Topic awaiting preservation: There is a best antivirus

I always thought that a good antivirus is a good antivirus and then anyone that is considered to be a good antivirus are the same. But then I found I'm wrong, so wrong.

My wife has a notebook that has been giving her trouble for a long time. The CD player doesn't work properly. It works at random, even without a disc inside it kept trying to find something, etc. My wife had it always open so to not bother her. You could not remove the Internet connection from the notebook - you could not take out the network cable from its back - because once there were no Internet connection, the CPU went to 100% and the notebook got very very slow (we have Internet all the time from the wall outlet that's why having the network cable plugged in the computer means Internet is on). Many time, copy/paste would not work, giving messages of out of memory, requiring a reboot to work. Rebooting was always impossible, if you rebooted it, it would give you the BSOD. You must turn it off, wait some seconds and then turn it on. Etc., etc.., etc...

See, my wife's computer is a piece of crap. I have told her that if I were her, I would have thrown it to the trash long time ago. But she kept using it, suffering with it, but depending on it because she didn't want to spend money buying one. This notebook is not really hers, it's her employer's that's, by the way, is the Brazilian Government (we are public employees).

But then, yesterday, she had enough. Harvard's firewall was not allowing her to use the Internet because it were detecting that her notebook had worms, and she must eliminate the worms before she could use it again. Harvard's firewall is pretty good, by the way.

Then she complained to me. I'm the super hero of computers for her, I'm the guy that fix everything. I'm the one! Well, I have had my days with her computer, and I got really nervous with it because it's a hell of a bad computer, brandless, useless, with some behaviors that I always thought were due to some hardware problem, not possible to be solved.

But now I had had enough also. Not being able to access the Internet is too much. So, I started scanning her computer with the worm removal tool. None worked. I try to delete all files from the IE temporary folder, impossible. The notebook crashed, requiring turning it off and turning it on (no rebooting, remember).

Then I started using free antivirus online tools. First, AVG, free edition. It found 6 virus, and theoretically removed them. Harvard's firewall was still complaining. Then I used Panda Active Scan and RAV antivirus and Trendmicro. Found 4 virus. Firewall still complaining. Then McAfee: found 8 more virus but no removal: I had to pay to remove them. What I did? I simply deleted all the files that McAfee told me were virus, and I searched for every occurrence of their name in the Registry and delete all keys related to them. Finally, the firewall allowed us to access Internet again permanently. Not satisfied, I used BitDefender that found one more virus. I removed it the same way, but deleting the file, the folder it was in and references to it in the Registry.

See, not all virus scanner are the same. Now, I'm in love with McAfee. It was the one that found most viruses. I didn't use Norton because Norton has no free scanning. I don't like Norton AV anyway.

Finally, a tip: if you have a file named FireDaemon.exe in your task manager process list, take care. This file itself is not a virus, but it's used by the virus to become a service. So, most probably, if you have it, you have also a virus. My wife's notebook had three firedaemon.exe running at the same time in task manager list. You cannot simply stop them, you are not allowed.

My wife's notebook has none of those problems now, I am still her computer hero and I want McAfee AV in my computer (and in hers as well) !!

The poster has demanded we remove all his contributions, less he takes legal action.
We have done so.
Now Tyberius Prime expects him to start complaining that we removed his 'free speech' since this message will replace all of his posts, past and future.
Don't follow his example - seek real life help first.

On the other hand I hate McAfee and love Norton AV. During the last few years I have seen McAfee cause more problems than it has fixed. Everything from corrupt installs to stoping Zip drives to removing system files. Norton does offer free scanning, it's called Security Response and they offer dozens of other free removal tools on their website. Another good webscan can be found at housecall.trendmicro.com you might want to give that a shot next time.

I used Tendmicro as well. It's mentioned in my first message.
I saw the Security Test in Norton website but I thought it was not about virus.

About a firewall, here we don't actually need it because our network, Harvard's network, has a pretty good one that won't allow scanning our ports, virus, trojan horses, worms, etc to invade your computer, etc. My wife's computer is infected from before this firewall was installed. It was installed in Harvard's network by 2003/april and my wife's notebook is unprotectedly connected to the Net since 2002/Sep.

I use a firewall not because what can come in, but because I want control over what can go out of my computer. I have some apps that I don't want them to have access to the Internet because if they do, well, I will have some problems...

quote:

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I have some apps that I don't want them to have access to the Internet because if they do, well, I will have some problems...

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tsk, tsk... warez?

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Is this thing on?

A Work In Progress

Not warez.
Trial software.

In all my years of computing, I have had a grand total of 1 virus on my computer. And it didn't really do that much, either.

My anti-virus secret? Use a Mac.
(I also have Norton AV and Norton Firewall, but rarely have the need to use them.)

-Xel

http://www.sophos.com/ is an invaluable resource.

My first experience with a Mac was in a Harvard lab, some months ago. It last half an hour, enough time for me to realize that I have nothing to do with a Mac. They may be better, they are more expensive, they are cool (here in the US), they have that beautiful apple shining all around, but they suck for a guy like me. I love PC, where I have total control of what goes inside it, where I understand every piece of it, every piece of hardware, where I can afford to pay for it, where I feel comfortable with it.

I don't know the exact figures, but in Brazil I believe there is no Mac market. Nobody sells Mac, and as a consequence, nobody buys Mac (and I am pretty sure that nobody sells because nobody would buy it anyway). Buying a Mac here in the US and taking it to Brazil would be like taking an unwanted sample of a rare species to a hostile environment with no chances of long survival, born to suffer from discrimination and disdain.

Yeah, sure, they aren't for everyone. I didn't say they were.

But just like you said what your best antivirus stuff was for you, so did I, heh.

-Xel

Actually, since I don't know Mac, I have nothing against it, and I can't even have an opinion about it.
In my last message I just wanted to be sort of dramatic...

I just wash my computer out with soap and hot water once a week, and make sure it's bundled up if I ever take it outside. That usually does the trick.


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Suho: www.liminality.org

^^ Are u sure u use the soap to wash only ur computer.......u Wa~Ker!



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