Antivirus and AntiSpyware Software

[2Channelwonder]

I've used ZoneAlarm now for 23 years since before the Check Point era when they added the anti keylogger and extra enhanced protection for Chrome users but recently there have been delays of two, four and sometimes up to six months between updates to the main AV engine added on to the customary firewall. The firewall never had any problems up until pretty much the end of last year when sometimes the entire Extreme Security program just didn't load up sometimes forcing a reboot, and it didn't matter whether I changed my account name/password/workgroup name/computer name or just plain reinstalled the whole Win10 from scratch.

So after getting stung for a full price renewal last year when I wasn't paying attention and could have had the Cyber Monday deal for 20 quid, I'm on the lookout for a trial of something different and will keep it on the new build if it does the basic job of at least loading up every time in one single boot. ZA is still valid until at least October and will stay on the old PC (if I paid full price might as well get my money's worth and run the clock down) so there's plenty of time to audition alternatives and I don't care about having Android phone add-ons either.

So what does everyone else use, for how long, and did you have to change to something else to find something your usual scanner didn't catch? Feel free to chuck in any purely anti-spyware or general anti-malware recommendations as well as I haven't tried Spybot Search and Destroy since they gave their interface a more snazzy front end, and there are almost as many free trials for general anti-malware as there are for pure AV.

[DjchunKfunK]

Windows Defender is generally considered to be up to the job nowadays making a standalone virus program mostly superfluous. I use Avira personally but mostly because I've never got round to just uninstalling it. It's fairly unobtrusive and doesn't really tax my system when running.

[Pew-Pew]

Yup, I don't think many people buy antivirus software anymore. I know I haven't bought any for years. I just use Windows Defender and occasionally will do a Malwarebytes scan.

[Wrathbone]

Yeah, I stick with Windows Defender these days. Third party antivirus software is increasingly obnoxious enough that it’s almost worse than having a virus.

At work we’re forced to use Checkpoint, including Sandblast for browsers. It’s bloody aggressive and bloody awful. Trying to fill in a web form? Prepare to wait a couple of seconds while it checks every field and prevents you from entering anything until it’s satisfied.

[Mantis]

Yup, I don't think many people buy antivirus software anymore. I know I haven't bought any for years. I just use Windows Defender and occasionally will do a Malwarebytes scan.

Pretty much the same here. Though I have Spybot Search & Destroy too and cycle between them.

[Sly Boots]

Wow, interesting. I've been shelling out £40-odd quid annually for the past five or six years for Kaspersky, which increasingly gets on my tits, so perhaps when my new system arrives I'll stick with Defender as well and let that sub expire.

[Mantis]

I don't think I have ever bought an anti-virus software package or subscription, in the 15-20 years I've used computers. Even before Windows Defender started becoming viable around about the Windows 7 time, prior to that there were always freeware options which never gave me any issues.

[Maturin]

Yeah, never paid for AV in my life. Always been free alternatives that did the job perfectly fine.

Avast has almost always been my one, although it's getting a little bloated these days.

[Pew-Pew]

Yeah, never paid for AV in my life. Always been free alternatives that did the job perfectly fine.

Avast has almost always been my one, although it's getting a little bloated these days.

Yeah, that's the problem. All the free ones (and paid ones too) just became more and more bloated over the years, and didn't really offer much of an advantage over Windows Defender. I got sick of Avira/Avast etc. about 8 years ago and haven't bothered since.

All you really need to do is get a good ad/pop-up blocker on your browser, let Windows run a scan every now and again, and not click dodgy things.

[Maturin]

Unfortunately, I do have 'moments of weakness' with my browsing habits so I've been grateful for Avast's online shield cutting in and saving me now and then.

[Pew-Pew]

Filth.

[Snowy]

I got in a rage with Avast a few years back, with its endless intrusive pop-ups. Fucked it off and have used Defender ever since.

[DjchunKfunK]

I am tempted to get rid of Avira as they have made the pop-ups twice the size recently.

[Rossell]

Avast is used for my work and the pop ups are a piece of shit.

[2Channelwonder]

Partially solved the problem recently, as I received a free trial of Malwarebytes and once I ran that first scan and it quarantined a couple of Potentially Unwanted Programs that it found dated the day after I last reinstalled Windows, I've had no more failures to Zonealarm starting up after I enter my login password. Will flip a coin over trying a different suite when ZA runs out in October but if it's happily working again I'll run the clock down and look again in the Autumn.