McAfee Update is Shutting Down Windows XP PCs

[hellwig]

Let's see, my work comp's McAfee installation is using 160MB of memory (I have barely of Gig on this old piece of crap). The program version itself is a couple years old (so you know its catching all the latest stuff like ILOVEYOU and Melissa), and twice a day it bogs my machine down scanning absolutely nothing. I'm so glad my employer uses such wonderful protection.

I personally dropped McAfee in 1998 and haven't looked back. Went with Norton for a few years, finally dropped that too (shows them for not supporting WinXp Pro x64), and have stuck with Avast! for the last few years with no complaints.

 

[Guest]

Whatever, I'm a computer tech, and so stuff like this brings us more business!

 

[warmon6]

[citation][nom]tayb[/nom]What does it matter the reasoning for the excess viruses? Windows is more susceptible to getting viruses. There are a multitude of reasons why but those reasons don't really matter. There are less viruses for OS X. You have a much smaller chance of getting a virus on a Mac than you do on a PC. Case in point, the Mac Lab at UT is up and running. All the other computer labs including the engineering lab is still down.[/citation]

You know why OSX have lower chance getting virus and malaware? With windows having the majority of the OS market, most people that make this stuff look at there chances of getting something good (aka, bank account number, ect). Well, larger market share = higher chance of getting that good stuff.

As everyone has said,

1. No OS is immune to virus, malware, ect.
2. If the majority of people switched to a OSX or a particular linux (say ubuntu), guess were all thoses hackers, malware, and virus makers are going? Yep, to the new most used OS.

 

[anamaniac]

MS Security Essentials FTW!
I don't even notice a performance hit when it's doing a scan.

 

[Guest]

jd91651 that is not how viruses work.

 

[HolyCrusader]

"The biggest vulnerability in virus protection is to assume your computer can't get a virus." That's something I read on either a Linux or Mac forum a couple years ago.

I started out with Norton; tried McAfee briefly but found it very cumbersome to use, and then went back to Norton for a couple more years. I ditched Norton when I was simply getting too many computers to buy a new $60 license for every year, and that's how I ended-up with avast! which I still use to this day.

AVG is good too, although it does seem to be more demanding of system resources (it can slow-down an older computer to a crawl I've noticed). I'm not really fond of Avira - I quickly grew tired of it's nag screens to register it

 

[Gin Fushicho]

I think McAffee just wants people to upgrade.

 

[jellico]

[citation][nom]ncarlson[/nom]One of the reasons that I don't use antivirus software.[/citation]
Alrighty, now just disconnect your computer from the Internet, and you're all set! You'll never have to worry about pesky malware ever again.

 

[ananke]

Norton is not crappy either - almost every time it updates, it kills my Win 7 Pro, and I have to spend at least an hour to fix it. For the sake, Microsoft is not any better with its own updates either, especially combined with AV pack running

At least I don't have spontaneous BSODs like I did with McAfee

 

[Guest]

All of the RI hospitals are affected and have not admitted new patients unless it's an emergency.
Also Bank of America is also one of those unlucky 60k businesses.

Someone is going to be fired... or be sleeping with the fishies.

 

[timbo]

Good think I use Kaspersky. Runs smooth for me, even if I leave it on during mp gaming. It's also caught flash based malware before it installed on my comp. on more than one occasion.

 

[Guest]

I stopped using (and trusting)Mcafee since 1995, and have no regrets doing so so far!

 

[Guest]

Um, we had this impact 20+ machines before we worked out what was wrong.

I wrote up some removal instructions here:

http://www.adfrad.com/2010/04/fixing-mcafee-w32wecorla-false-alerts.html

Good luck eveyone!

 

[IzzyCraft]

Obv they found the main security problem with xp problem and dealt with it

 

[Marco925]

[citation][nom]schwiing[/nom]So the moral is...updates are bad..wait..that's not right.[/citation]

The Moral is Don't use McCrappy

 

[aford10]

This is a little vindication for all those who don't trust free AVs, just because they are free and 'less trustworthy.'

+1 to Avira, Avast, and Microsoft Security Essentials

 

[lauxenburg]

Who the hell uses McAfee...oh right the 10 billion people who bought Dell computers and don't know how to use Control Panel...

 

[eddieroolz]

lol McAfee, one of the biggest name in fail.

 

[rooket]

McAfee still updates? News to me. Every time I use their antivirus and their """"update"""" (yes I used 4 quotes , it fails to detect and clean anything from a PC that has virii on it. What a joke of an antivirus software lol.

 

[rooket]

Proxy, Comcast no longer provides it for free (thank god) but I hope this doesn't mean that Norton 360 is going down the tubes as well (no I don't use norton 360 it is just what I have been hearing has replaced mcafee). SEP works great for me at work though.

 

[Trueno07]

Avast, MS security Essentials, AVG...

Why would anyone pay for virus protection?

 

[Guest]

LOL, It crashed all of the computer labs at my university. (Utah Valley University) All the students were hoping it meant the servers containing their grades had gone down. If only...

 

[owens]

A prime example of poorly programmed 3rd party software causing problems, not the OS itself!

 

[Guest]

I saved my workstation at work by
Start, Run type services.msc click OK. Services Window scroll to DCOM server Process Launcher- double click. recovery tab change all three responses to restart the service- click ok- then scroll to Remote Procedure Call and change the same services. click ok- close the window- this will save until patch arrives.

 

[zuke]

Lots of arm-chair quarterbacks here.

We use McAfee under an enterprise license agreement, and have a few thousand computers covered. Haven't had any significant problem in over 15 years and receive good customer support.

This issue has only plagued our XP boxes, the Win7 and WinVista boxes are running fine. Our IT Dept figured out the problem a little before lunchtime and the fixes are being rolled out now. This seems like a QA problem with the DAT file, since it's pretty consistent with every XP box. Someone dropped the ball and is probably gonna get fired!