Antivirus: Free vs Paid

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whoisme555

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May 24, 2010
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I have been using AVG Free, Malwarebytes and Super AntiSpyware for a while now. I torrent a lot of stuff and my other computer recently died. I took it into bestbuy (still had a warranty) and they ran the diagnostics where they found many viruses that my antiviruses apparently didn't pick up. They want to charge me $130 to clean the computer, and now I'm worried about what might happen to this computer. Is it worth paying for an anti virus? If so, which one? And with which program can I clean the viruses on my other computer and potentially this one?
 
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If you're looking for something free, I'd give a thumbs up to trying Microsoft Security Essentials. It is available as a free download, and if for some reason you do not like it, you can easily move on to something else - http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials/

Cheers,
Cassandra
Microsoft Windows Outreach
 
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You've gotta be realistic - no antivirus is 100% effective, and running lots of them has it's own issues. If you're going to run questionable stuff like what you get off torrents then you're going to have these kinds of problems. You're probably better off trying to organize yourself for quicker recovery, such as having image backups that you can restore from.
 
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Yes try the MSE. I posted the other day with a concern over if it was ok to use mse vs kaspersky. Kaspersky was bogging down my system and mse has a small footprint. I did some research and it seems that mse is pretty decent. I have coupled that with the windows firewall and malewarebytes. As for bestbuy charging you $130 to clean your computer...run run run...
 
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So MSE appears to be a winner for a free antivirus, next part of the question is whether or not a paid program will offer more anti virus scanning protection. Is buying an antivirus program a good idea? The guy at best buy told me that free programs, especially AVG, were junk. I've never heard that anywhere else, so I assumed he was just trying to sell me stuff I didn't need. He also told me having AVG, Malwarebytes and Super AntiSpyware was bad, because they conflict. Once again, I heard the opposite was true online, so he lost credibility to me. Anyone know for sure?
 
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The employees at best buy remind me of the ones at the now defunct circuit city...The majority don't know what they are talking about. While AVG maybe junk, the other free virus software like avast and avira use the same virus databases I believe as their not-free counterparts and are pretty higly rated. You may get more bells and whistles with the pay stuff. From what I have researched, it seems that no antivirus is 100%. Some will pick up something whereas another will not and vice-versa. I guess the key is to be an informed consumer and try to avoid bad sites and questionable downloads. So far I am happy with using MSE and not having to deal with the constant system load as I experienced with Kaspersky. Good luck!
 
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His saying that the free ones were junk is wrong, some are, but any of the top 3 free ones will do a good job, as good as the top 3 paid ones.

AVG, Malwarebytes and SuperAntiSpyware will not conflict one bit. AVG mainly does virus scans with some spyware removal although not super good at that. The free version of Malwarebytes does not have a resident scanner (meaning it only runs when you start it to check for issues) so that does nothing at all with conflicts. Super AntiSpyware does run resident (you will see it in the system tray) but it does not conflict with AVG and sure as heck not with Malwarebytes as that does not even run till you start it.

Print this out this thread and bring it over to them 😀
 
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I used Kaspersky for years and it was one of the best I've used. It certainly did NOT bog down the computer whatsoever. Norton bogs down a computer.
Click to expand...

Depends on how you configure it and what other security software you run it with. It can slow your system down quite a bit if setting are set high. But you getting something in return. Its not the old norton slow because of sloppy code thing.

And yes, Kasperski is about as good as an AV gets.
 
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Another factor to bear in mind in this discussion is terminology. BestBuy may have used the word "virus" as a generic term they expect the public to understand. Start talking about Trojans and Rootkits and most computer users simply glaze over. It's highly likely that Whoisme555's system had more than simple virus attacks.

Therefore, it's no use just having an AV if you put yourself in the "at risk" category by torrenting - you need a package and that should include Spybot, MalwareBytes, SuperAntiSpyware and a jolly strong Firewall.


 
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I do my fare share of "risky" downloads and never had any problems with regular free antivirus (I used AVG, Avira, Avast and I'm now using MSE). One thing I usually did, when downloading small but potentially dubious files like cracks from russian sites, is to use VirusTotal; it scans the file with 20-30 antivirus and gives you the result.
 
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Try this combo! It'll make you satisfied in all aspects!
Download & Install the following 3 freewares. It forms a free complete security suite for your system!
1. Avira Anvivir - http://www.free-av.com/en/download/index.html .
Avira is best & light solution for excellent overall system protection & internet security with real time updates, .

2. Malwarebytes - http://www.malwarebytes.org/ .
Malwarebytes is one of the best & effective antimalware tool out there.

3. Ccleaner - http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download .
CCleaner is a system optimization, privacy and cleaning tool with an efficient & most useful registry cleaner.

The Best Security & System Optimization combo for all types of systems.

If you need, you can install MSE instead of Avira, Both are free, Lightweight and equal in performance/effectiveness also
 
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hey all i have used all and have nothing bad to say they all provide basic protection and with common sense web surfing i have had very good luck. i go to alot of bad websites i know are infected with something just scan before you open and you should be ok. just my opinion. thanks poorguy
 
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