+1, I've used it for nearly 4 years now, couldn't be easier to renew the free license every year. So far it has saved my ass quite a few times. It did let me down once, when it let some strange virus slip through (this was on a very old, crappy laptop running XP, however, so that may be the reason) and I had to reinstall the OS.
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Common sense doesn't really work anymore.
Now you don't even need to accept a java applet for a silent driveby to get into your computer on any website.
All it takes is a website to be hacked by someone who knows silent java drivebys.
You can always disable java, but why risk a new exploit coming out, and having nothing to protect from it.
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Unfortunately although I find it amazing the developers have not released any new patches and so only those who had self made kits were able to keep it.
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You know, I really want to believe you, but the more I read from you, the more I can't help but think you don't really know what you're talking about.
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AV-Comparatives and AV-Test are proving you wrong. See my other reply. PC Mag is just quoting both of them and is doing some nice but fairly unsubstantiated math on their own.
But hey, you're the expert. If the figures from AV-Test and AV-Comparatives don't convince you, and if you think a few false positives are worse than actual malware going undetected, then please, keep using and recommending MSE.
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So your argument is, use the AV software proven to be one of the worst, because it doesn't matter anyway?
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OK, so how does that work? Is it like an auction, where the highest bidder gets a 99.9% test result, and the rest are tiered accordingly? And whatever Microsoft paid them was enough for 94% in September, but only sufficient for 92% in March?
How exactly are the tests not representative? When were they proven to be faked? Sources? Or is it just because every time something out there doesn't rhyme with what people want to believe, it must be bought and paid for, and therefore fake?
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MS Essentials is the program I normally use. Very reliable
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I wasn't very fond of antivirus, because they could be a pain in the ass, but I've been using Microsoft security essentials (search on google), and I'm very happy. Simple interface, does the job well, low RAM consumption. Try it, you might be surprised as I did.
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IF YOU'RE USING VISTA OR HIGHER: The only worthy antivirus is Microsoft's Security Essentials. It's free, and they have the greatest vested interest in you having a virus-free Windows experience.
Source: I have a masters degree in computer science and spent an entire term studying computer viruses.
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And you've seen how many times MSE tanked in independent antivirus tests. Damnit, I've used paid MS safety products before and they were crap.
If you use MSE, you might as well have nothing.
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Yeah, I hear that one every time. Truth is, these organisations have no vested interest in singling out one specific product. But if there is one product that repeatedly tanks in these tests, then something else is wrong.
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Unfortunately, zero-day is where it's at. That's where the wheat separates from the chaff. Zero-day vulnerabilities are worth actual money out there. If someone can exploit a zero-day on your PC to join it to a botnet which steals credit card data or runs DDOS attacks, somewhere out there, money changes hands. If zero-day detection is not up to scratch, the whole thing is fairly pointless.
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For the amount of system resources it uses, MSE is the best there is. Period.
But your computer is ultimately your responsibility. You don't have to take my word for it, even though I did go to university for seven years studying this very thing and am certifiably an expert on the subject. I'm sure you must know better.
(Also, I'm fairly certain "dammit" doesn't have an 'n' in it. I was also an English teacher, but I'm sure you're right about that too.)
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I also have a degree in computer science. I also have 14 years of industry experience. I have first-hand experience in using Microsoft security software, and numerous other products. Microsoft Forefront was an abomination. There is nothing that tells me that MSE is any better. If av-test.org isn't good enough for you, upload any infected file to Virustotal and see how often you get a hit from MSE.
Edit: And damn it, English is not my first language.
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MSE isn't Forefront (and for the record, the current version of MSE isn't the debut version either; it has improved dramatically). I'm sorry that you had a bad experience with one Microsoft product, but you're painting them all with the same brush.
av-test.org and av-comparatives.org ARE good enough for me, but read their full reports. MSE has ZERO FALSE POSITIVES. To me, that's a very big deal. (I had an AV find a "virus" that was actually a BSD system file)
AND it catches MORE viruses than Norton (source) AND uses fewer system resources.
MSE isn't Forefront, and if you think MSE is bad, you're just plain wrong.
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Zero false positives means nothing to me. MSE is well below the industry average in zero day detection, and a good whack below average in 2-3 month detection. That's bad enough for me. Why am I not using MSE? Simple. I don't want to take the risk.
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If it has to be free, go for Avast. If it can cost money, Kaspersky, F-Secure or Bitdefender are always among the best tested products.
Anything but Microsoft Security Essentials - don't touch that stuff with a barge pole.
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For free I would highly recommend Avast, but if your willing to pay get Kaspersky.
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if you pass so much time in website i recommend you ESET Smart Security/Nod32 because the (and for bad luck) Norton have the biggest exploits collection and its always upgrading, a virus is hard to find, but and exploit appears inmediatly with any pop-up webpage and can be more dangerous because they dont destroy computers, but they STEAL information as passwords and accounts. At least, when im in windows i trust in Eset and I never have problems. AND TRY TO KEEP JAVA DISABLE IN FIREFOX AND CHROME AND IEXPLORER.
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Javascript and/or cookies is the way internet advertisement companies (like ad-sense) use to track you. Viruses that break your programs are 20 years in the past. Todays malware mainly gathers/steals information from you.
Not to say that you can browse for days without landing on a site that have Java application, compared to 99.9% of the sites use javascript. This ofc doesn't mean to run java applications that you are not sure about.
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After looking into your recommendations, it looks like Bitdefender is the winner! --- deal! - check that coupon code :D
I won't purchase it immediately, so if anyone has any opinions/information to add about Bitdefender, feel free. And I'll leave this thread open for anyone else who might have similar questions.
Thanks!
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AV-Comparatives latest On-Demand test from March 2013 shows Symantec behind MSE by a whopping 0.8%, with 91.2% and 92% detection rates respectively. Both of them are at the bottom of the list, while Bitdefender is sharing rank 4 with Bullguard, eScan, Panda and Emsisoft, with a detection rate of 99.3%. So while MSE may be marginally better than Symantec in this test, both of them are still more than 7% behind Bitdefender.
It should also be mentioned that in September 2012, the same test had MSE at 94.9% detection rate (still way down the bottom end of the results table), while Bitdefender had 99.2%.
AV-Test.org's Windows 8 test from Jan-Feb 2013 uses Windows Defender as a baseline - MSE is not there. Every tested product save one beats the baseline for protection.
Your link for false positives does some nice math, but fails to elaborate why FPs are such a horrible thing. The test used 136610 samples, the worst number of absolute FPs was 38. That's a whopping 0.02%. Myself, I'd rather have a program give me a false positive than not detect a file that's an actual issue.
If, based on these figures, you still want to recommend MSE over Bitdefender, be my guest. You're the expert.
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I've been using Avira Free Antivirus for a few years. It's quite light, have been consistently in the top zone of av-test for some years now, it's updated daily and actually finds stuff from time to time.
The single drawback is that you get prompted with an ad window sometimes (once a day I think... I close it automatically without even realizing at this point).
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Comodo Internet Security is pretty much the best one I've used in 15 years.
It is very advanced, yet also mighty confusing & complicated to the unfamiliar. But definitely the best.
Features everything $50+ internet security software do and more. AND ITS FREE!
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I use MSE. It does the job and I've had no complains with it thus far.
I've heard that ESET NOD32 is just as good. Can anyone elaborate on it? Pros/cons?
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I have been using Microsoft Security Essentials for a couple years now with no problems.
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Im not sure if this still works but you can get bit defender for free with a free 1 year subscription http://www.techolac.com/free-one-year-license-for-bitdefender-internet-security-2013/
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I'm currently using Norton Internet Security (got it free with my new computer a while back). I only have 11 days left though, so it's time to find something new. (I meant to ask this sooner, but keep forgetting)
I've used NIS for a few years now and I've never had any problems, however I'd like to find a good free software that works just as well or better.
What would you guys recommend?
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