are the world leaders notwithstanding preference.

still learning

arnee

 

well i dont like mcafee or norton because normally they are hard to remove fully before using a different antivirus program.
also they dont have many options for tweaking the program to my needs.
i think mcafee and norton are mainly for home users that dont know what there doing and dont relise that mostly they use to much resourse and slow down the pc to much.
thats why i find bitdefender,kaspersky,nod32,antivir,dr web all better options and would choose any of them over norton.
lodore

 

Norton, Mcafee, Symantec's products are mentioned so often, because they are used worldwide by many companies and some users due to their reliability, but they are designed to the companies mostly, that means eg almost none false positives, because a company can not afford, that an important mail, which is not infected, would be put into a quarantine, so it would not be delivered on time. Their products are not optimised for common users, PCs, so they are resource hungry, but on companies computers it does not really matter, since there are used only for work, like documents, no music, games and etc. I would never recommend any of those products, but some users can actually like it. Anyway, common users have many good choises with better detection like Avira, Bitdefender, NOD32, Kaspersky and so on, which run just great on standalone PCs, but none of those have more than 5% worldwide, because most people even do not know about them and they think, that if it is not made in USA, it can not be good, regardless the fact, that all their quality hardware bought in USA, is made in Asia.

 

I do however get upset a bit lol when especially nod and drweb users bash avira while infact it is a very solid av at the moment.

I don't c too much of my av users here on wilders bash others that do great but offcourse i can note several drawbacks of at least nod that's presented superieur to all: way longer scan time compared to antivir, more system impact, does less on spyware, cost way more.

to be fair: on many other features nod does a great job as well drweb at least that's my experiences.

Only product i bash in real life is grisoft free users that get infected all the time cause they solely depend on it.

 

You are right, talking about big names, there is not really "a bad AV", they are all good enough, well more or less. Lets do not forget, that there are hundres of AVs outhere with less than 50% detection and they are still used by thousends people. AVG Free has the worse detection from free AVs (from most paids too), but it s easy to use and it is reliable AV, especially when used with AS, AT and firewall. Though I wonder, why some users do not switch, if they get infected.

About bashing, I am an IE user, so I am used to it and it learned me to respect other's people software. If someone uses Avast and he never got infected, why should I force him to use Avira, which I consider to be best, if he does not need it? If it is not broken, do not fix it.

 

That's not a good reason. These are programs to install and let them do their job. If u like to test av programs, well it's your choice...and your risk.

 

Hi Lodore,

Did you test them all?
That must have taken at least 8 month's (1 month for each app.), you forgot to mention FSecure.
Believe me: most users are "home users".
And those who are not home users have to take what the company offers.

Gerard

 

In the last three or four years I have used and tested probably every antivirus program available for a windows environment. I have found that most of the "popular " av apps are the least compatable with the most bugs. After all of the testing I have personally done I have come to the conclusion that The supposedly two most bloated products Norton and McAfee actually give you the best all around protection with the least amount of incompatabilities and bugs. I know that there are people that will disagree with me but the majority of them are the people that frequent security forums and have the paranoid Idea that every piece of malware is after them personally and that only their security app is the one that will protect everyone. But in the real world the truth is that Norton and McAfee are by far out in front in the home and corporate use. And the argument that it is because they come reinstalled might be a very small part of the reason. But the main reason is that contrary to the belief by quite a few people here is that Norton and McAfee just work as advertised and do a very good job at computer protection against malware attack. After all of the testing that I have done I won't use any antivirus but Norton or McAfee, at the present time I am running McAfee Total Protection and it works just great. It runs light even though it does run a few processes. The updates work flawless and it is compatable with everything I have on my computer. Even the Vista Advisory app states it is not incompatable with Vista. The detection rate is top notch with both Norton and McAfee,and the only reason I can figure that the people on security forums bash Norton and McAfee is that they enjoy being the underdog amd feel it is cool to bash the big guys. I just can't find any other valid reason that they bash them.

bigc

 

Hello,

First, it is possible to intentionally develop inferior software.

Second, some AVs can be inferior to others, and important factors here include not only detection rate but clutter, resources usage, install / uninstall procedure, price.

Example: I cannot understand how can anyone pay to use Norton 200x when they can freely download and use Antivir or Avast or AVG, for example. Lastly, in a real combat situation at several friends' computers, i have witnesses the downfall of the big ones.

As to the AVs, most are comparable and offer similar protection. And therefore, when you pay 80 dollars for a brand name, you expect extra. It's not that the big brothers suck as much as they suck for the money invested. If a free AV can fare at least as well as they, at 1/5th CPU / memory usage and 1/10th disk space and 1/infinite of the price, then there's a significant problem with the big brothers.

Mrk

 

I haven't found an av that will run at 1/5 the resource usage of norton or McAfee. And like I stated I have tried them all and I do mean all of them and have not found a good reason not to use the "big guys". It is a personal preference, and if you feel protected with a free av product then more power to you . But I have made my choice after years of testing and usage and will stick with my choice. And really what difference does it make how many processes an av uses if it doesn't effect the computers performance??

P.S.
I got my McAfee for free after rebates and Norton can be purchased for very little money if one just looks a little for a deal. The deals are definatly out there and available.

 

I reckon opinions vary because everyone's computer hardware, configuration and what they use it for are different.
I used Norton for years because I didn't take the time to check out other options. It did a good job as an AV program, but "took over" the computer. For the past year I've used BitDefender9, a very good AV program, in the next day or two I'll install NOD32 and give it a shot. I've got a feeling that the performance of BitDefender and NOD32 will be very close.
Does that make Norton a "bad" AV program? Nope, just third out of three.

 

...but only in the US. Tom has a point; disparity issues are still relevant in the digital age. 'The perfect antivirus' means different things to different people.

 

ok situation number 1
you buy a dell laptop and it comes with mcafee or norton preinstalled most do anyways.
but what if i dont want to use 2005 version of mcafee and want to use i dont know say nod32 then i have to fully remove mcafee because i dont want use it and dont want it to conflict with nod32.
sometimes you can do alot of damage completely removing norton or mcafee
do you see my point?
lodore

 

i dont agree lodore,

what damage can be done from removing the pre-installed stuff, i have had no problems with my dell, and no problems removing the pre-installed mcafee.

 

norton is normally more damaging then mcafee when removing.
also i hate all this preinstalled rubbish.
i dont mind if they give you discs to these products or evena folder of install files but i dont like how thye install it on the laptop.
we all know that installing and uninstalling alot means your pc dont run as well and closer before a format.
lodore

 

in a perfect world, they would give you the cd's for mcafee etc.

but thats just not the way it is, but in a good way.... i know that if my AV goes belly-up, i can just ctrl+f11 (i think) with a fresh start and mcafee 2007

 

Too be fair there is only one product i didn't like for several reasons without looking at detectionrate and cleaning ability whilst it's strong in that part and that is mcafee. My personal reasons ( how silly that may be): - no trial! I think it's fair to be able to try somethingh that is really important these days also because competitors offer it. - It's interface looks like a busy street with lot's off passengers,busses, stoplights and advertisement Maybe im just out of it. - price!

Norton: good detectionrate, no false positives, nice gui, gives a positive and secure feeling.

my cons: heavy but improving, been infected too much in the past because it solely depend on it's updates, non cleanup ability whatsoever, no forum, slow and nonhelpfull support, deinstall is a mother for most users.

note: haven't run norton in a while but it gets my vote.

Why is norton aside from grisoft most used where i come from: it's ussually free on most new pc's and it's almost the only known av in general that is if ur not workin for nasa or nsa like u guys

However mcafee ive only met on two pc's so far and that was on mines and some ict guy lol.

All im sayin i haven't met a bad product so far but they all have their cons and pro's and when it comes to lovin or hatin has all to do with experiences and personal liking.

Hope ive made a contribution in here being a newb

 

I'm a "home user" and know exactly what I'm doing. I am no newbie to computers or computer security, and yes, I use Mcafee Antivirus...

 

I just bought a new desktop with pre-installed Mcafee, it uninstalled without issue, I then installed Nod32 with no problem, then changed my mind and reinstalled Mcafee. I have never had a problem removing antivirus programs.

 

ok maybe i should of said norton and not mcafee then because norton is a pain in the ass to remove and have to use like three of there removal tools first and if not some av's will still think norton is installed.
i was testing outpost firewall on my old pc a few months ago and it still found traces of norton in the registy and wouldnt isntall till i removed those registy entires.
so norton is a bugga to remove.
i dont know about mcafee.
what version of mcafee is it?
and how many processes doe it use?
and whats your pc specs?
lodore

 

My newest destop is just a simple little emachines Celeron D 352 processor, with 512K ram. I use it for email and newsgroups. It came preinstalled with Mcafee Internet Secuity 8, runs fantastic!

 

it depends what machine you have to what runs well, if you have a good machine, you shouldnt have any problems or slowdowns from ANY av, even the ones that are called 'bloated' and 'slow'.

simple, choose an AV for your machine, that runs at a good speed and does what you want it too.