Norton, Kaspersky or McAfee?

[square1]

Avast for many trouble free years. Some IT guru talked me into switching to MS Security Essentials, my PC became infected within 6 months. One I got my PC working again I went back to Avast and I have no intention of switching again.

 

[wcampbell47]

I have had extremely good luck with AVG Free running with Malwarebytes Premium. I have been running this combo for more than 5 years with no serious infections. No annual renewals with AVG Free and Malwarebytes is a one time buy with regular updates.

 

[jim44]

I had Kaspersky for a couple years, and it seemed to do alright. Only problem I ran into was communicating with them when I ran into some difficulty or had a question. There was no way to contact them that I could find. Probably would not be a problem if one was fluent in russian. May have improved by now. I have McAfee now, and I guess it works. Seems that pretty much any website I open is a threat to my computer, according to their "test". And I have yet to come up with a password that is not weak and insecure. These notifications are done by way of pop-ups, which are really beginning to wear me down.

 

[Bird]

Norton was the first antivirus I ever heard of, and I used it for many years. But I dumped it when Charter Communications offered their Charter Security Suite (F Secure) at no additional cost. But I recently had a phishing attack that I couldn't get rid of; had to let Best Buy's Geek Squad do it. So I signed up for their protection plan which includes Webroot Anywhere for 3 devices. I also bought an additional HP laptop yesterday and installed Webroot Anywhere on it this morning. However, the new laptop came with a trial version of McAfee and I haven't found a way to uninstall that from Windows 10, so I'm going back to Best Buy today for them to get rid of McAfee and the trial version of Office 365 that's on the new laptop. Then I'll install Office 2013 for Hone & Students, which is what I'm using on the old computer.

 

[Soundguy]

If I get Kaspersky, which level should I get?

they, I think, now offer av, internet security, and a total package. IMHO.. I'd at least go middle ground with the internet security. that gets their firewall and malware program.. etc. safemoney browser app.. etc.

 

[kco]

I went with Internet Security package because I did not want, or was using alternatives for the Total Package.

Contrary to jim44's difficulty in contacting Kaspersky I had no problem about 1 year ago when I contacted them about pricing (they matched a Staples online update price). I have not contacted them with technical questions which may be an entirely different experience.

I have had success for technical questions by just "googling" the error. Most recently it was a persistent message telling me my software was not up to date when it was.

The Kaspersky renewal process is a bit frustrating. It warns you to renew about one month prior to the current license expiration. When you do renew, it issues a new license code while keeping the existing, about-to-expire, old one. It does not simply extend the old license, so you loose the remaining time. Also, it continues to warn that the old license is due to expire, even though you are now running under the new license. It can be confusing (as it was for two of my neighbours) to continue to get the warning messages even though running under a new license. Perhaps one could get a refund or credit for the remaining original license if they contacted Kaspersky, but I did not bother. The problem can be fixed by updating closer to the original license's expiration date. A better system would be to simply add the new license time to the original license like most software companies do.

I do think Kaspersky is a good product but have no experience comparing it with other products other than McAfee a few years ago. From the anti-virus evaluation site I posted above it looks like McAfee has improved since then and there are several good products. It also looks like the variance between products has become smaller than a few years ago.

 

[Soundguy]

Just wait to add the license. When I got my new one, I didn't activate till needed

 

[truckdiagnostics]

Kaspersky is a Russian company out of Moscow Symantc/Norton is an American company out of California, and near as I can figure publicly on New York stock exchange? The Russians are the ones that have Stolen and are continuing to steal all the unlock codes for you name it. So, it would stand to reason they would have the best software. I will stick with an American company thank you.

 

[boggen]

norton and mcafee = scam for your money. not worth it.

AVG, kaspersky... out of the 2, bigger fan of AVG,

i prefer some sort of software firewall as well. beyond wireless router firewall. and AVG antivirus + firewall seems to work good with each other.

the pctuneup of avg. not much of a fan of it. (came with last 2 packages) and i end up installing it and then going through the pctuneup settings and disabling all the features.

my family cleanup computer tools are
"hijackthis" i forget right off hand from correct website to download
and "spybot search and destroy" from safernetworking .org? or .com? i want to say .org
between the 2 normally can identify multi virus family computers have been infected with. top of the list norton / mcafee the computers need to be format reinstalled much more quicker than when i have installed AVG on them.

we are talking about kids / teen computers. and all the crud / sites they end up on. from @orn to hacks / cracks to everything else. AVG still miss's some stuff. here and there some how. like every antivirus software. but avg seems to keep up with stuff *shrugs*

 

[IXLR8]

I find Norton and Mcafee to be system hogs, really slowed things down. Norton use to load itself in the root directory and it was about impossible to completely get rid of. I ran AVG for a while until it got bloated like Norton and limited options. I have been running Avast for the last 5 years, free version, and have not had any issues. I have read reports that Kaspersky has had some malware built into it and being from Russia I wouldn't touch it.

 

[rgr33]

Computer came with McAfee, didn't work well with other programs, absolute pain to try to get it uninstalled, kept running in the background,even after I thought it was finally gone for good.
Used AVG for years, liked it, but wished for something just a little better. Tried Avast, really like it, very active, not a space hog, does the best job of all I've tried. Still like AVG, it's in a solid second place.

 

[rgr33]

Computer came with McAfee, didn't work well with other programs, absolute pain to try to get it uninstalled, kept running in the background,even after I thought it was finally gone for good.
Used AVG for years, liked it, but wished for something just a little better. Tried Avast, really like it, very active, not a space hog, does the best job of all I've tried. Still like AVG, it's in a solid second place.

 

[techman]

Here are some "comments" on McAfee from John McAfee

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKgf5PaBzyg

paul

 

[kcflhrc]

+1 for Avast, works fine.

 

[truckdiagnostics]

FYI, Avast is coming out of Czechoslovakia so for all intense and purposes it is Russian.

 

[kco]

FYI, Avast is coming out of Czechoslovakia so for all intense and purposes it is Russian.

Czechoslovakia is no more, but the Czech Republic & Slovakia are both NATO members.

 

[davesl708]

I ran Norton for years then ran Norton and Comodo at the same time. Comodo caught stuff Norton did not.

 

[Redneck in training]

FYI, Avast is coming out of Czechoslovakia so for all intense and purposes it is Russian.

I was born a lived half of my life there. We used to love to hate Russians. Even most commies hated them because they had to kiss their a**es. Both Czech Republic and Slovakia rushed to NATO to isolate themselves from Russia as much as possible. So to say Avast or anything produced there is Russian is simply wrong.
In fact Kaspersky is Russian. I remember when the company started making antivirus about 20 or so years ago. They would give you scanning software that found lot of viruses that other antivirus "missed" on you computer. The truth was that all those viruses detection were fake making Kaspersky better than the rest. It eventually blew up in their face.

 

[meos1]

I ran Norton for years then ran Norton and Comodo at the same time. Comodo caught stuff Norton did not.

You should only run one at a time.

Users at TBN may want to review the following Microsoft article: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/129972 (How to prevent and remove viruses and other malware) **Please note*** This article is aimed at the home user. Commercial defense is handled much differently in some cases. The article provides guidance on configurations and techniques. You should proceed with caution and if you are uncomfortable, consulting a reputable technologist is recommended. As will all DIY type projects, the potential exist to do irreparable harm. Data loss can occur.