Poll: Which Anti-virus?

Well, their goes my Geek cred because I just voted for Norton and I'll tell you why. I have had Norton Antivirus 2002 available to me for quite some time. Instead of purchasing a newer copy, the only thing I have to worry about is newer virus definitions. Because it is such an old version, it doesn't contain a load of crap that newer versions have meaning my system does not run like a slug because I have Norton installed. I am either smart or lucky but I barely ever see a message that says I'm infected and I have yet to be hit by a virus or a worm.

Also, when the definitions license runs out, I uninstall Norton, delete the associated registry keys and then reinstall and poof, I have another year of Virus definitions at no extra charge. Until they fix that, I won't go with another AntiVirus because as far as I'm concerned, Knowledge and Common Sense make up the best AntiVirus tools.

By the way, once you get infected, what the hell good does an Antivirus do anyways.

I agree prevention is better than cure. But the best tools against infection is common sense. Part of that common sense is running a decent Firewall (hard or soft) and anti-virus. But on that Jeff - your right!

Don't worry there are a few souls that have fallen from grace today... Herne, Doug - he was half way there though - he admits to using IE which is worse than Norton and totally voids the first rule - common sense! Geeze!

I use Nod32 on my desktop (but have installed Avast on a laptop).

I did have Norton back in the Windows 3.1 (and Win95) days. I also had Norton Utilities back then and it was a good product. In the years since, Norton has become a bloated piece of shit.

yey! I am not alone... thank you Matt :)

I used the hard to pronounce, for some anyway :_), Kaspersky. Seems to work well, only problem I find is it bogs down some sites, such as Facebook and Twitter when I use it on FF3, so I tend to pause on occasion and scan afterwards. Does not seem to be an issue on Chrome.
For Spyware I have good success with Webroot Spy Sweeper. Norton for me has always been crap on the home PCs, used Norton and McAfee in corp world without issues.

Cheers,
Dave

Mac User OR Balls of Steel? How about BOTH! ;)

We had McAfee at work and it was pretty poor. Well, I'm sure it stopped viruses, but every time they did a remote update and forced our computers to be updated.... well, you'd better have saved your stuff the second before you got the "Updates have been found for your system - do you want to install? Yes / Yes Please" dialogue box as 9 times out of 10 the upgrade process would crash the whole thing. And your system was slow for the next few hours as it did a mandatory "scan all" thing. Probably a poor implementation of it on behalf of our IT goons but still. Though did I ever have a virus on my work PC? Nope. So I guess it sort of worked!

When I had my own PC I used Norton as my bank gave out their own branded version of NAV. That worked OK too.

A lot of it is being sensible though I reckon. Of course you could get yourself infected, but if you don't download random .exe files or click on links in spam emails you're most of the way there.

I compile clamav on my macs but I dont use it other than scanning other people's garbage. my father-in-law's PC does not have any AV but he's on firefox reading news all day. I block sina and xinhua at the router b/c I feel mainland sites run by the PRC government backdoor your machine.

I had to vote McAfee, but under duress. First off, my ISP gives it to me for free. Second point Id like to make is I never install it unless I have a problem. Why? Cuz it sucks
It takes me longer to stop all it's auto updating and boot-time crap then it does to reload Vista.

P.S. My iPhone hates this text editor/entry field.

I use AVG when I need anti-virus software. However like jeffro said commonsense is the best anti-virus out there. I got around to installing AVG onto m XP partition on my mac around 4 months after installing XP. Did a scan and no viruses or nasties.

wuhu! I'm in the majority! (as an Avast user) Actually, now I think about it, is that a Good Thing? Hmmm...

Yeah sure it is. I will say that the cool thing about avast! is that it just sits there doing it's thing. In fact it has such a low impact on all fronts that I forget I am using it. Which leads me to what you could say is it's biggest downfall - when it updates it announces it at a volume that is louder to a factor of 10 compared to every other sound that you have happening. It has scared the crap out of me on more than one occasion :P

You think that scares the crap out of you.

You should hear Avast once it's discovered a virus!

It's like there is a chemical spill in sector 7G.

Scary shit!!!

Opps I forgot to add Avast has the option to turn off the Audio announcements. Recommended. (unless you enjoy the crap scarying!)

Yeah I know you can turn it off - but it is kind of reassuring...

And yes I have heard it go off and yes it DID scare the shit outa me :P... it was an email - no I had not opened it - it detected something in a message that was unopened - I deleted it :)

I'm now using avast on my new computer. much easier than AVG.

Glad you gave it a shot. It really is a pretty cool piece of software. Don't forget to register - it is free and keeps you up to date for a year. AND NO I have never been spammed by them - just a reminder to re-register once a year. Small price to pay in my book.

One feature that I really like about avast! is it protects a network. If a virus is detected on a PC it is locked out of the network in so much as transferring that virus to other PC's on that same network. This rule also works in reverse. Nice touch.

Complete package in my book. IM, email, P2P - the lot in a simple non-intrusive package.

I am sure you'll be happy with it.

I am still using Macafee installed on the home desktop cause it was free from work. On this laptop I am using Symantec - cause its work...

wow....that's really great to know that i'm not alone in my devotion to avast...i think it's a great service with an all important kicker...IT'S FREE!!!