Please recommend an AV product

[Anita]

I've been happily using AVG Free for years, and updated when prompted towards the end of last year to v9. As others have found, Firefox slowed to a crawl, with some pages not loading at all, so I reverted to v8.5.

Yesterday it nagged me again to update, and as there was a new version released in January I installed it, hoping they'd addressed the problem. They haven't!

I'd read good reports of Avast, so I uninstalled AVG and installed that, but returning to my PC after an hour away from it I found it had frozen and could only restart it by pulling the plug. Windows started, albeit slowly, but hung while loading startup programs. After several tries I finally booted in safe mode and restored to a point prior to installing Avast.

Having done a search it seems to be a known problem (see this forum thread), so I'm now running AVG v8.5 again, but I wonder how long it will be supported.

Can anyone recommend a reliable AV product, preferably free but I'd rather pay if it avoids any more problems.

Thanks.
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Anita
TomTom VIA 135 - App 12.075
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Samsung Galaxy S21

[MaFt]

i've not had any problems with avg9 and firefox... perhaps you should reinstall it, select the 'custom' install option and don;t bother with the firefox toolbar? i don;t use it so maybe it is the toolbar that is an issue. i know mozilla's devlopers found various faults in a previous release of the toolbar and simply set firefox to 'block' the add-on!

MaFt

[BigPerk]

The one I use on my laptop, Avira's Antivir, seems ok. My laptop and PC always seem a bit slow but I put that down to my cheap-skate purchasing strategy.

I can't vouch 100% for it's speed as I got the recommendation from one of my 'must-have' sites, MSE.com

[Darren]

Anita, apols if I missed it but what OS is your current PC using?

I used to deploy and administer large scale anti-virus solutions but for home use I found AVG Ok.

However, in its latest incarnation its become bloated and memory hungry and so now I'm running Win7 on the one PC I have retained I've moved.

I know use MS's own free product which, whilst not being the flashiest of those available, works well in a basic anti-virus role and is free.

But I think it only supports Win7. If you are using something else then Avast Antivirus is worth considering.
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Darren Griffin

[mikealder]

Whilst its not free it isn't too expensive Kaspersky if you have more than one computer the best approach is the three seat license so you can protect a number of computers with a single purchase.

Its what I have been using for some time and it works great with no lockups and it doesn't hog the entire computer, runs fine on my Vista machines and the daughters XP based computer - Mike

[MaFt]

[AliOnHols]

Hi Anita, Sorry you have had a bad experience with Avast. I have been using Avast Home Free for at least 6 years on Win98, XP and Vista without any problems at all. I find that it loads and updates quickly and does a good job at filtering out the badies. Would you consider giving it another chance?

If not:-

Sorry for this as I try not to impose it upon anybody but, if you want a fast, free, complete, virus free OS, try Linux. It has come-of-age and does not have the problems associated with it of previous years. All of our (8) PC's and Laptops have Linux (LinuxMint and PuppyLinux) installed, very rarely do we have to resort to MS Winows. You can try it out without installing it by running it in RAM on a CD. Happy to give you a helping hand if you are curious.

Regards. Ali.
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[theripper]

[Anita]

Thanks for your advice everyone. Trouble is there are so many variables that what works well on one machine doesn't necessarily do so on another. Maybe it's something on my PC that's causing the problems with AVG and Avast.

I've decided to follow Mike's recommendation and buy Kaspersky Internet Security. Staples have a half-price offer of £21.26 + VAT on the 3 user version, so I can use it on my desktop and laptop (both XP, Darren) and my sister's computer too, so less than £10 per machine. And at least I should get support with a paid-for product.

I'll have a look at Linux when I have the time, Ali. I've never considered it, so it will be interesting to find out about it.
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Anita
TomTom VIA 135 - App 12.075
UK map 1125.12264
Samsung Galaxy S21

[AliOnHols]

[Anita]

Thanks, Ali. I might well take you up on your offer!
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Anita
TomTom VIA 135 - App 12.075
UK map 1125.12264
Samsung Galaxy S21

[Privateer]

Hi Anita,

I have to agree with mikealder about Kaspersky Internet Security.

Do you by chance do on-line banking with Barclays Bank? If you do then they will give you a three-user licence for Kaspersky Internet Security for free.

Regards,
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Robert.
iPhone 6s Plus, iOS 14.0.1: iOS CamerAlert v2.0.7
TomTom GO Mobile iOS 2.3.1; TomTom (UK & ROI and Europe) iOS apps v1.29
Garmin Camper 770 LMT-D

[Anita]

Thanks for the tip, Robert, but I bank with First Direct and they only offer "Rapport online fraud protection, which works alongside your anti-virus software and firewalls to protect your Internet Banking and other log on details".

I've ordered Kaspersky Internet Security from Staples and it should arrive on Monday. Looking forward to trying it out.
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Anita
TomTom VIA 135 - App 12.075
UK map 1125.12264
Samsung Galaxy S21

[spook51]

Thanks for the Barclays/Kapersky heads up, I hadn't spotted that.

My browser of choice is Opera though I also have Chrome, Firefox and IE installed. I'm currently using AVG Free 9 which doesn't slow my laptop's performance (currently running Vista though I have a free Win7 upgrade to install) but my desktop running XP has slowed noticeably after swapping from AVG 8.5 to 9. It may be coincidental but, after reading the advice here, I'll remove it and try Kapersky.

[PaulB2005]

Personally (and for what it's worth) i use ESET NOD32 Anti Virus (www.eset.co.uk)

Lightweight and very good. Often detects stuff on hard drives I've pulled from customers PCs that AVG, Norton, McAfee etc have missed.

One complaint is that the "start up scanner" does bog some PCs down for a minute when first switched on but there is a free 30 day trial so you can see if you like it...

If you want to go down the Free route then Avast 5 Free Edition (www.avast.com) is hard to beat....

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