Ask the readers: Inexpensive anti-virus software?

Like others have said, the free version of AVG is great for antivirus software. ZoneAlarm works very well as a firewall program. You can “train” it for which programs you want to have access to the internet and other parts of your computer. I’ve used both as our protection for the last 4 years or so and not had a bit of trouble. Any virus threats are stopped immediately and virus definitions are auto updated every morning providing the latest protection.

I would like to also reccomend Avast. We love it!!, and it’s all we have ever used on our laptop.
My dad told me about it and that it is what he uses on all of his personal computers and he works for a Big International computer software company!!

I have to disagree with the others about free virus products. It is worth every penny to go with a paid subscription service – I use Norton. I must say I am a computer programmer with a Master’s degree in computer science, and I did lots of research for my degree on this very subject. Free programs are often delayed in posting updates for new viruses and miss many of the viruses “in the wild”. If you need futher proof, I just removed 5 viruses from my MIL’s computer – she runs AVG. I promptly bought her a copy of Norton Antivirus this weekend. I agree that many of the paid programs are “bloated”, but it’s better than having a computer full of viruses. Trend Micro is a very good program that is paid and isn’t as bloated as others. The company I work for (a Fortune 500 company) uses this on all their computers. Check with your employer as well – my company offers a discount when buying Trend Micro though them. I can get it for $15 annually. HTH!

My husband is a network technician and has been for over 10 years. On all 5 networked computers in our home, he has installed AVAST! It is free with all the bells and whistles. He has tested 4-5 different programs, but (according to him) AVAST is the best, and it is free.

To download it, here is the link:
http://www.avast.com/eng/download-avast-home.html

Great job asking for help with this task. It is great to have friends with answers. : )

All of my clients are running AVG for their antivirus softare with a mixed bag of Ad-Aware, Spy Bot and Windows Defender (because in my experience NONE of them gets everything but all three combined seem to get it all) to back it all up. Windows Firewall is verboten at client sites because I set them up with SonicWall firewalls to let me remote in securely and the Windows one is less effective anyway. For families and home users who can afford it (about $150 a year) I HIGHLY recommend a SonicWall but if it’s out of their price range then Windows Firewall makes a suitable backup.

I second the first person’s post. I am a HUGE Trend Micro fan. I also heartily agree with Jim’s assertion that you don’t need virus software at all if you use some common sense when opening files and email attachments. We have not run Windows updates or any virus software for over 5 years and have been fine, by the Lord’s grace. I do not like the fact that a company can access my computer and “install” whatever they like on it and access my files at the same time, so I immediately uninstall all virus programs and turn off Windows updates when getting a new computer. When I have knowingly opened a questionable file and gotten burned and ended up with an adware program, Trend Micro’s online House Call scan has done the trick! I should also add, that before I became a virus program snob, I would often get infected and even when running Norton’s, Adawre, Spybot, etc, I would often have to turn to Trend Micro to get rid of whatever I had! TM was also the top pick among all others in some computer magazine publications due to their excellent track record.

We have free Norton through our DSL provider. We also have the BSafe Online suite that offers anti-virus, firewall, spam filter, pop-up blocker, and family-friendly Internet content filtering. We do pay $69 for it each year, but it’s worth it to have the trash filtered out. Between the two (DSL’s Norton and BSafe Online), we haven’t had any virus troubles!

I always have used Norton Anti Virus, and I have never had one single problem with spyware, hacking or anything at all.

I also have been using AVG for a couple of years now and I have been very satisfied with it.

AVG Free for anti-virus and Zone Alarm for firewall. Both are free and work well. They are recommended by some of the top computer people.

I am going to quote an e-mail from a family in our church that I found very helpful:
I’ve heard of a few situations in the last few weeks of children accessing inappropriate sites over the Internet so I thought I would do some research into content filtering software (even though our family is young, I though it would be good to have something in place now, before problems arise!).

Most of the systems are costly and don’t work that well, but I’ve seen some very good reviews of the following service that is free and does not work by installing filtering software on the computer. Rather, it works by changing the DNS settings on the router/computer that then allows the software to block sites that are inappropriate. It seems to be highly used by large corporations, but best of all, it is free!

The web is for the service is: http://www.opendns.org

I installed it on our router in around 10 minutes, there are very easy instructions online to set this up.

Hope others find this to be a helpful system too.

We have used AVG for years. And our systems are constantly exposed to malware (hubby worked as a rater). It’s free & it works!

Your internet provider may give you a free software; ours does. Also, periodically you can get Norton antivirus or McAfee for free after rebate from places like Staples or Office Depot. I don’t know of any ongoing promotions right now.

AVG free all the way. We’ve used it for years and have never had a problem.

My vote goes for Avast. It’s free for personal use. I’ve never had a problem with it, and it doesn’t slow down my computer like the big name anti-virus programs.

My husband works as a developer for Symantec, the parent company of Norton. Ironically, the first thing he does when he gets his hand on a computer is uninstall Norton and install AVG. He’s a huge fan, and it’s always worked great for us.

If you download the free AVG, do you have to remove norton before installing it? I was told that some of these virus protection programs will cause issues if you install more than one.
Thanks in advance

My IT person told me that if you set your computer up with a password protected administrator account and user accounts (at least one to work from, but as many as you want) that DO NOT have administrator rights. Then only go into the administrator account to install or uninstall programs, you will never need virus protection. My computer has been set up this way for 4 years without virus protection and I have never had a problem. He said that the reason this works is that virus have to be installed on your computer and that requires administrator rights. So if you are working in an account that doesn’t have administrative rights, a virus can’t install with permission. It helps to NEVER open an email that you weren’t expecting too. If you set your email up to a preview pane (where you can read some of the email without actually opening it), it helps to know if the email is valid. If you are ever questioning the validity of an email, find out from the sender if they actually sent it before opening it. This is free and my computer has been completely protected for 4 years now.

I had several tech guys recommend Avast! The explanation I got from one of them is the Avast! was created in Russia and that’s where all the really bad viruses and spyware come from…so they really know how to find them…I don’t know, but it’s worked out well for me in the past.

My vote is for AVG, too.