Suggestions for the best computer antivirus (free or paid for).

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DropBear said:
Norton is just bloat AV, it's a virus in it's self. and a massive pain in the ass if you ever need to uninstall it.

Never had a issuees, Norton has been getting better and better since it's bloat days.
 
AVG Free is fine to use so long as you also use a malware catcher on the side such as malwarebytes. Because AVG Free and Avast are prone to miss alot of trojans, PUP advertisement agents, advertisement cookies, page hijackers like mystartsearch, registry automation executors and rouge programs! because AVG Free being free does not properly scan all the files on your computer and even the paid version doesn't scan all files. Software you may have downloaded from the internet at some point often can contain stuff such as toolbars, popcap games often are embedded with advertisement agents or any software downloaded from CNET or sourceforge can contain embedded software that may have been infected. Malwarebytes can miss some viruses that AVG Free will catch. that is why running both on programs is recommended.

You can obtain malwarebytes for free on their website: Sadly you will have to google Malwarebytes as I do not have 10 posts as of yet to provide the link.
 
I agree with Makarei.

I use Avast free and Malware bytes and have never had a problem with them.... Being careful to "untick" those extra toolbars ect when installing programs helps too. ;)
 
WOW!!
Awesome amount of help everyone and thanks heaps for all the replies!
Still not sure which one I will run with but seeing as I have "malware bytes" already, its looking like Avast may be the one for me.
I don't mind paying for quality, but if it works and its free, so much the better.

Cheers,
Billy.
 
Not a fan of the free a/v products, outside of MS Essentials/Defender as they tend to advertise the pro editions too heavily for my taste, doubly so with AVG.

I haven't changed the below combination of programs since I first got Windows 7 installed in May 2010, though I have a lot of experience getting machines up to scratch so it might be a little difficult for some to setup themselves. The below I have installed on many other computers and it is rare that I ever see them again with another virus, trojan or other unwelcome web code.

MS Essentials for antivirus. Yes this program is active scanning if enabled.
On slow computers though, I make exceptions for its folders and svchost.exe (windows update).
Spybot search and destroy for malware, spyware and immunization feature to stop some nasty stuff getting in to begin with, or calling home afterwards.
MalwareBytes Antimalware for malware, I have the pro edition for active scanning.

Note that MBAM scans for different things than MSE so they work fine with each other active, as opposed to Norton and AVG which I had 'fun' untangling when someone managed to get both installed on their computer.

To give the machine a basic clean, I use Piriform's CCleaner and Defraggler, note not to use Defraggler if your machine has SSDs (Solid State Drives).
For deep infection removal, I use AdwCleaner first and in major cases Combofix (do NOT run this unless you are told to) when something really nasty gets into a computer that all the above can not remove.

Other tips I have are to use Adblock Plus and https everywhere. Hit up Google to find them.
Be careful which sites you visit and not click randomly on email attachments.

Not related to computer security, but Lazarus Form Recovery can take great frustration out of using forums.
Ever lost a post because you hit refresh instead of submit? Grab that and thank me later.
 
Utm devices are a nice solution. Sophos have one you can run for free at home. Offload the scanning to another computer/device.
Because a lot of malware is encrypted or changes its signature or rootkits itself, you cant presume to know if your pc is clean with the protection installed as software on the pc in question.
 
Thanks again to everyone for their suggestions, I have just signed up for the "avast internet security" for $50 a year and will take advantage of the 2 week return policy and see how it goes.

So far so good but really how do you know?

This little community we have here rocks!

Cheers,
Billy.
 
Mbam is a stand out app for sure.
That and spybot search and destroy plus hijackthis can get most things.
Best general strategy is do not run as admin user. Then if you get a virus you can create a new user and the virus is stuck in the old profile.
 
Trend Micro for me now on all pcs and laptops. I had another brand on a laptop and it cost me $165.00 to get the virus's cleaned out of it. Once bitten, twice shy.
Mackka
 
I use Vipre and pay for 5 users..

Run Mbam on demand..

Do not bother with the Internet fire wall....

Run Acronis and schedule a Backup every day.. Worse case - re image..
 

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