Free (or dirt cheap) Antivirus!

[EarlGrey]

Been using Avast! on several machines for many years, and never had a problem. It's always the first thing I put on a new machine now.

[Faboo]

I cant belive that nobody suggested comobofix as an antivirus. It is by far the best software ive ever found. Beats the crap out of allmost everything else, which is all mostly useless.

[peterb]

And firewalls, as far as I understand, stop unwanted inbound and outbound traffic, i.e. one of these malicious files sending out your login details to some 's server.

Partially true. A NAT router will effectively hide your computer from the wider internet and protect you from prbeing attacks, port scans etc (provided you don'y have any inbound ports open.

However they won't stop you from importing malicious code from an e mail or a falky web site. An AVprogram will (you hope) detect malicious code on inbound e mails (if it has that facility) and scan your computer periodically for malicious code that is running in the background.

You can configure some NAT routers to block all outgoing ports except for the one you want but that then becomes a bit tedious as you need to investigate what is happening when an application stops working. A software firewall on your computer recognises applications communicating, and if a new one appears, flags up a warning. That requires a bit of understanding by the user - there are many legitimate processes that access the internet, but you need to check out each alert before clicking 'OK' to be certain that it isn't something unwanted.

However one of the most important things is NOT to run your system with administrator privileges - create a user account for yourself that is less privileged, although that can cause problems with poorly designed applications.

I use a NAT router which has some open inbound ports, AV but no software firewall. However I am running Linux, and I check my system logs frequently!

[Thorsson]

I have to say that the thought of running Vista without Admin privs fills me with horror. It's damn bad enough having to run a number of progs as Admin as it is. From what I've seen, if you have a hardware firewall and don't visit dodgy pron/warez sites then you won't have much to worry about. A decent antivir is just icing on the cake.

[floppybootstomp]

I'm actually wondering by what criteria people recommend Anti Virus software.

I think it's probably fair to say that if a user likes the software interface and they haven't suffered a virus in x amount of time since installing it, they tend to recommend it.

But that's not the full picture is it?

Mostly AV software will only prove it's worth once you're unlucky enough to catch a nasty.

And even then, how do you know your AV software of choice is acting any better or worse than it's peers?

I made my decision(s) by reading lots of real life scenarios from users, usually experienced, who'd cleansed machines of viruses using different software.

I think only real life experience as a professional or semi-pro software troubleshooter, or the introduction of viruses in a controlled experiement and the subsequent trying to remove them using different software, is the way to judge.

Broad statements such as 'most of them are rubbish' should be looked at with the cynicism they deserve unless the person who makes the statement produces hard evidence to backup their claim.

[cd_rom]

I have been using Avira Antivir Personal and Zonealarm firewall, they are fine. Better to use them in conjuction with Adware, tookit detector/remover.

Just my 2p

[lodore]

the fact is if you have cash to spend kaspersky is the best option.

very decent detection and hourly updates. if a virus or malware isnt detected use winrar or winzip to compress the file. make sure you password protect the archive. use the password "virus"
you will always get a reply back and if its malware it should be added very quickly.
email address is
newvirus at kaspersky.com
you get what you pay for.
in the rare case of a false positive put false positive in the email body and subject.

nod32 is a detect av but it takes them ages to add malware to the bases if you send them a sample.

f-secure is also a very detect av. uses kaspersky engine plus f-secure in house engines.
it is heaver than kaspersky 2009 range but is a very decent program.

if you have no cash to spend i reccomend avast. best free av imo. doesnt slowdown the machine and doesnt nag you. can be slow to add malware to database if you send them malware.

btw avira has quite alot of false possitives. has a nag screen and the updator breaks alot. same for there paid versions. my sister used avira paid on her laptop for a year. then i switched it to kaspersky which i use on all my machines now.

[richieuk]

I used avast, but it stopped me connecting to any Steam games, so it had to go, any others available that don't do this?

[TAKTAK]

I used avast, but it stopped me connecting to any Steam games, so it had to go, any others available that don't do this?

???

are you sure it's not your firewall stopping steam connecting?

avast + steam is fine for me

[richieuk]

Very sure, I uninstalled avast and it worked fine again, i checked steam and it said Avast can cause these problems...

[Thorsson]

I had issues with Avast. It seemed to interfere with things (a la Norton). Certainly when I went back to AVG my issues went away.

Trying Antivir at the moment. Easy to remove nags. Nice small footprint. Only time will tell how it performs.

[2Cold Scorpio]

I rather love the free version of Avast!, particularly coupled with Comodo firewall (I turn Defense+ off too). Both are quite lightweight. I also have Windows Defender and PeerGuardian 2 running for additional security. All are light enough that I can usually keep 'em running in the background even wen playing demanding games (except Crysis)...though I usually turn off PG2 while gaming.