OT - Re: [at-l] AntiVirus software

[DaRedhead@xxxxxxx (DaRedhead@xxxxxxx)]

--
[ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ]
As an AOL person (shut up, Ryan <g>) I have to input on this.  While Norton
is probably a better product all around, it messes a lot of things up for me.
 AVG, a free service, doesn't do that, and appears (note I say "appears", I
could be wrong) to handle all the current viruses, with free updates when you
want them, not when Norton decides you need them, usually while you are doing
something that Norton causes to crash.

While it is true that you generally "get what you pay for", in terms of virus
protection you have to go with what works for you. I have to admit that both
McCaffee and Norton are memory users, and if you have a system better than
mine, which isn't a stretch, maybe their use of memory resources isn't that
big of a deal.

The important thing is that you do *something*.  Pay for it, or get a free
anti-virus program.  I guess it all depends on what you need to protect, and
what your system - and pocketbook - can handle.  I have both Norton and AVG
running right now - and I disable Norton most of the time because of how it
interferes with certain programs I run. This may be an AOL thing, or it may
be how archaic my system is now. I'm not sure, and I don't guess it matters.

My only advice (as a person without a degree but as a frequent computer and
'net user) is that you get SOME virus protection.  I ignored this for a long
time, assuming AOL was taking care of it. (Again, hush ;))  The first time I
ran a scan, I had about 75 viruses on my machine and didn't know it.  My
speed and performance (uh - my computers, I mean <g>) improved drastically
after I took care of that. So whether you go with the expert computer folks,
or you go with what you can get free - do something.  Because unknown to us,
as we happily go about posting, if you have a virus and don't know it, you
can cause big problems if you belong to a list, or even just have a few folks
in your automated address book.

Red