Computer Guys Question

[willy]

Valiant, MJ, any of you other fellows who are up to speed computer wise what are you using for virus protection on your comps.
I have WebRoot now that was recommended when I bought this laptop last year but all it seems capable of doing is finding and quarentining sp cookies.
now I got a virus affecting my Windows mail ( says I have corrupt data in my calender) and will not let me open it or do anything with it from Admin or anything else.
I want a product that actually protects me. Oh and its windows vista 7
Is there anything that does?

[macojoe]

I use Avast, its free and works fine as I have not had a virus in more then a year.

Also when I have a issue that it (or others) seems not to take care of I go to Trend micro, House Call You can do this one online and it works great!!!!

[garagenc]

I have the new Norton that came out at the start of this year. The antivirus companies finally came out with a grading system.

This Norton scored the highest in every catagory.
It has caught everything including some viscious virus's and registry change worms and firewall things.

I haven't had any problems.

[lumberslinger178]

I have AGV its avaliable online but I had it installed when I had my hard drive replaced. Seem to work well .

[Destroyer]

I agree with MJ about Trend Micro. House Call is a really good, free, program that lets you scan your comp over the internet... so there's no danger of your virii infecting the host computer and not being detected.
We use the business edition of it at work to protect our servers, and since we're talking about millions of dollars of files, drawings, etc, etc, it has to be good.

Having said that, my recommendation would be Nava Shield http://navashield.com/order/purchase...FlOnjGsAORWw== for a number of reasons.
1) Price. Usually about $50 a year, but they run specials so you can get better deals.
2) Robustness. It not only finds virii that have infected you, it seeks out and destroys worms, adware, spyware, registery infections, etc. In short it's a really good program.
3) Proactive shielding of your computer. It's constantly monitoring your internet connection and your computer ports. It closes unused, open ports that are a constant source of internet infections.. keyloggers and trojans love to sneak in on them and take over your computer when it's on and use it to spam adware, virii, etc. NavaShield stops it cold.
4) Anonimity. There's a setting that you can switch on that blocks your IP address from anyone and everyone. So if you visit a site and the site wants to see who you are or where you are it cannot backtrack your IP address to find you. Everything is encripted....useful if you download a lot of music.
5) Ease of use. Load it, turn on the things you want on and off the things you don't want and that's it. It' runs in the background, you usually don't know it's even there... it just works.

I've been using it for a year now, and truthfully, I haven't had to resort to using House Call or any other program since installing it.

Cons: There is one minor annoyance to the program. You cannot set it to scan at a certain time... like 3am or something like that.. it has it's own clock and, while you can turn it off and tell it to scan manually anytime you want, you cannot set an automated specific time. To me, when I'm playing an online game, that can mean the difference between living or dying if it decides to do a scan while I'm in the middle of a fight. Like I said, it's really a minor annoyance..

All in all I'd give it a 9.5 out of a possible 10.

Note* Norton is Norton in name only. Peter Norton sold the program and the rights to use his name to Symantic long ago.
MacAfee was just bought by Intel... Maybe now they will make a good program?

[valiant_200]

As Joe said, I use Avast because it is free and it works. If I get something so bad that I can't get rid of it with Avast, I reload the operating system. I know.., brutal cure.., but it works!

[willy]

So if I go to an Avast or navaShield what do I have to do when I down load it, seeing as I have this other program on now?

[Destroyer]

Originally Posted by willy

So if I go to an Avast or navaShield what do I have to do when I down load it, seeing as I have this other program on now?

Go into your system and uninstall webroot., then I'd go to the Trend Micro site http://housecall.trendmicro.com/?cm_...-_-HouseCall71 and load/run Housecall first. Depending on your internet speed and the size of your hard drive(s) it can take a while to scan your computer, but at the end of it you should be relatively free of whatever virii are infecting you. (Assuming that you are infected with a virius. You may have registry errors, in which case there are other proggies (free) that you can use to fix them..)

After you've run the HouseCall then you can DL/install whatever anti-virii proggie you feel is good for you. Truthfully Willy, I'd go with the Avast proggie first, simply because it's free. NavaShield is a great proggie, but it will cost you half a hundred. Whenever I'm in doubt about something I use my old motto.. "If it's for free, it's for me"

[willy]

Sounds good and thanks for all the advise guys.
Computer froze on me last night, definetly a virus, as per my 17 year old son.
Said, let me see, went into safe mode or something, went online thru some other browser, down loaded something called C Cleaner went thru all the promps, in five minutes handed me back the comp and said it's gone Dad.
But I will load up that Avast, just so I don't have to have my son save me as often

[Destroyer]

Willy, if CCleaner removed your problems chances are you didn't have a virus, just bad (corrupted) registry entries. CCleaner is a great proggie, one that I use myself (See the "if it's free it's for me" quote above)... But it's not a virus checker/cleaner. To help clear things up, this description of it from CNET:

Quote "Although it lacks a few of the bells and whistles found in other PC-cleaning applications, this free program offers more than enough features to make it a worthy download. CCleaner's interface is logically designed and makes it easy to wipe away your tracks from Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, and Google Chrome from various Windows system areas, and from some third-party applications.
CCleaner doesn't support the large number of extraneous programs that some competitors do, but it can erase traces from such popular programs as Spybot - Search & Destroy and WinZip. CCleaner now offers secure file erasing along with a Registry-cleaning utility that quickly scans for invalid entries before removing them. CCleaner can even back up your Registry before removal, in case it accidentally removes a crucial component, and the download includes a rudimentary feature for uninstalling any program on your machine.
Since this free application handles the majority of PC-cleaning chores and offers a nice extra, we strongly recommend CCleaner to all users, except those who need robust tools to remove supersensitive data." Unquote

So as you can see, you were safe from nasty virii this time.. but by all means do install Avast as soon as you get the chance.

BTW... Another great registry cleaner is Eusing Free Registry Cleaner, which can be had by going to this link: http://www.eusing.com/free_registry_...ry_cleaner.htm
That is my number one go to registry cleaner for my own pc, so you know it's good... and did I mention.... it's FREE!!! Yaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!

Stand tall my man.. no more begs to your son are necessary