Is Microsoft/Giant Antispyware good ?

I was not exactly sure which forum to post this on.

I am wondering if Microsoft/Giant Antispyware (you know, the SP2 goodie) is a good scanner for general security, hijacks, activex, trojans and spyware to have running in the background at all times. I had been using it as an on-demand spyware scanner like Ad-aware. I am behind a NAT firewall router and use the XP SP2 firewall for redundance. I am going to start using an AV software, likely NOD32. I liked the trial edition on my laptop.

I am switching to some real-time protection not covered by NOD32 or typically by AV software and I wanted to know how good this is for a free program. I do like the pop-ups and the info. that they give. I use Avant browser but renamed it "iexplore.exe" so I get all of the popups and info.

Spybot Search & Destroy can also run in the background and "inocculate" your PC. Any ideas if this is a good application or not?

Is there a better free alternative to either or both of these ? I noticed in the posts about recommended security software for the three levels of protection that neither was mentioned at all. Do they suck ?

B.

 

Hey brjoon,

I will close this duplicate thread and we will continue the discussion in your other thread.

This thread---> Is Microsoft/Giant Antispyware good ?