Ologhai Jones Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 I'm a fairly long-time user of the non-commercial Avast anti-virus thingy, and I'm pretty content with it. With a new machine I'm getting imminently, there's 15 months' subscription for McAfee SecurityCenter thrown in. Just for consistency with other machines, I'm wondering whether to just uninstall McAfee to begin with and go with the non-commercial Avast. Does anyone think it's worth running McAfee for 15 months just because it's 'free'? Is it actually likely to be better than Avast? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ologhai Jones Posted August 4, 2011 Author Share Posted August 4, 2011 Wouldnt touch McAfee with a barge pole, the computer manufacturers get commission for any subscription arising from a new PC hence why its installed in the first place and the amount of PC's I've had to clean Virii from which had McAfee running is in the hundreds. Same goes with Nortons Anti Virus. You see these two decided some years ago to create two new markets, a virus market and a malware market, they are still both computer programs with malicious intent but they were greedy so coined and plugged away with some new phrases namely spyware and malware. Also had to remove a Virus from a machine running Avast as well over a month ago. No big deal, did it all remotely and I just put MS Security Essentials (SE) on in its place but exclude any mapped drives as these will get scanned and slow up the network and exclude any file extensions to isam db files like Dbase et al. I've seen people complain about isam db corruption caused by MS SE but thats becuase they havent setup their machines/workstations properly. Only complaint is it doesnt do rootkits but AVG free does but I found AVG free to be quite heavy on the processor compared to MS SE. FWIW. Right, so out of a choice between use McAfee for 15 months, then switch to Avast OR just switch to Avast to begin with, it sounds like the latter is winning! Thanks for the advice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Downside Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Why not try AVG Free? I've been using that for the last 3 or 4 years and never had a problem. It runs silently in the background so you never get any annoying pop ups either Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Knimbies who say No Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Why bother with anti-virus at all? Slows system down etc etc. When I did use them, AVG was about the best I found, but that was a good five years ago now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Number79 Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Avast makes computers painfully slow and mcaffee is garbage, I run avira and have no problems. I didnt choose avira lightly, it was subject to much reading or reviews etc etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
okaycuckoo Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Avast makes computers painfully slow and mcaffee is garbage, I run avira and have no problems. I didnt choose avira lightly, it was subject to much reading or reviews etc etc. Yes, I still use avast on pc - it updates regularly. But I removed it from laptop because it screwed responsivity of the touchpad. Made my laptop chuck-it-out-the-window irritating. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ologhai Jones Posted August 4, 2011 Author Share Posted August 4, 2011 Why not try AVG Free? I've been using that for the last 3 or 4 years and never had a problem. It runs silently in the background so you never get any annoying pop ups either It sounds like I'm pretty much in the same place -- I've been using Avast (free version) for a few years and never had a problem. Why bother with anti-virus at all? Slows system down etc etc. This seems a bit of an odd question to me; something like 'why bother with insurance?' You might decide not to have insurance, but it'd be with the knowledge that there's more of a risk involved without being covered. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ologhai Jones Posted August 4, 2011 Author Share Posted August 4, 2011 Avast makes computers painfully slow and mcaffee is garbage, I run avira and have no problems. I didnt choose avira lightly, it was subject to much reading or reviews etc etc. Yes, I still use avast on pc - it updates regularly. But I removed it from laptop because it screwed responsivity of the touchpad. Made my laptop chuck-it-out-the-window irritating. It's odd -- I've used Avast for quite a long time on all the machines at home (desktops and laptops), and never really noticed bad performance. It's always seemed fine to me. I suppose it might be worth trying Avira as you've made it sound as if you've looked into it, Number79 -- but I won't know what it would've been like with Avast unless I try that too because it'll be on a new PC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bossybabe Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Avast makes computers painfully slow and mcaffee is garbage, I run avira and have no problems. I didnt choose avira lightly, it was subject to much reading or reviews etc etc. +1. I also found Avast slowed my computer down to painful levels, and that McAfee is a bu66er to get rid of if you want to - I ended up deleting individual files the uninstall had left behind. Very time consuming. I use Ad Aware and AVG, both free. I've used them for around 7 years and no problems. I've also had Microsoft Security Essentials for a year or two. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dinker Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Avast makes computers painfully slow and mcaffee is garbage, I run avira and have no problems. I`m running Win 7 64 bit at the moment, Task Manager shows Avast using 0%. You should uninstall any software that comes with a new computer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Number79 Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 +1. I also found Avast slowed my computer down to painful levels, and that McAfee is a bu66er to get rid of if you want to - I ended up deleting individual files the uninstall had left behind. Very time consuming. I use Ad Aware and AVG, both free. I've used them for around 7 years and no problems. I've also had Microsoft Security Essentials for a year or two. For me it was a close call between avg and avira, couldnt remember the name of the second choice (avg) or why I went for avira but I dont think that there was much in it. What I do remember is that avast was at the bottom of a long list Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Knimbies who say No Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 This seems a bit of an odd question to me; something like 'why bother with insurance?' You might decide not to have insurance, but it'd be with the knowledge that there's more of a risk involved without being covered. Hmm. Just don't click on anything funny, and run a good firewall. No probs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bossybabe Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 What I do remember is that avast was at the bottom of a long list Avast behind, then? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ologhai Jones Posted August 4, 2011 Author Share Posted August 4, 2011 Hmm. Just don't click on anything funny, and run a good firewall. No probs. And don't accept any of the files from clients that I need to work with. No probs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blobloblob Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 I used AVG for years but after a major new release (can't remember the version number now) about a year ago I found all our PCs slowed down. I now use Avast and am quite happy with it. On the last couple of new PCs I've just uninstalled McAfee straight away and used the free equivalent. I've only ever had one problem with antivirus which was a false positive on AVG. I had to download an update on another PC then take it to the problem one and update it in safe mode. Fine after that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
longtomsilver Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 My old dell laptop came pre-infected with McAfee, avoid like the plague as it clogs the CPU, slows the HD and doesn't actually detect/destroy at all well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hedgefunded Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Hmm. Just don't click on anything funny... www.billyconnolly.com is a safe bet then. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blobloblob Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 www.billyconnolly.com is a safe bet then. + infinity Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonb Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Right, so out of a choice between use McAfee for 15 months, then switch to Avast OR just switch to Avast to begin with, it sounds like the latter is winning! Thanks for the advice. I personally would go with Microsoft. It is free, doesn't slow the computer down, you only notice it when it finds a virus, and in independent tests it finds more viruses than just about any other anti-virus scanner. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Knimbies who say No Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 And don't accept any of the files from clients that I need to work with. No probs. Fair enough, you didn't mention that before Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ologhai Jones Posted August 5, 2011 Author Share Posted August 5, 2011 Fair enough, you didn't mention that before In every post I make, there's lots of things I don't mention. Almost everything in fact. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ologhai Jones Posted August 5, 2011 Author Share Posted August 5, 2011 I personally would go with Microsoft. It is free, doesn't slow the computer down, you only notice it when it finds a virus, and in independent tests it finds more viruses than just about any other anti-virus scanner. After doing a bit of nosing around, I'd actually begun to wonder whether it might be worthwhile giving Microsoft Security Essentials a go. Does anyone have anything bad to say about MSE? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
interestrateripoff Posted August 5, 2011 Share Posted August 5, 2011 Never used the McAfee consumer products. However the Enterprise version is OK, used that on several PC's at work without issues. At home I use Avast and not had any issues with it, and it's not slowed down either of the PC's I've got it installed on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
interestrateripoff Posted August 5, 2011 Share Posted August 5, 2011 After doing a bit of nosing around, I'd actually begun to wonder whether it might be worthwhile giving Microsoft Security Essentials a go. Does anyone have anything bad to say about MSE? Apart from the fact it's made by the biggest virus vendor of them all, Win ME, Win Vista god those virus's where awful. Both slowed your PC down to a crawl. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ologhai Jones Posted August 5, 2011 Author Share Posted August 5, 2011 Apart from the fact it's made by the biggest virus vendor of them all, Win ME, Win Vista god those virus's where awful. Both slowed your PC down to a crawl. Agreed... although given than I'm resigned to having Windows 7 on the machine anyway, what's one more little side-virus among friends? Actually, it'd be pretty funny if MSE spotted Windows ME and Vista as being malware! From what little I've read, though, MSE compares pretty well with other anti-virus offerings -- and I was just wondering if anyone had any specific tales of woe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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