*Security geeks will find themselves leaving the UI window in a corner so they can see the updating of threats and events. It's quite hypnotizing in an ubergeek cool way.

That's not the "typical" hardware firewall that Foldingstock was referring to unless you use their gatekeeper product inline.

Personally I'd have a hard time calling the Pico a hardware firewall since it is run through USB and actually interfacing at a software driver level.

@SM177Y
I'd like to know why you think Avast is a joke. I recommend it to many people who call me after they let their paid subscription to ??? antivirus run out and then get themselves infected with their click happy browsing. It works well for them.

Avast! - This was probably the best one that I used


I couldnt agree more.AVAST is the best

We shoulda made a poll vote option with all the popular AV for this thread.

Well, as far as detection capability is concerned Avira's Antivir is the best.
resource hungry Norton is best, if you quickly want to remove the virus
I use avira to detect and then I try to remove it manually or using a removal tool (that's the best way to learn about virus ).

I have actually heard that the new Nortan is the best rite now. What scanner is the best at any given time changes. The new nortan is supposed to be faster use less resources and detect the most viruses. The latter being the most important.

Spyd3r-Mom wrote:I have actually heard that the new Nortan is the best rite now. What scanner is the best at any given time changes. The new nortan is supposed to be faster use less resources and detect the most viruses. The latter being the most important.

The day Norton is king of AV is the day Chuck Norris loses a fight to a 5 year old.

Avira and avast works great! prefers the avira very light on resources

Every AV sucks all they are good for is taking some money out of you pocket and slowing down you computer. Dont waste you time and bandwidth on downloading and updating you AV.. all a AV is just a big wall to jump over. well i guess it could keep the script kiddies away. but still no AV wil go on "my" machine.

zarlag wrote:Every AV sucks all they are good for is taking some money out of you pocket and slowing down you computer. Dont waste you time and bandwidth on downloading and updating you AV.. all a AV is just a big wall to jump over. well i guess it could keep the script kiddies away. but still no AV wil go on "my" machine.

Besides that Antivirus is a pretty valid defence, this topic is really old.

The best Offense needs no Defense.

any ways i just wanted to put my 2 cents in.... i hate AVs...

My favorites are MSE and ZenOK free antivirus (lighter)

zarlag wrote:The best Offense needs no Defense.

any ways i just wanted to put my 2 cents in.... I hate AVs...

I did read or hear somewhere a long time ago that,"hackers where all teeth and no shell". I guess your one of them. Personally im a paranoid schizophrenic. If your running Windows without an AV, no matter how 1337 you are, that's just not a good idea. There really isn't a reason to hate AV's. They should be designed to find viruses that find their way to your machine, and more importantly, prevent them from installing on your machine. Now, some suck at that. But then again, there isn't a single security mechanism type out there that I've know that hasn't been defeated at least once, or has some PoC code for it do be defeated.

But you should be reminded, that security only has an effect in layers. And AV should be one of the layer's of the shell for a lot of users. Also, there are decent free alternatives out there. As well as Open Source (w00t) AV like Clamav.

Do I run AV Always? No, but currently my only Windows installs exist virtually or not internet connected, but the non-connected does, for more realism....

You should read "The Art of War". Or at least some of the best excerpts from it. I don't think people read anymore.

Avast Free : Light on Resources & Good Detection Rates
AVG Free : Misses out Viruses
Avira : Issues with the Firewall & Good Detection but with many False Positives during Virus Scan
Noton 2011 : Light on Resources, but lower Detection Rates of Newer Virus Outbreaks
Kaspersky 2011 : Hogs System Resources & Slows down the PC as well as the Internet Connection
ESET Nod32 : Light on Resources but low Detection Rates
Trendmicro Titanium 2011 : Light on Resources, but issues with the Program Features
Panda 2011 : Good Detection Rate, but Program is unstable with my Windows 7 x64, hangs often.
Trustport 2011 : The Best in terms of Virus Detection (it uses 2 engines), but hogs System Resources.
BitDefender 2011 : Good Virus Detection Rates, no Problems so far. I am using this now.

AVG is best in all.it's lightweight and effective.

I would say it's about who is out first on the newest announcements.

Kaspersky or F-Secure.

I can't see why people rate AVG so high, an antivirus that also doesn't protect against spyware or malware where you can thank Kaspersky and F-Secure ..