After many crashes, freezes uninstalls and updates we decided to bin Norton Anti Virus when it expired. Since doing that the performance of the W7 PC has improved beyond recognition, its faster than ever, stable and way way better to use than ever it was with Norton.

Currently using Windows own backup and Firewall programmes and after 6 months, we are still alive, havn’t been robbed blind and in general, wondering what all the AV fuss was about…

Is there any reason to pay for AV software, or are we missing something (except the marketing guff), not having 3rd party AV protection ?

Windows Defender, download from Microsoft for free

Is there any reason to pay for AV software,

No

or are we missing something (except the marketing guff), not having 3rd party AV protection ?

No

Free stuff is fine and the pay stuff is often worse than getting a virus

Mike, we are using Windows Defender… is working fine.

Norton was a complete sluggish crashfest… When it froze it took almost half a day to remove, re install and then scan….

Norton …. get rid at once 🙂

For peace of mind I use avira … been good so far (3 years now)

well there you go you have one of the best anti virus tools for windows, just carry on

Defender is not anti-virus, it’s anti-malware. There’s a difference. Unless you’re on Windows 8, you need Microsoft Security Essentials. It is far better than the third party offerings. It runs in the background iwthout fuss, it doesn’t bug you all the time and is generally invisible and unnoticeable. And free.

Norton, Macafee etc are basically scams. Shit software that they convince you you need.

http://lifehacker.com/the-difference-between-antivirus-and-anti-malware-and-1176942277

What I don’t understand is loads of this crap gets packaged with new PCs (see my recent thread on this) but all they do is serve to give a negative experience for most users, slow machines down and cause compatibility issues.

Surely if a PC was shipped *only* with the OS and no third-party gubbins, they would run more quickly and consumers would be happier with their purchase.

And there is the rub. There’s not a huge amount of margin in PC sales so vendors and OEMs load a bunch of crapware to help add a bit more profit. None of the people in that chain have any real vested interest in the end user having a fantastic experience. And then Microsoft get blasted for the user having a shit experience on Windows when there are a host of issue that are nothing to do with them.

This is one of those areas where the Apple experience will appear so much better because they are the only people that manufacture the machines, it is their operating system and their apps that get installed. The whole process is considerably more optimised.

They also get packaged with lots of ‘free’ software downloads so yu need to be careful to untick at install.
On a related note the Ask search tool that comes as an opt-out install with Java updates is a pain too.

That “Ask” search tool appears to be a right pain. Even unchecking the box for it appears to make no difference and it downloads plus Java anyway.

When I had PC, Norton indeed was rubbish. Tried McAffee and didn’t see it working any better than Norton. But once I tried Kaspersky, … I kept subscription with them for 4 years. The best of the lot IMO. Never had any issues on start up, bugs and all that shait. It just worked.

Now I ditched windows completely as having Apple in long term proves to cost the same as Windows but having better product without additional bundles.

Surely if a PC was shipped *only* with the OS and no third-party gubbins, they would run more quickly

Nothing hypothetical about this, it definitely does. I would ALWAYS install a clean Windows image then download the drivers I need/want from their website. Takes a bit of time, and you have to be a little bit savvy (but not that much) but it’s well worth it.

molgrips – Member

Unless you’re on Windows 8, you need Microsoft Security Essentials. It is far better than the third party offerings. It runs in the background iwthout fuss, it doesn’t bug you all the time and is generally invisible and unnoticeable. And free.

Norton, Macafee etc are basically scams. Shit software that they convince you you need.

Sorry but that’s just not true.

The dotted line here is the newest version of Essentials, confusingly now known as ‘Defender’:

http://chart.av-comparatives.org/chart1.php

When I say good or bad, I’m not talking about level of threat protection.. 🙂

Year ago, I was occasionally paid to visit people and get rid of malware on their PCs. Removing Norton was always the first thing to do.

Plenty of good AV out there, but Norton definitely isn’t among it.