Need a simple Antivirus without all the extra crap

I ran AVG for years but it is no match for Avast.
Go here:

http://www.avast.com/


and download the correct version for your OS.

You'll be glad you did.

Once I stopped laughing....I had to reply...I have written TEST virus that can walk right through avast...Avast, like Norton and McCaffe are...well just sad. I have used it, and found it to defy the laws of physics...it sucks and blows at the same time...Avast...I just cannot stop laughing...thanks I needed a good laugh.
Have a happy new year.

No antivirus application is perfect, and each will detect viri differently based on their definitions. Thus, while your test virus may not be caught by Avast, others may miss it as well, and Avast may catch something that others miss. While each AV test will produce different results (based on what malware the tester purposefully installs and the definition version of each AV), clicking here will give you one recent example. That particular test determined that KAV Antivirus was the most effective if finding and removing the installed malware, with a 99.88% accurracy rating. Norton was second with 99.41%, McAfee came in at 98.19%, and Avast batted at 91.06%.

However, I'm careful not to use the word 'best' anywhere in the comparison, as what makes a good antivirus is not simply the efficiency rating of one test. Other factors include how much the program takes up in the way of system resources, how easy it is to learn to use, how much it can be customized, how fast it scans your hard drive, how quickly the company issues updates after a new virus is released, and how helpful, the level of customer support, and the 'bang for the buck.' Avast may not be the most efficient according to most tests, but the fact that it's free, fairly easy to use and customizable, reasonable on system resources, and able hold its own against most malware is enough to earn it the title of "best" for some.

John


P.S. The laws of physics were defied and changed long ago when the didgeridoo was created by the ancient Australians.

Well said. Very well said. you are correct. The reason that I recommend AVG in the first place was because it is simple, has low RAM usage, and just down right a pleasure to run. Granted there are many other AV's out there and I do tend to get in a snit over certain things. The perfect AV is like finding the perfect lover or a comfortable pair of underware. What works for some, does not work for others. So hats off to you, and have a Happy New Year.
thanks!

First, as you stated, it wasn't designed to detect all viruses therefore it doesn't..It was designed as a stand-alone tool to remove ONLY certain viruses which are listed at the download site below:

http://vil.nai.com/vil/stinger/

SEcond, Stinger doesn't scan e-mail or downloaded files or anything else as "Real time" antivirus tool. Using it as the only only onboard antivirus program will certainly put your computer in danger.

Third, You stated: "And the kicker of it is, it's not even any more effective than the likes of AVG." Although I agree with your point about McAfee's virus scan being a resource hog, (and it's certainly a sufficient reason to NOT run McAfee) I have yet to find an unbiased review which indicates AVG is better at detecting viruses than McAfee. McAfee's virus scanner is still among the top four or five virus detectors around and far exceeds AVG in detection scores.. See below for just one unbiased test:

http://www.av-comparatives.org/seiten/ergebnisse_2005_08.php

And personally, I prefer Avast over AVG..It's good on resources. It's easy to use and it scores better on most tests than AVG..Just my opinon though...

Hope this helps.

Grif

The person expressed a desire for no-frills AV program. Stinger is pretty much the ultimate in no-frills AV.

Point three of yours was in relation to McAfee VirusScan, and you're reading it the wrong way. I was saying VirusScan's effectiveness isn't so much greater than AVG that it warrants the huge overhead that comes with it.

The reason I don't like Avast, is they seem to spend more time worrying about the interface of the scanner then anything else. I've never before seen a virus scanner that has a skinnable interface. Who cares? How often are you going to be looking at the thing, that such a feature makes a difference? AVG6 was god awful looking, like some sort of Windows 3.1 mutant interface. AVG7 isn't a whole lot better, but I almost never see it, so it doesn't bother me. It just sits there doing its thing.

Without waxing too much philosophic, everything humans do and create is biased, period. The idea of an unbiased review is a nice thought, but that's all the more it will ever be.

If that's the case, then you definitely need to remove one or the other. You haven't described EXACTLY which version of Norton was installed, but you should be able to clean out ALL of the newer Norton versions by following the steps in the link below:

How To Uninstall Norton AV and Internet Security 2004 & 2005 (SymNRT)
http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039?Open&src=&docid=2001092114452606&nsf=nav.nsf&view=docid&dtype=&prod=&ver=&osv=&osv_lvl=

By the way, if you're referring to NAV32.exe running constantly, then it's most probably a virus (NOT Norton) such as the one at the link below:

Yaha.j
http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/yaha_j.shtml

By your description in this last post, you'd rather be infected with viruses, exploits, and spyware than run the computer with appropriate security programs. Antivirus scanners are designed to scan your computer in ''real time'' and that means during start up. And YES, it does impact your machine a little. It's your choice as to whether you want that to happen.

If that's the case, then uninstall all your antivirus programs and only run online scans..Unfortunately, as you've seen, you WILL get infected using that procedure but it's entirely up to you. The problem with your general tact...the viruses and spyware of today will slow down your computer till they're unusable. Oh yeah, And if you happen to be on a network with friends or relatives, don't be surprised if YOUR machine starts infecting theirs.

Hope this helps.

Grif

No AVG is uninstalled, i did have both installed at the same time though, but norton was completely disabled.. or as disabled as i could get it.

The NAV32 process only starts up when i try to look at certain sites or install new ActiveX controls. It doesn't run all the time.

I never get any major viruses or have any problems with not running an antivirus program. I avoid certain sites and know what emails not to touch, so maybe that's why. If any big new viruses come out i'll download the one little program designed to get rid of that, and it's done. Don't have to worry about most exploits if i update windows on time.

I think the shell scanner or somethin of Norton, and the norton script blocker, are still running cause one way or another they're processes i can't get rid of.

I guess there aren't any simple virus scans. I just don't see the point of scanning everything constantly and living in paranoia on my computer. There's no point for an email scanner and blocker, a script blocker, shell scanner, resident scanner, and just allllll these programs that are going to eat up half my RAM and CPU, stop me COLD when i'm in a good match of UT or somethin, and just be generally pointless.... because i just don't get viruses. I have my router NAT firewall, Windows Firewall, and when somethin goes wrong i'll grab a virus scanner and go lookin for the viruses. Oh and i use Spybot and Ad Aware.

What's the worst that'll happen? I get a bad virus i can't get rid of. So what, i have backups of everything. I'll use the reformatting discs the computer came with and then restore all my stuff i have saved to my cds and dvds. I can even scan the cds and dvds for viruses before i put them back on here. Easy. But if i go the antivirus route, i have a SLOW *** startup because it scans every time the computer starts, opening my email is going to be a drawn out process, i'm going to have processes running out my *** and eating my cpu and ram up, and every little step i take on the computer has to be scanned and screened and made ABSOLUTELY SURE...... that's it's -safe- for my computer, when the real thing downing my performance is NOW the ANTIVIRUS program ITSELF...... o_O I do almost nothing but play games on my computer, and when i'm going one-on-one with some guy and my antivirus program decides it's time to scan somethin for no reason and i skip and die... it really pisses me off ya know? So Mr. Antivirus Scan, did you find anything? "No." Yeah and you haven't found anything the last 896 times either have you? "No." Half the games i play won't run right with an antivirus program installed, and all the tech support people and players i talk to have always told me to disable or uninstall my antivirus programs. They're more trouble than they're worth. So what if i'm completely open to viruses. Let them have my computer, i'll reformat the hard drive and rebuild everything i had in no time.

...every other internet user suffers the consequences of your computer's lack of virus/trojan/spyware protection. (You previously mentioned 47 exploits on your computer.) Read about "Zombies" and such and as I mentioned before about your machine infecting others, as a "System Admin" in my place of employment, you wouldn't be allowed to use your computer on our network. Thousands of our computers could be infected (damaged or unworkable) by your machine simply by being on the network with the single unprotected computer. Hopefully, you recognize the internet isn't much different.

It's much like an individual who's a typhoid carrier that frequents large, crowded areas simply because "I feel fine".

It's your choice...Good luck..

By the way, you stated: "Half the games i play won't run right with an antivirus program installed". I don't know of a SINGLE game that won't function WELL with an antivirus program installed. Yes indeed, games will perform much better with the antivirus disabled.(Like many others, I also recommend TEMPORARILY disabling AVP's when playing a game.) But that's a temporary thing and shouldn't cause an issue with virus infections..

Hope this helps.

Grif

Grif

The first thing i do with a new computer is disable any kind of antivirus crap. Same with my brother. Same with my nephews. Same with my girlfriend. Same with evry friend i've known. I really doubt anyone's "suffering" because i'm not using "computer protection" (omg, sue me). Just because i connect to someone through... aim... or yahoo... or msn or anything like that, doesn't mean i'm giving them my viruses. Those programs have virus scans built in, and scan everything that goes through them. Same with most everything else. Programs aren't made so that all my viruses can just magically pass to everyone i come into contact with on the internet. It's not comparable to an air-born virus being passed to other people, it's more like an STD. No one's going to get it unless we have nothing at all protecting our computers, or unless the computers are very closely connected. But the same goes for everyone else about me spreading my "disease." What if someone else isn't using an av, or (oh no what will i ever do) what if their virus program doesn't catch the virus, and i get it somehow. Most Likely, it's a pathetic little virus that's not going to do much to me. Yeah there's bad viruses but you're most likely not going to get them unless you're downloading or opening emails. Yeah i'd probably have antivirus on all the computers at work if i was you, but that's only because the way those people use those computers. If i'm at school or work, i'm just not going to care WHAT happens to that computer. It's not my money, it's not my problem. Someone else is going to fix it for me.

My point is, the worst thing that could happen to me.. is not something i'm particularly terrified of. If somehow i could spread it to other people, then those people should have virus programs if they want to avoid that. That's why people get them usually, cause they don't want viruses. Not because they're looking out for everyone else. So let the few people like me that don't want those damn programs eating up their performance and would rather just scan every now and then instead of scanning everything that happens on the computer, let us be vulnerable and share our viruses amongst each other. If i happen to get somethin bad, i'll reformat. But i don't want everything i do on this computer being choppy or slow because maybe once this year something will happen to my computer that will force me to simply reformat, and be done with it. Viruses just don't happen to me, so an av program isn't that important. I run spyware programs cause spyware actually DOES SOMETHING to my computer (like slow it to a crawl), and i don't want that spreading around cause it's annoying and about 2 years ago, i thought i'd never be able to use the internet without my computer being trashed. That's threatening. The viruses i'm likely to actually GET aren't. So i have some viruses on my computer now, i'll get something to get rid of them and that'll be that. 47 little exploits over almost 2 years isn't bad. What are they doin to my computer? nothin, hasn't effected me at all. But man i tell ya, not runnin those av programs for 2 years has definitely made things smoother *kicks back and relaxes*

I love these guys.

I've been running NAV since the late 80s, now running 2005. Absolutely zero problems, at least none I didn't cause myself.

I often wonder what is on their machines. 99% of the time the machines are so full and hosed up with junk, that you probably couldn't write a DOS command. Then they complain that an AV program won't run. Don't they realize that these AV programs HAVE to run in the background to be effective, and having 14 programs running in the taskbar, and 60 in the background just might have an effect on performance?

I've fixed too many machines (not mine) and that's my take.

would rather use DOS...and to a point you are right..having crap running in the background can and will slow a machine down..and as far as AV vs AV the more it has running the slower the machine. Correct? All of my experience (4 years of Norton) I just came to loath it.
sorry. I am an AVG fan now and always will be.

I also run spywareblaster and zone alarm and firefox is my browser. My puter never gets sick. Cheers.