Freeware AV, choice considerations

cmon Hermes, your recommending
clam now?

I thought you knew about secuirty.

 

clam... so? give it another couple of years before you start criticising it i would.

 

no thanks, think i will criticize it right now.

its crap and always has been, its open source so dont expect any kind of technologys (or good ones) being introduced.

sure, they could improve their detection only...... but this does not mean security.

 

disagree completely mate. i know its open source, but i will say it is crap in 3 years time if it is.

 

Hahaha.... Just love to steer the pot!

Keep in mind, I didn't recommend it, I simply posted information about it and asked what you peeps think of it...

Ya'd think someone might of liked it... Some are actually using it as their main AV, what I'm interested in is what others like me actually see out there.

I don't have firm numbers but even though I see it used on some system it probably is in the area of less than 3 % of systems we work on... not much actually.

I see it used most on USB sticks as www.portableapps.org. Which means many are likely using it professionally in the field as a secondary virus cleaner or at the very least to mop up infections on friends and family's infected computers...

You can read about right here: http://portableapps.com/news/2008-01-22_-_clamwin_portable_0.92

Any Opinions about it on this type of use?

 

ok, go ahead and use it, its your machine.

-------

they have already had more than 3 years........

 

I thought the same thing. After checking I found you can indeed block avnotify.exe with Vista Home Premium. Works great.

 

IMO people that use ClamAV are not malware removal experts, and they have not spent time researching other viable alternatives that actually clean and remove nasty infections. If you want a portable AV then stick with Kaspersky's AVPTool or Dr. Web's CureIt. Both are updated several times each day (you must download the latest version manually) and run circles around ClamAV.

 

Hello Kees

In order of importance to me:

1. Ratings in respected tests
2. Ability to exclude folders
3. Ability to prompt or quarantine rether than delete
4. CPU hog/boot delay
5. Heuristics
6. Completeness
7. Update frequency

In recommending to others:
1. Least likelyhood of phone calls to me.
2. Usually the age/speed of the computer is a factor.
3. The ability of the person to tolerate Avira's popup.
(My wife thought I had been surfing for porn on her computer after seeing an Avira popup with a blowup doll in the ad!) Needless to say She got Avast installed pronto and she has been happy ever since.

Generally I recommend to all who are less computer savvy, one of the three AV's, SAS, BOclean, and I never hear from them again.

 

not that i want to use it... Maybe in a couple of years.

 

Hello,
I'm gonna spice the argument some more:
Does it really matter what AV is used?
Mrk

 

eh, thanks for the advice but I have never even tried using it for this purpose...

Depends on the infection...

 

Is AVG still the one with least CPU hogging? Avira is known to be one of the fastest on-demand scanners with an exceptionally high detection rate, but I wouldn't know whether that's a guarantee for a fast on-access scanner. Has there been any test with opening/copying a great diversity of files from one place to another while having the different resident shields active?

 

I choose AV after these criterias:

1. I want a AV that doesnt access the hard drive constantly or impact on system performance otherwise.
2. It doesnt hurt if it does good on tests but no need to be on the top since I am not exposed to malware and I run limited user anyway.
Well thats about it and Avast is the one that meet those demands best.

 

Suckaroff,
Agree after reducing standard shieldf operation to write only (disabling execuition control and read)

 

Re: Freeware AV, choise considerations

Partial quote above.

Not a rescource hog ?

Then why do I experience 100 % or near 100 % CPU cycles for a few minutes the first time I active the computer on any given day ? Mostly Microsoft, and in particular, McAfee phoning home.

I just checked the number of applications mentioned in the firewall list. A few real/extra applications, but there are 53 ! Even though programs like Acrobat Reader are not listed there, since I give those programs only temporary access (exceptions). It's massive. Mostly McAfee stuff, and some windows things, probably also related to McAfee.

And btw, I have 512 MB RAM, and although this computer is a few years old, the CPU has no problems with other software.

 

I also found the solution. Fairly easy too.

 

It's too bad it also blocks the functionality of looking up viruses straight from AntiVir.

 

Free should be free. Period. I use to use AVG free and it was ok. Then I tried AntiVir and the nag upgrade screen was a pain as well as the slow updates. Then I switched to Avast. Fast updates and no nag screen. I am now using NOD32 but when its expired I will be going back to Avast. I have Avast on my laptop at work.

 

I haven't gotten any detections in a while, so this function isn't in need yet