Norton Anti Virus

LordSutch

After paying online for 'Norton' (One year €54.99) what do you have to do to update your PC Anti Virus to make it work? > A friend of mine paid his annual sub two weeks ago , but his PC still hasn't updated the Anti Virus, (Warning, Not protected)! maybe there are other steps he should take to actually update Norton on his the PC, or should it update itself?

Overheal

I just paid $30 at costco for norton internet security and norton utilities - you got marked up son :pac:

You can do a few things

- Click the Express Renewal button in the Norton Control Panel and enter the CD-Key you got with your order
- Use a Retail CD to install the newest version
- Use the support System
- But they will just do this: Run the norton removal tool - restart the PC, and run the Installer for the newest version (2009 to 2010, etc)

PogMoThoin

Norton is a virus, I'm sorry for being blunt but its a complete waste of €54.99 when free av programs will do a better job. I see a huge amount of problems every day with it bringing peoples pc's to their knees and detecting very little. Terrible, terrible software. McAfee is just as bad

If You insist on buying a software suite get Nod32 or Kaspersky

NothingMan

I agree, Had Norton internet security running for a year and whenever I had problems it only ever found one cookie. Ran AVG and Spybot and one time found 90 infections including the main virus I knew I had.

Sorry you already spent your money but it really isn't worth it. Try and get a refund.

JonathanAnon

PogMoThoin wrote: »

Norton is a virus, I'm sorry for being blunt but its a complete waste of €54.99 when free av programs will do a better job.

I agree 1000%. Norton and McAfee grind your PC to a halt. AVG Free is as it says on the tin and far more lightweight. Hate when I have to work on a PC that someone has Norton on it, cos you know it's gonna be sooooo much slower than if it were running some other AV.

Biggins

Sorry to say, I too agree with the others. Norton was pre 2005/6 a good application generally but after that, its turned into a nightmare usually mentioned to as "bloat-ware" amid other things.

Found it to cause far more problems than people realise. First chance you get, move to another application.

See this thread: http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055741120

Overheal

Biggins wrote: »

Sorry to say, I too agree with the others. Norton was pre 2005/6 a good application generally but after that, its turned into a nightmare usually mentioned to as "bloat-ware" amid other things.

Found it to cause far more problems than people realise. First chance you get, more to another application.

See this thread: http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055741120

Norton Security Scan usually shows up on OEM PCs - thats just nasty, nasty bloat. It does nothing! But scan, and tell you you have problems, and to upgrade to real Antivirus. Blech.

I've been using Norton IS 08/09/and now 2010 - very happily. And theyve been anal since the change to 09 about getting the footprint down to something sane.

I'll chime what others say though: If youre just using Norton Antivirus: Don't Bother. Free AV is just as good or better at the virus game. Now I find Internet Security Suite very worth it (especially when you find it for $10 per PC) Because it adds heaps more function.

As for Ad-Aware: I just ****ing hate it. Obsolete software with respect to Adblock-Plus.

PogMoThoin

Norton is completely bloated, like a sluggish car. It might do the job, but it eats cpu and ram. How much is Your Norton suite totalling Overheal?

I use and highly recommend Nod32, I barely know its there other than the tiny pop-ups I get twice a day when it updates, I don't have to run scans, its secretly scanning all the time using very little cpu and memory and it doesn't bug me every so often like Norton does. At the moment its using 2552k of memory? Yes thats right, Skype is using 20000k, msn 23000k and Steam 7492k, impressive eh?

Overheal

PogMoThoin wrote: »

Norton is completely bloated, like a sluggish car. It might do the job, but it eats cpu and ram. How much is Your Norton suite totalling Overheal?

I'll check when I get home.

It cant be a whole bunch, but id be surprised if it wasnt more than compared to a Pure AV program. Like I says: NIS2010 does more than that. It's be more fair to add it up to an AV and Adblocker a Spybot and a Firewall.

Though if you can run on less resources with freeware: more power to you. Ive learned I cant be arsed managing 2-4 different prommies :pac: that takes anti-laziness.

As for NAV2010 vss a freeware AV: Thats a good question and I'd like to see the numbers.

I use and highly recommend Nod32, I barely know its there other than the tiny pop-ups I get twice a day when it updates, I don't have to run scans, its secretly scanning all the time using very little cpu and memory and it doesn't bug me every so often like Norton does. At the moment its using 2552k of memory? Yes thats right, Skype is using 20000k, msn 23000k and Steam 7492k, impressive eh?

I dunno. Its been a while since I looked around the task manager.

We have Avast running in the Office as my preference over AVG which they had on before. Cant be bothered licensing all of the machines in the office with payware. "But Overheal thats a Home Edi-" SILENCE! They can fine us. I told my boss when I found out but at that point he told me to forget about it - his liability.

PogMoThoin

Overheal wrote: »

I'll check when I get home.

It cant be a whole bunch, but id be surprised if it wasnt more than compared to a Pure AV program. Like I says: NIS2010 does more than that. It's be more fair to add it up to an AV and Adblocker a Spybot and a Firewall.

Though if you can run on less resources with freeware: more power to you. Ive learned I cant be arsed managing 2-4 different prommies :pac: that takes anti-laziness.

Please do, I'd be very interested to know how much its using

Nod32 isn't freeware its paid for and it is a full security suite, it does everything; antivirus, antispyware, firewall and antispam (although I don't use the firewall as I have better one on my server that does the full house). There is no managing, no scanning (does it silently), no configuring (integrates itself to thunderbird/outlook), just install and forget about it................ till it sees an infected file You're downloading

Overheal

Thats about what theyre all doing now. Norton doesnt integrate into Thunderbird but it does integrate into Firefox 3+ and IE5+/Outlook with a bunch of features.


Scanning is set default as only to be done when idle and it goes into silent mode during fullscreen apps - because theres nothing like crashing out of CSS for a false positive intrusion alert. Or maybe theyre real. IDK. ****ing Hax0rs

mukki

OP you have wasted e55 on the norton scam, now what ever you do don't install it as it just makes your pc slow, you should still go ahead and install a free av


a person could make a living removing norton internet security and charging people for upgrading their pc


if you have a home pc use windows security essentials
if you have a businnes get kaspersky

make sure to run the norton removal tool and the macfee removal tool to ensure neither of them are running on your pc

FunnyStuff

Yeah Norton is rubbish, far to big a footprint even now when they have trimmed it a bit. And stay away from AVG,yeah its free but it only virus, no malware or anything else of any decency. Go for NOD32, best protection on the planet.

Overheal

@Pog: from a wake and having Firefox running:

(Symantec Service Framework)

Norton Utilities is a separate thing altogether.

I'll reboot and see what numbers I get from a clean start.

Overheal

This is after I rebooted while I went to clean the kitchen. I came back and the Idle Time Scan was using up a little over 100 meg which was unsurprising during a scan. After about 10 seconds it leveled out to thus:



So its a slightly bigger footprint than what you have Pog, but far from being a gigantic bloated monster. 2mb though is a big difference when youre on 128 Ram I guess.

The only time I notice Norton is when it picks up something during an Idle Scan or when SafeWeb thinks Im on a dodgy site or if I download an executable and the Insight popup tells me wether its trusted or not. Doing its job. Not intrusively imo. That worst was when I had Comodo Firewall...that thing needed a nanny!

On a side note I think its a Faux Pas to blame a Security Program for slower startup times. Its a bit like blaming TSA for the 3 hour boarding.

PogMoThoin

Must admit its not what I expected, but the truth is there are people I know making a living out of removing Norton and installing better free programs

LordSutch

Oh bugger, that's goodby to €54 for nothing :mad:

Overheal

Camelot wrote: »

Oh bugger, that's goodby to €54 for nothing :mad:

If you downloaded digitally you may not have noticed but on the side of the box there is a 60 day money back guarantee.

Yeah if I had only gotten AV and still had to go through the trouble of finding and Antivirus and Spyware program Id be pretty pished too. Especially for 55 squid. feck.

as it stands though, for simple Antivirus function, even Microsoft Security Essentials is a great program. Reportedly manages itself a 98% detection rate, which will easilly afford it a spot in the top 10 next year if it doesnt get hacked the **** out of.

Alun

For all the people going on about what a resource hog Norton is, whilst I agree 100% with respect to the older versions, you're actually out of date. With the introduction of the 2009 version they completely rewrote the whole thing from scratch, and as a result it's a much leaner beast altogether. Just Google for reviews if you don't believe it. It may be too late now to rescue their tarnished reputation, but it would appear they actually listened to the flack they were getting and did somehing about it.

mukki

norton 360 sucks disk

Overheal

mukki wrote: »

norton 360 sucks disk

Ive been hearing that a lot in the reviews. not sure how or why its so different aside from file backups, so its a bit strange.

Biggins

Alun wrote: »

For all the people going on about what a resource hog Norton is, whilst I agree 100% with respect to the older versions, you're actually out of date. With the introduction of the 2009 version they completely rewrote the whole thing from scratch, and as a result it's a much leaner beast altogether. Just Google for reviews if you don't believe it. It may be too late now to rescue their tarnished reputation, but it would appear they actually listened to the flack they were getting and did something about it.

I still do a lot of installs monthly and still find it a heavy resource hog to be honest, system slow down, 2009 and all.
2009 version has done nothing to change my own mind since the introduction of 2006 version and onwards.

Capt'n Midnight

TBH if you getting an internet connection or are getting a wireless box then spending some a few quid to get a router with NAT/firewall features WPA2 will get you more security than spending a similar amount on security software instead of using that freely available.

there is a download called pcdecrapifier that removes bundled crap from your machine including most try-before-you-buy security packages

How good are the best of breed free security apps ?
Many are market leaders in the corporate versions, but allow home users to use them free
All decent AV's have always claimed to recognise 99% of what is out there, the remaining 1% depends on which ones each vendor sorts out first.


Open source OS's / OSX / *nix etc. are so far ahead of windows when it comes to malware immunity that secuity add-ons just aren't an issue and so there are few windows ports and they still aren't quite up to the level of the very best windows ones. ClamAV won't scan on the fly for instance.

Norton/Mcafee and other bloated integrated security packages can take up to 30% of the cpu / I/O time on older pc's and this isn't anything new.

Smau5

Why people pay for a false sense of security, I'll never understand.
Get avast: http://www.avast.com/


8<- - - - - - - - - - - -
Snip
Please read the charter about warez

Naikon

PogMoThoin wrote: »

Norton is a virus, I'm sorry for being blunt but its a complete waste of €54.99 when free av programs will do a better job. I see a huge amount of problems every day with it bringing peoples pc's to their knees and detecting very little. Terrible, terrible software. McAfee is just as bad

If You insist on buying a software suite get Nod32 or Kaspersky

No offense, but they all suck.
Security is a process, not a cd contained in a shiny retail box.

Brain > antivirus software

mukki

Naikon wrote: »

No offense, but they all suck.
Security is a process, not a cd contained in a shiny retail box.

Brain > antivirus software

disagree

virut and sailty are nasty viruii that add themselves into exe files on your pc and usb key, so if you run an exe file from an infected usb key/download it will infect almost every exe file on your pc. infact sality copys an infected notpad.exe to your usb key and makrs it as hidden and as the open and explore autorun


your pc will be no slower, even if you have the useless avg on your pc it will work fine and not report any problems.


the best way to remove it is to format the pc, change all your passwords and credit card number, about 4 hours work

a lot handier to install a free antivirus that detects and removes virut and sality like m$ security essentials, takes about 2mins
also these virii have no effect on vista with uac on

Naikon

mukki wrote: »

disagree

virut and sailty are nasty viruii that add themselves into exe files on your pc and usb key, so if you run an exe file from an infected usb key/download it will infect almost every exe file on your pc. infact sality copys an infected notpad.exe to your usb key and makrs it as hidden and as the open and explore autorun


your pc will be no slower, if you have avg on your pc it will work fine and not report any problems.


the best way to remove it is to format the pc, change all your passwords and credit card number, about 4 hours work

a lot handier to install a free antivirus that detects and removes virut and sality like m$ security essentials, takes about 2mins
also these virii have no effect on vista with uac on

Jesus, seems like a lot of hassle to deal with this stuff.

I am glad I am sticking with FreeBSD and Linux if this is
the type of crap windows users have to put up with.

Most security exploits are caused by the user, the others by an
operating system stack which by design is mostly insecure.
Application bugs tend to cause havoc is code is not inspected.

IDS software and rootkit checkers are not perfect, but any
hardened box will withstand alot of crap out there.

Capt'n Midnight

Naikon wrote: »

IDS software and rootkit checkers are not perfect, but any
hardened box will withstand alot of crap out there.

No software will protect you from this


But with the notable exception of windows most up to date desktop OS's do a resonable job of keeping themselves secure ( keeping apps secure is another matter )

Here is the longest list of malware for OSX I've seen http://macscan.securemac.com/spyware-list/
remove the ones for classic since OSX doesn't offer the same backward compatibility as windows

first two items of malware on the list is a commercial package which costs $79.99 :rolleyes:
http://www.parental-controls-software.net/mac-keylogger-perfect-keylogger-for-mac-os-x.htm
VNC is also on the list as a piece of malware :rolleyes:

CBA checking further but I'm pretty sure more of the list contains more such scaremongering and lots more apps that have to be downloaded and installed manually.

OSX will withstand a lot of the remaining crap, but we are talking threats you could count on your fingers.


While betweens windows and other apps Spybot has 1,756,620 fingerprints of nasties


Even if the OS could protect you from a lot of this it still leaves a lot more

Windows is getting better, but it has a LOT of catching up to do