Switch to McAfee from AOL, Avira, or stay with AVG?

I'm planning to reformat my laptop soon and start fresh. With this, I'm considering switching antivirus programs. No particular reason, really, except maybe to see if I've made a good decision by sticking with AVG. Kind of a "Is the grass greener on the other side" kinda thing

Here's what I use right now:

PC Tools Spyware Doctor/ThreatFire-I'll probably keep these two regardless of what antivirus I choose, since they work so well.

Windows Firewall-If I choose McAfee, I'll probably turn off Windows Firewall. Anything else-It will stay on.

AVG 8 Free

Haute Secure-I'll probably keep this too.


Here's what I'm thinking about switching to/or keeping:

I'm leaning a bit toward McAfee (Link to info page) because it has a two-way firewall that (hopefully) wont be as "chatty" as Comodo but more secure than the one way Windows firewall. AV Comparatives ranked it's AV way behind both AVG and Avira though, and, even though it's a newer version than the disasterous "upgrade" that turned my Mom's Dell into a dog before AVG-I'm still worried about a performance hit.

Avira-It's test results are quite impressive, leaps and bounds ahead of McAfee and just a bit ahsead of AVG and a lot of people here seem to like it. I have a few questions though-Does it scan files as they are being opened, (real time protection) etc. like AVG or McAfee, or do you have to manually invoke a system scan for it to find anything? I'm also pretty sure that it doesn't scan incoming/outgoing e-mail like AVG/McAfee does. Is scanning e-mail a serious issue today or am I just being paranoid by wanting it. I view my e-mail in Outlook 07 BTW.

AVG-I've used it for a while and it seems fine. I like that it has an email scanner but i'm annoyed that the new version's integrated Anti-Spyware flags cookies as serious threats and that it "finds" adware entries in my registry from IE (even though I never use IE-and Spyware Doctor along with ThreatFire find nothing of concern)

I don't know if these are false positives or what (the scan results always display that nothing was found but when I click the "Warnings" tab it shows all the "items")

I just wanna see what you guys think-I really respect your opinions , am I fine with what I have now?

 

Avira hands down for anti-virus protection. Yes, it has an active protection function that scans files when opened. In a sense, lacking internet email protection isn't that big of a deal. What I mean is that anything you download from your email, once you open it, if it contains anything bad, Avira will pick it up and stop it. So you kind of have email protection.

AVG, frankly, I'd avoid it at this point. If I was going for a back-up scanner, I'd use Avast (well I do use Avast as my back-up).

I didn't like PC Doctor when I used it way back when, perhaps it's better now. When I used it before, it drastically slowed my system down when its active protection was on. I also like SuperAntiSpyware, A Squared, and Malwarebytes Anti Malware more than any other anti-spyware programs I've tried.

Never heard of Haute.

I'd say keep Comodo (defense+ off since you have threatfire) and let it settle down before deciding to uninstall it. Comodo, as with most firewalls, should calm down after its learning process is over.

 

Hi.

I have moved to Avast after years of using AVG.

Avast Free, even stops websites trying to installing spyware in their tracks.

Regards

John.

 

I took a look at Avast-how does that compare to Avira?

Thanks for the help so far
Ricky

 

Avast scores a bit lower than Avira.
It has antispyware integrated, much options for modular installation (only install what you will use) and an email scanning option.
Options that Avira lacks.
Avira's active protection however will also scan every email you open (if you use an email client).

 

Hi.

Avast scans your emails too, I tried Avira and did not like it.

Regards

John.

 

I advise to just stay away from McAfee. I seriously rather not having an antivirus than installing Norton or McAfee.

I suggest to use Avira and keep your antispyware.

 

AVAST has never let me down. I recommend it.

 

Now I'm definitely leaning toward avast. I'll try it for a bit before i reformat. Thanks everyone

 

Hi.

If you dont like the way avast looks download a new skin!

http://www.avast.com/eng/skins.html

Regards

John.

 

i usually recommend Nod32, but its not a freeware

 

LOL. That's one of the first things I did. I changed it to the Vista skin-It looks much better, and easier to navigate.

One question though: Is there a way to make it's icon in the notification area stop spinning? It can be a bit distracting.

 

That's the VRDB building, when the notebook is idle.
You can set yourself when it should build or not.
Cheers.

 

Yeah, whoever designed Avast!'s default skin needs to get fired.

It's great that you like Avast!, but I would try out Avira too. I liked Avira more because of it's low RAM and CPU usage and it's fast scanning.

 

Great post, i fully agree.

 

Okay time for an update on my experinence: it appears that Avast and PC Tools ThreatFire really dont like each other, esp. during ThreatFire's Scheduled Scan. It's doing it's thing right now but both cores of the CPU are maxed out and I can immediately tell a difference literally as i'm typing this, I have one IM (trillian) open, Firefox 3 and WMP open but not playing and I can type out the sentances in this post faster than they appear on screen. The fan is also on high, something that almost never happens outside of a BIOS update. Also, the music on a website i'm visiting stutters to the point of, well, pointlessness. I wonder why this is occuring as the VRDB is done building.

I've lowered the protection level for each "On-Access module" back to "Normal" from what I had set it to upon install "High" hasn't appeared to do anything.

Time to uninstall this puppy... unless someone can figure out what is happening?

 

Let the lappy sit overnight untouched to complete the ThreatFire scheduled scan. This morning it was still slow and still had high CPU usage. I forgot to mention that Power Management was set to "High Performance" during this.

Uninstalled it just now, big difference, it's feeling snappy again. I'm going to try Avira now.

Thanks to all who are responding

 

Try Avira and get back to us!

 

I wouldn't run the AV part of ThreatFire (maybe only for an incidental on-demand scan if deemed necessary).
Just use the AV program you have installed whether it's Avast or Avira.
It seems more people experience slowdowns though with the Avast/TF combo atm according to the TF forum; link.
If you had TF running a scheduled scan resulting in high CPU usage, it would make no difference if you changed the module settings in Avast.
TF is still an excellent behavioural blocker imho. Keep an eye on the TF forum admin's aswers if you're adamant about using the Avast/TF combo.
Cheers.

 

Hi.

AVG shot itself in the foot with v8.0 , I had the now infamous 25.000 false warnings with AVG.

I now use Avast and COMODO firewall.

Regards

John.

 

Yep, already installed it and have noticed a big difference even when the scheduled ThreatFire scan is not occurring. The whole machine feels faster, CPU usage is hovering between 0 and 30% (using the "balanced" power profile) Even browsing webpages is faster, without the noticible lag that occurred before with Avast!. So Happy

To be fair, and to ensure that i've made a good choice, I'll start a ThreatFire scan while Avira is active with my standard programs open (Firefox 3, Trillian, FeedDemon and Outlook 07) to see how things change "under pressure"

I agree, my confidence in AVG really went down with the false warnings, so many updates and still not fixed, that's my main reason for looking for a new program. I can't be confident in such a crucial computer security program that wants to delete things willy nilly.

 

New update! I'm typing this with Avira's real time protection turned on and TF running a Full Scan-same scan as the scheduled one before. I'm in "balanced" and no lag at all, CPU's not pegged at 100, excellent performance.

I can live with this, Consider me switched!

 

Hi booboo12,

i'm Avira user too
I have install on my computer Avira Premium + ThreatFire and its works great without any lags or high CPU usage.

Additionaly i install to this configuration this software:
- BOClean
- Comodo Memory Firewall
- Comodo Firewall Professional

... and its still works very well


Regards,
Peter