Panda Platinum 7 vs Avast Home

As for the RAM i was running that old SDRAM till last September too,when my motherboard "departed for better life" and so i upgraded significantly CPU,RAM,mobo and graphics card (well it's just an FX5200 but better than the GeForce 2MX i had) and HD.

 

I killed the Panda engine and started Opera. It worked. Then i started Panda and turned exit Opera. After this proces Opera opened normally. Strange s**t. Yeah i checked that CPU thingie,but no difference.
I'll test it again until avast! 4.5 is out Its legaly free (Panda),why not

 

dear Hyperion, if you're using the free version of Sygate i'll recommend the Panda Firewall anytime. the Panda version is better but not better than the Pro version. i think the problem is caused by some third-party files not XP native files. so if there is some confliction or problem the Panda guys maybe will be able to help you out.

dear RejZor, i'm sure you'll report this strange problem to Panda so that they'll be able to fix this issue. can you give me the report on Firefox if you have it? thanks.

 

Dear AMRX,yes i m using Sygate free,while waiting for a stable Kerio release (the 0.16 gave me BSOD).

I WILL try Panda's firewall,although can i have the AV disabled and use only the firewall?

BTW,i installed the 7.07.01 (after much torment that Abtrusion Protector gave me because there were some dlls in temp files that he didn't recognise being Panda's and i added them manually),and till now the scan is fluid.

Haha!Finished!It's the first time i see this screen on Panda!

Thanks a lot AMRX!Whatever it was the issue was solved in this release!!

 

Nope,Firefox 0.9 works just fine. But resources usage is terrible compared to my champion avast!. Panda uses 49MB! right now and i think its way too much. Is this normal?
Platinum version uses Sygate technology for firewall,so i think its "stupid" to use standalone Sygate Firewall. Except if you installed Panda Antivirus without integrated firewall.

 

dear Hyperion, i guess it was a common issue. the 7.07.00 version was released on 20th or 21st May and this 7.07.01 version was released on this 16th. so maybe a lot of users complained, so they fixed the issue. that's why don't forget to report bugs and send your suggestions. also remember to send heuristic picks and files you consider suspicious. these suggestions holds true for any AV as it'll help to improvise it. BTW that Abtrusion Protector is a funny software. yes you can disable the AV and still use the firewall. just open Permanent Protection configuration box and uncheck "permanent file protection" and "permanent mail protection" keeping the "permanent firewall protection" checked.

dear RejZor, my Panda is using 21MB with its AV+Firewall with the mailscan turned off. using Sygate Pro is a good choice but Panda's firewall provides wonderful protection. it is better than the Sygate free version.

 

Well its very nice that they offer Panda Platinum for free,but i noticed too many holes. First one was not scanning emails at all! Second one was a DCOM port that was shown as Opened instead of Stealthed (every time). Also problems with starting Opera browser and very high memory usage.
Don't know,avast! and Windows Firewall do the job better with less memory usage. avast! checks all mails in any client with a very simple configuration,memory usage is perfectly acceptable and Windows Firewall passes all firewall tests each and every time (also DCOM). I have mixed opinions on this peace of software.

 

You can say that again!!! I said to try Panda's firewall.So i first i simply disabled Sygate.But Panda noticed it and told me that Sygate is installed so couldn't activate its own.Well,logical.So i tried to uninstall Sygate.Then for the first time,Abtrusion did the unexpected! He interfered with the uninstallation process,practically blocked a dll and the firewall resulted semi-uninstalled.I couldn't neither uininstall nor re-install it anylonger and Panda wouldn't work either.Tried to delete manually all Sygate files ,used registry cleaner,deleted manually some registry entries,nothing.Fortunately i had backed up the registry 10 days ago and i restored it .This did the trick ,though of course i had to reinstall Panda and KAV (that was updated in these 10 days).Oh,i didn't like at all the interface of Panda firewall,i like giving manual permission to most applications and the GUI with small letter on the lower right doesn't come handy for me.I re.installed the "normal" Sygate.

You 're right about Panda though,i should have contacted them,but since i used it for backup,i really didn't bother much.As for giving infected samples,of course,but i don't get infected often Last time i did it was Byte Verify exploit that bypassed KAV 4.5 and i wasn't running Abtrusion then either.

Anyway,all *seems* running back normally.Thanks for everything!

 

dear Hyperion, you can configure to have manual permission but yes the panda screen is too small compared with the big alert screen of Sygate.

dear RejZor, if you're having problem with emails then you should report this problem. in my system Panda+Firewall was lighter than AVAST. BTW i'd like to ask you one question. is there any special reason for using DCOM port? i'm sure even if you use it its already patched. have you found any more security holes? i notice you noticed too many holes. i'm curious about them.

 

Unless you're in a networked environment, I can't think of any reason for DCOM.

 

thanks for that answer but i think i should rephrase that question to this "dear RejZor, is there any special reason why you're using that DCOM port?"

 

Dear AMRX,in fact i had put Panda firewall with manual permission but i couldn't stand the slow pop up with tiny spots to click at.

Anyway,today i installed Panda at my friend's PC,all went fine and Avast as secondary.

And i couldn't help myself seeing the lovely pirate skin at his PC and i 've put Avast as secondary on mine too all fine except from the fact that indentified two files of Panda AV as viruses,but i m used to it,Antivir was doing the same.I excluded Panda's folders.

 

Well i don't use DCOM and i disabled it via GRC's tweak tool for DCOM.
Windows Firewall stealths the DCOM service port,but Panda's one doesn't (it shows it Open or if i block it manually it shows Closed)

 

dear Hyperion, both of those free AVs have some problem with Panda. it makes a lot of people think Panda doesn't cover its signatures. well if thats true then logic tells us that those AVs can detect 'n' viruses which Panda also detects, here 'n' being the number of FPs in PAV.SIG. i think AntiVir produced the FP for a different file. please report those FPs to both parties. BTW you can also click on the text not only the spot.

dear RejZor, so is that all of those 'too many' security holes you found?

 

Dear AMRX,you 're right.If i well remember,Antivir flags as virus a dll in Panda,so not the same file Avast does.In fact i did mail the dll zipped to Antivir entitled "Possible false positive" ,all i got back was an automatically generated mail telling me that i sent them a virus so i may be infected.As far as i know there was no fix on this for a month.After i stopped using Antivir mainly because i am bored to see those programme upgrades every 2-3 weeks.

About Panda not covering the signatures,yes,i ve been told that before.But i didn't quite understand what you mean from the point "well if that's true"...English isn't my mother language,so excuse me.

The interesting is that KAV doesn't flag anything inside Panda.Avast,Antivir and Clamwin(if i well remember) do.Anyway,i ll mail in these days the file to Alwil ,although honestly,i think these must be well known issues,i doubt i am the first to discover it.

 

dear Hyperion, its funny about those AntiVir guys. i hope they'll fix those things. but one thing we have to give them, i've never seen a scanning engine getting upgraded so frequently. they should include incremental update and component upgrade. its annoying to download the whole file.

don't worry about your English. it isn't my MT either so excuse me too. the point is there is no point in accusing Panda of exposing the signatures as it doesn't. these are not viruses just plain FPs.

 

Exactly!More times i wonder,why don't they make incremental updates as you say or make all the updates to the engine they like,keep them in the lab and release a programme update once avery 3-4 months.That would be acceptable.Anyway,once it did detect on my PC the Byte Verify exploit on more files than KAV.In fact i sent kav the files and they replied to me that they added the new components.So,maybe i ll re-install it later.

Ah,so it doesn't expose the signatures.Well,i guess explains why KAV never flags anything.But it is also weird that the others do.Maybe there is some code very similar to virus code used?

 

dear Hyperion, its a free AV so don't expect too much of it. they are still doing a very good job if you ask me. i wouldn't use the word CODE but i'll use BYTE PATTERN. sadly it matches with their signatures and there goes the alarm.

 

I see.Thanks for the explanation.

 

@AMRX be more precise: why is the Panda version of Sygate better than Sygate free? Where is it worse than Pro version?
Thanks

 

Reading the test in this link
http://www.rokop-security.de/main/article.php?sid=705
and the results in http://www.av-comparatives.org/

Panda would seem one of the best AV with almost the same results as kaspersky or McAfee. As you are using the program what do you think about?

 

dear c0ltran3, the Panda version has a built-in Anti-Dialer and the configurability is way better than the free version. also it checks the hash of the file which is connecting to the Internet and shows a warning if the application is changed. well the Pro version has a trojan checker with a updatable database and the DLL fingerprinting works wonders. oh that free AV is not Panda i was talking about AntiVir with Hyperion. yes Panda is a very good AV comaparable with Kaspersky and McAfee and the firewall gives it the edge but sadly its not so good in detecting spywares and other malwares compared to Kaspersky or McAfee.

 

@AMRX Thanks for your answers. Your posts are always very stimulating.