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Norton has expired (finally). Which virus software do I get?

stoney

Part of the unwashed, middle-American horde
Jul 26, 2006
21,514
7,058
Colorado
Preferably something that is not a RAM hog and top tier. I have Win10 on one comp, Win7 pending conversion on another, and XP on 2 others which are rarely used. We have our phones on Norton as well. It's a tank and I would like to take advantage something that will let my comp run better, as they are all struggling for speed because they have the Adobe Design Suite as it is.
 

stoney

Part of the unwashed, middle-American horde
Jul 26, 2006
21,514
7,058
Colorado
Is it a pre-installed app? Like go in and uninstall Norton, then activate pre-installed Defender?
 

stoney

Part of the unwashed, middle-American horde
Jul 26, 2006
21,514
7,058
Colorado
It is done. I'm not sure if things move faster, but at least it's not eating up my memory or space anymore. If only I could convince Wifey to take the Adobe Design Suite off the non-work comps now.
 

canadmos

Cake Tease
May 29, 2011
20,190
19,155
Canaderp
It is done. I'm not sure if things move faster, but at least it's not eating up my memory or space anymore. If only I could convince Wifey to take the Adobe Design Suite off the non-work comps now.
Why need to take it off? Stick an SSD in there and prevent any of the garbage from starting with the computer and you'll be golden.
 

syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
12,690
290
VT
MSE/Windows Defender is terrible (significantly worse than any other free AV), disable it and install AVG, Avast, or Avira instead (top three free AV):

Microsoft Defender generally performs the worst — by far — of any free or paid antivirus program in recurring evaluations conducted by independent German lab AV-TEST. In an April 2014 round of tests, Windows Defender's ability to detect cutting-edge malware threats was considerably subpar; it detected only 68 percent of zero-day Web and email threats against an industry average of 94 percent.

Windows Defender also performed below average in detecting widespread, commonly known malware; it detected 79 percent of those bugs, compared with the industry average of 98 percent. In comparison, Avira Internet Security (a paid version of Avira's antivirus product) scored a perfect 100 in detecting both zero-day and widespread malware, and Avira told us that Avira Free Antivirus offers the same protection.

AVG Antivirus Free came in first among free antivirus software programs tested by AV-TEST, detecting 96 percent of zero-day malware and 99 percent of widespread malware. Avast Free Antivirus got 94 percent of the zero-days and 98 percent of the common malware. Malwarebytes Anti-Malware is not evaluated by AV-TEST.
 

syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
12,690
290
VT
I used AVG but still got Herpes. 1/10, would not buy again.
Two different bank accounts I have give their customers free paid AV clients which can be better than the free ones, but very few clients are good against zero day exploits.
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,092
1,132
NC
MSE/Windows Defender is terrible (significantly worse than any other free AV), disable it and install AVG, Avast, or Avira instead (top three free AV):
Those numbers are dramatically off from the more recent evaluations of Defender. The most recent evaluation shows Defender picking up 95% of released malware.

Still under the industry standard but a lot better than 79%.

I'm never sure exactly how much to trust 0-day evaluations. Primarily because it requires 0-day exploits to be in the wild but not patched/included, which means the type is going to vary a lot depending on the selection out at the moment.
 

syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
12,690
290
VT
Those numbers are dramatically off from the more recent evaluations of Defender. The most recent evaluation shows Defender picking up 95% of released malware.

Still under the industry standard but a lot better than 79%.

I'm never sure exactly how much to trust 0-day evaluations. Primarily because it requires 0-day exploits to be in the wild but not patched/included, which means the type is going to vary a lot depending on the selection out at the moment.
He has only one Win 10 machine with the improved version of MSE. The Win 7 and WinXP machines certainly need something far better than the older MSE available on those OS version. AVG, Avast, or Avira would be the options if he's going with free.

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2480487,00.asp
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,092
1,132
NC
Fair enough.

Anyone running Windows XP should just run with no scanner and use the inevitable virus as an excuse to upgrade.
 

neboboro

Chimp
Oct 5, 2015
3
0
I use AVG AntiVirus and so far i'm satisfied.. they have good and user friendly interface and very good protection for the Internet..
 

mykel

closer to Periwinkle
Apr 19, 2013
5,067
3,778
sw ontario canada
Virtual machines people, Virtual machines.
If ya gets a problem, dump it and load the next instance from a backup copy.

But for the host machine, Bit-Defender has been good.
Had too many issues with Avast and AVG...