Not the best success with NAV 2003 on one PC...

Having success testing NAV 2003 on Windows XP (which it is "made" for) I decided to test it on a machine running Windows ME.

I can assure you, it was a horrifying experience.

NAV 2002 was still installed on the PC. Having the boxed copy of NAV 2003 Professional, the installation graciously told me it could remove NAV 2002 for me. Since I had not tried this method on the Windows XP machine, I figured it couldn't hurt to see how well it worked...

Install seemed to go smoothly (NAV 2002 auto-protect was shut down, etc.) and it asked me to reboot. Upon reboot, the machine choked a couple seconds into the boot-up sequence with a "NAV Auto-Protect self-test error - please look at your settings or reinstall". After logging into my profile on that Windows ME PC, the machine just shut itself down (before the task bar, or anything else popped up).

Repeating the boot-up procedure gave me the same result.

Thinking about what was stated in the message...the software wanted me to alter the settings, yet refuses to allow me to completely boot-up to do so. *Bug #1

Booting up in Safe Mode worked fine (fortunately). Unfortunately, Safe Mode on Windows ME doesn't seem to support CD-ROM drives, so I could not reinstall NAV 2003, as the message suggested. *Bug #2 (Yes, not completely Symantec's fault - but still bad planning.)

Looking at the hard drive, I found that NAV 2002 was not uninstalled - at all. Could it have been because I selected a different directory to install NAV 2003 in? Who knows.

Through a very annoying and time-consuming process of manual file deletion and registry editing, I managed to get the machine to boot-up normally. Obviously, the average user would have considerable trouble doing this.

Upon boot-up, I was not able to install NAV 2003 - it still insisted that the program was installed, and that I should allow it to "remove itself". Of course, the uninstallation froze halfway through every time. *Bug #3

More manual editing of the registry got it to get through to installation, since it was already removed (manually). Installation seemed to go through smoothly, and reboot went fine.

HOWEVER, NAV 2003 Pro still does not work correctly on that Win ME machine. It claims auto-protect is running, and will scan directories/files on demand with the right-click menu options, but I cannot access the main configuration window. Every time I try to access it, NAV gives me an error about various "licensing components" being missing. Uninstall and reinstall does not fix this issue. And the link in the window points to a non-existent "support database" page.

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For the various reasons outlined above, I cannot, at this time, recommend the boxed versions of NAV 2003 to Win ME/9x users. It worked very well on all Win XP machines I tested on, but seems to still have some issues with Windows 9x machines (or at least, with certain installation options).

Maybe once some program updates are out, I will revisit it on the Windows ME machine again.

Hopefully this is useful information to someone.

-Javacool

 

If only the many millions of future instalers could read this, I am not a fan so I shant comment only its a familiar theme .
Nice one for the guinea pig test and hop it does help prospective buyers.

 

I think it's only fair to add that I have come across several people on different boards that were very unhappy with NAV 2003, even on XP machines.
I understand that no product is 100% wonderful on every machine, but I had to discard Norton and then McAfee a few years back when I got my second Dell. Norton came installed on it and it still did not catch about 30% of the nasties in my virus library.
So, I have come to believe that because there are many faithfull users of Nortons AVs and even McAfee, those two AVs seem to perform much better on some machines than on others, but I can't get a handle on where the problem might lie.
Even KAV seems to have joined the ranks of the unstable on some setups.
Just my musings from the FWIW category.

 

Hi Javacool,

It should indeed have been better to use Add/Remove to uninstall it.

Some other info:

http://service4.symantec.com/SUPPORT/nav.nsf/pfdocs/2001092114452606

How to uninstall Norton AntiVirus by using the Rnav.exe removal utility

Situation:
You want to use the Rnav.exe utility to uninstall Norton AntiVirus (NAV).

Solution:
Rnav.exe is a utility that will manually uninstall the program files and registry entries installed by NAV 5.0/2000/2001/2002. It will not remove the files or registry keys for the virus definitions, subscription information, entries in the Task Scheduler, or other shared files. The utility should be used only when you cannot uninstall through the Add/Remove Programs applet. Uninstalling Norton AntiVirus through Windows does a more thorough job of removing the program.



And for those using NIS:

http://service4.symantec.com/SUPPORT/nip.nsf/docid/2001090510510636?OpenDocument&src=hot&prod=Norton%20Internet%20Security&ver=2002%20Professional%20Edition&stg=2&base=»<A%20HREF=

How to uninstall Norton Internet Security or Personal Firewall using the Rnis.exe removal utility

Situation:
You want to use the Rnis.exe utility to uninstall Norton Internet Security or Personal Firewall.

Solution:
Rnis.exe is a utility that will remove the program files and registry entries installed by Norton Internet Security (NIS) or Norton Personal Firewall (NPF). This utility should be used only if you cannot uninstall through the Add/Remove Programs applet or through the Uninstall option.

NOTE: You must have Windows Administrator rights to remove NIS or NPF from Windows NT, 2000, or XP.

You can use the Rnis.exe utility to remove all previous versions of NIS or NPF. The utility is included on the NIS 2002 Professional Edition or NIS/NPF 2002 CD. In case you do not have the CD, the utility is attached to this document.

NOTES:
- This version of Rnis.exe should not be used with NIS/NPF 2003 and Norton AntiVirus 2003.
- This utility is not supported. Symantec Technical Support cannot help you resolve any problems that might arise from using Rnis.exe.
- If you installed Norton AntiVirus (NAV) 2002 when you installed NIS 2002, you must uninstall NAV before you use Rnis. For instructions on uninstalling NAV 2002, see the To uninstall NAV 2002 when it is integrated with NIS 2002 section in this document.
- If you are using a non-English version of NIS or NPF, see the document Using RNIS with non-English versions of Norton Internet Security or Personal Firewall.


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Some notes by me:

Very recently I wanted to try NIS2003.
I had NIS/NAV2000 installed. (Windows 98 SE).

First I used MS RegClean. Cleaning by that stops NIS from loading at reboot. (BTW: Symantec has since ages a reg-tool to fix that after using a tool like MS RegClean).
NAV was already not using the email-scanning. I think it is important to make sure that NAV does not use email-scanning before uninstalling.
I rebooted.
I closed everything except Explorer and Systray (looking at Contrl-Alt-Del).
Then I uninstalled NAV2000 using Add/Remove: no problems.
Then I used Add/Remove to uninstall NIS2000. This was not completely succesful, so after that I used the Symantec tool Rnis.exe. To be sure I used again MS Regclean. Now the uninstallation was succesful.

Then a Scandisk and Defrag.
Again only Explorer and Systray running.
Then I installed NAV2003, then NIS2003.
Installation was fine.

Eh, what about my opinion of NIS2003:
Brrr, grrr, I didn't like it; what a chaos.......
So I uninstalled (using Add/Remove).

 

The issue above was that it would NOT uninstall itself through Add/Remove (it always froze halfway through).

Also the rnav.exe utility is only compatible with 2000, 2001, and 2002 versions of NAV, and does not do anything to NAV 2003 (except it *may* remove some general Symantec registry entries).

-Javacool

 

I have an XP Pro machine and are not happy with NAV2003, several install-problems and the detection rate is not o.k. for me.

I stay at DrWeb, no install-problems and runs smoothly, with very good heuristics.

 

I have a dual processor Pentium4 runnung XP. I have been a McAfee user for some years, but I was unimpressed with v7.0 so I tried Norton 2003. I would NEVER recommend this program to anyone. I have been using a trial of NOD32 for two weeks and I amd EXTREMELY impressed with it. I will be buying it.

 

I used to test Quarterdecks Cleansweep , then Norton bought it and it remained pretty much the same. However, I did have a few issues wirh Cleansweep.

Below is a link to that List of Lists page.
Looks like a good list but I do see one commandline program.
take a look and maybe some of us will see how well some of these work.

http://lists.gpick.com/pages/Install~Uninstall_Tools.htm

This commandline program looks like a good Windows ME program or any other for thast matter. Allows the replacement of those locked system files. An install can change a DLL or other file making another program not funtion properly.
Ususly you then find out the file is protected after bootup. The program has the commandline and Windows interface.

http://www.kraftig.com/InstallFile/

 

Thank you - I will definitely take a look at it.

Also, I would like to say that I still believe NAV 2002 is a good product - I just do not feel the same way about the 2003 version.

NOD32, however, seems to be working rather well on that Win ME system.

-Javacool

 

i had norton and mcafee on 2 of my 3 machines . they were the only ones to ever get infected . my 3rd macne used ipe free , and now AVG free . , it catches what the other pay versions don't . plus it and ipe are not resource hogs like norton and mrcofee