My computer fizzled a couple of days ago. It was in the repair shop for two days and came back for one day, fritzed again, went back to the shop and now, here I am with it home and so far, working. I have a few odd issues with it though. (Sorry but I couldn't decide where to put this email. There doesn't seem to be a forum for virus/scumware/niggly bits.) I had just bought an AVG virus and firewall license which the techie replaced with a Spanish version of Norton. Everybody seems to sing Norton's praises but I don't like it. I have always found conflicts and the only time I bought it absolutely, amazingly bad customer service. I'd replace Norton with my AVG/firewall license in a red hot minute BUT... in the process of reformatting my computer, the techie buggered up my email. All the emails I had now have no From or Date fields and do not appear in the Inbox in any order whatsoever. The Find function is damn useless as in most cases the emails that were saved only saved the first five lines or so... The email containing my AVG license number is lost in a morass of porridge. Also I am getting odd messages that I never got before from 'Windows Messenger'. Things like your Windows Registry is corrupted. Go to www.(delete) fixregedit.(delete) com or You have a security flaw yada, yada, go to www. (delete)updatepatch. (delete) info. I might be thick as a shithouse brick but I do know that being led by the nose to some unheard of URL spells trouble. Is Norton letting these weirdo pop-ups in? The other issue is that Norton is a Spanish version. I can get by, especially in written Spanish, though would be more comfortable in English. So... are there any passionate votes one way or the other? Apparently, the Norton he loaded is valid for a year. The AVG I paid for would be valid for a year too so I am not really losing any money. I could use the XP firewall and Norton. So AVG plus firewall or Norton plus XP firewall? Comments on my mysterious email problem would be welcome too, by the way.
Personally, I take Norton off every machine I ever work with and replace it with AVG. I've been using AVG for years and have had zero issues.
Using Norton is just asking for trouble. I use Pccillin from Trend micro which is much better product.
It's funny that both replies so far are definately anti-Norton. It was always my gut feeling but I have been made to feel in the past that Norton was the 'professional' choice. I always felt a little guilty for preferring a different option. Is that just good marketing on Norton's part, do you think?
I would take off anything Symantec. In the past, Norton was truly the 'professional' choice. But that was like 10 years ago when they only had competition from McAfee.
Aaah. Thanks everyone. I was really swithering because the techie from the repair shop was so adamant that I was a plonker for not using Norton.
i use norton even tho i hate it lol, i use it as a bundle tho anti virus/firewall/systemworks, i would recommend pc-cillin.
Norton Antivirus for the most part is a good product, just don't get the whole Norton Suite of products. Then you are really asking for trouble. AVG is also good, but there updates are never as quick as Norton it seems (IMHO). I also find that Norton's update feature is a lot easier to set and forget it which is a good plus for most people.
I love Norton, never had any problems with it - Norton AV, Norton Firewall, and Norton Anti-Spam. I hate McAfee - more false positives than most and it kept conflicting with my OS. I did use AVG briefly but it didn't have a firewall then and I felt the updates weren't reliable - I think it has improved since then but I've never seen a reason to go back from Norton. ZoneAlarm kept messing up my system so I ditched that and went back to Norton for the firewall too.
Since we are on the topic, http://www.virusbtn.com's VB100% award gives you an idea which antivirus is better in terms of virus detection.
Not really. All it does is give you a PASS or FAIL on a long boring list of AV programs, most of which no one has ever heard of. In the end, what you've got is the expected list of AV programs which are rated PASS. Doesn't really help you at all if you don't know which one to buy beforehand.
If you look at the results history of a particular antivirus, you can see how many tests that antivirus passed/failed. VB100% award is very well-respected, you will notice that antivirus companies loves to announce in their press release whenever they are awarded a pass. It might not help you decide which antivirus to buy, but it is certainly something to consider in your antivirus comparison researches.
Possibly. But think of the top 6-10 AV programs and I think you'll find that all of them are rated PASS and I'd be surprised if any of them didn't get that rating every time they were tested. I think the sort of comparisons that PC World or PC Magazine do are more likely to be helpful to someone trying to make a decision.
Norton Pro here personally, been using it for a few years and loving it for the most part. Have many others here as well, but those are just collecting dust at the moment.
I have heard to many complaints about Norton from my old job to everybody I know that uses it. I have used it to I'll admit when I was poor and only could afford cheap dail u but I have solved the virus solution. NOD32.com was recommended to be by every software engineer from Mi crosoft I spoke with. You do have to pay for it it's $35.95 to start and $4.95 a year after that. Keep in mind I found out that this is the same virus protector the NSA uses.