Norton Antivirus 2007 Beta [impressions]

First off let me say I am not a huge fan of Norton, nor have I ever been. I have tried many Symantec/Norton security applications and disliked just about all of them, if you count Ghost 8 as "security". Needless to say I did not go into this installation with a open mind.

But much to my surprise NAV07 seems to be going the right way, only a few extra bells and whistles.

• Resource usage is greatly decreased, less system impact ( you can still feel it a little though)
• Scan times are a little on the slow side(no technology like Kaspersky, yet?)
• Auto quarantine is annoying, but the files are just that q'd so restoration is ok.
• Obtaining that green check mark takes some work though.
• Detection can be seen in the latest AV-Comparatives report.
• "Firewall" settings are in additonal options -> internet worm protection
  (hint: look there for blocked problematic connection issues)

So I have to say all in all I am impressed, and will keep this version for a bit,
ok maybe...

Below is the Summary of changes, I also attached the entire TU3 log.
If this is against the EULA please feel free to remove, to me this fell in the "grey area":

Code:

DETECTED CHANGES
  FILE SYSTEM
    Folders created  :    84
    Folders deleted  :     5
    Files created      :   966
    Files deleted      :     7
    Files modified     :    95
  REGISTRY
    Keys created      :  1107
    Keys deleted      :    18
    Values created   :  2771
    Values deleted   :   177
    Values modified  :   113

Link to the public beta:
http://www.symantec.com/home_homeoffice/products/overview.jsp?pcid=is&pvid=nav2007beta

 

Here is a cap of processes using tskmgr:
http://img49.imageshack.us/img49/9533/nav07221112lf6.th.jpg

And some more misc caps:
http://img114.imageshack.us/img114/6807/nav07221127fs3.th.jpg

http://img61.imageshack.us/img61/7488/nav07221240ri2.th.jpg

http://img356.imageshack.us/img356/9490/nav07221300ky0.th.jpg

 

well indeed norton 2007 looks promising,but what makes me not to use it,is the UI it plain s****!

 

Well looks like they did some work on mem usage. But we will need to measure its CPU resource usage as well. And it would be nice it they use less process instead of 5.

P.S How much ram have you got?

UI is not really a problem since you hardly look at your AV apps. As long as it looks modern , clean and decent it is fine.

But the beta release only last 30 days?

 

Im testing it too right now. And gosh it rocks. Compared to any othere of the suites it's really good. As pointed already it's using less resources and loading much faster than the previous versions. The interfase is quickly responding, is sipmle and easy to understand. It really looks like Symantec is going back in the game

 

Damn it doesn't work on Vista ><

 

I did notice that you still had to just leave the PC alone while it does a full system scan, not a big deal but normal users will wonder why the system is so slow.
If this continues to improve I may not have to recommend the removal of NAV when someone purchases a new PC in the next coming months.

 

Could anyone comment on the updating frequency. Has it improved?. How long between updates and how many per day?.

Thanks.

 

The updater is automatic, no hourly or daily options I can find yet.
And I have not had it installed long enough to test it out I will check the logs later on today.

 

Interface sure is nasty looking

 

Ok i looked into this it seems to check for updates every 4 hours in auto mode.
But it has only found updates once at 1647 EST. HTH

If you want to look at the update freq go here:
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Symantec\LiveUpdate
and open Log.LiveUpdate with notepad.

Still running smooth no huge memory leaks or the like that I have seen yet.

 

Ok, one glaring annoyance I found it the fact it pops up the trial box everyday.
I know this is a trial, but why is it bothering me already when I just installed it yesterday So now every day I want to continue the evaluation this product I have to click "ok" to continue trial period.

I hope they change this when it goes RTM or people are going to uninstall it and surf naked. Never a good idea.

 

Interface look nice, I hope it work&detect malwares that good

 

Well Detection rate is very good according to av comparatives. Also it has very very low false positives as well which is why i think this will be good for novice users.

 

What version of LiveUpdate does it have? If it's 3.x, you should be able to go into LU>Configure, and set it to check for updates every hour if you want. That's the way it was is NAV 2006 anyway.

 

Curiosity got the better of me, and I decided to give NAV 2007 beta a try.

The first thing I noticed was, the NAV install process hasn't changed. It still takes a long time to install NAV. Just before the install was complete, the first LiveUpdate notifier opened. I was able to configure LU to check for updates every hour, and then install the updates.

The GUI is not bad. I think it's nicer looking than the old NAV GUI, and easy to navigate. When I tried to configure NAV the way I wanted though, I found there were less options for the user to pick, especially in the Auto Protect, and LiveUpdate section. I think they made it too simple. But maybe they figure people like fewer options to deal with.

Then there is the Norton Protection Center. I didn't like it in NAV 2006, and I don't like it in NAV 2007. I don't want my antivirus telling me, by way of an exclamation point icon staring at me from the task bar, that Windows Update is not set to automatically download and install updates. I know it's not. I have it set up that way. At least in NAV 2006, I was able to disable this in Services, but I couldn't do that with this one.

This is just my opinion. It might be a nice AV for some, but not for me.

 

You can disable that exclamation in the protection center for AU by selecting the little options button just below the Antivirus tab, go to advanced settings and then then uncheck the box.

I agree this may be good for some users but boy this is a little to "dumbed down" for me.

Anyone figure out how to have it ask for ALL risk levels?

 

I'm most interested in the less resources part.

Is it noticeable less bloated?

 

I noticed that Symantec stripped NIS 2007 of its Parental Filter. Anyone know the reason why?

 

NAV 2007 is no longer in Beta, it should be out any day. Looks like those screenshots are from an older build of NIS. The newer ones take about 10-15MB of memory with 3-4 processes. LUComServer only runs during a Liveupdate. And the kicker is that it is free for NAV 2005, NAV 2006 customers that have a valid subscription.

 

Trim the fat.. focus on the features that really matter and make them kick a**. Thats the new Symantec mantra.

 

You can't please everyone. Symantec typically has had the most intuitive UIs for a long time now. Wait and watch how other vendors copy the UI in their next years products.

 

OH btw did the 2007 has any improvement on its proactive detection?

 

Fair enough. I thought maybe they just accepted that others could do a better job at filtering. When I used NIS 2006 the Parental Filter used 90MB. Personally I have used K9 for 10 months and it is bang on in filtering and only uses 3MB. Plus no slow downs. I do really like the set-up of NIS 2007. It is working great with multiple accounts.

Best,
Mikel108

 

What specifically is free for NAV customers?

Also, as I recently uninstalled NAV 2006 and Personal Firewall 2006 due to it seeming to just start bogging down my system more than ever with weird new conflicts (maybe with Spy Sweeper), and replace it with the trial version of NOD32 and Comodo's free firewall, do you think 2007 is worth returning to? Or just keep going with NOD/Comodo?