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Thread ID: 80886 2007-07-08 07:46:00 Anti Virus Decision Jill Harrington (12529) Press F1
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566951 2007-07-08 07:46:00 My annual subscription to McAfee Internet Security is about to expire on 11th July. I'm a home user and would like some advice by you experienced people out there as to whether AVG Free Home Edition is sufficient, as long as I install Zone Alarm and Spy Bot, or as per information in the June PC World Magazine what is Avast like and is the free version for home users enough?

Any information or advice would be welcome. McAfee has been fine, but it's so expensive on an annual basis.

Thanks.
Jill Harrington (12529)
566952 2007-07-08 07:50:00 AVG home is perfectly fine, as is Avast Home which is also free. It is also advisable to use FireFox or Opera web browsers as opposed to Internet Exploder as the ActiveX in IE tends to let a lot of crap onto your system.
I use AVG on XP Pro SP2 with Adaware and Spybot and I use Firefox as my browser of choice. Comodo firewall which is free is also a good option.

Welcome to PF1 :)
winmacguy (3367)
566953 2007-07-08 07:50:00 I am very happy with AVG Free Edition....as long as you do scan....especially if you have a six year old computer like mine :D! zahmad (8963)
566954 2007-07-08 07:53:00 Try Avast Home ( . avast . com/eng/avast_4_home . html" target="_blank">www . avast . com)

Or AVG Free (http://free . grisoft . com/)

Both are free . They maybe pretty basic tho .

You could try Zonealarm ( . zonealarm . com/store/content/home . jsp" target="_blank">www . zonealarm . com)

Or Comodo (in my sig below) which is free .

Zonealarm is free, BUT to get more out of it, I think you have to pay for it .

Depending on the version you download .
Speedy Gonzales (78)
566955 2007-07-08 08:22:00 what is Avast like and is the free version for home users enough?

Avast has been my anti-virus of choice for several years . I much prefer it to AVG and highly recommend it .

With regards to Zone Alarm the the latest free version is a 39MB download because it includes Zone Alarm Security Suite . Installing the security suite is optional but you still have to download the whole thing even if you do not install it .
FoxyMX (5)
566956 2007-07-08 08:32:00 I stopped paying for anti virus software on my old PC about 4 years ago after a friend put me onto AVG, Ad aware and Spybot. Using a decent web browser helps somewhat too. winmacguy (3367)
566957 2007-07-08 08:39:00 And if u get Zonealarm Sec Suite, its not compatible with Avast (Pro), so I found out.

As the virus scanner in ZA is Kaspersky, and will conflict with Avast.

So, u cant turn the virus option on in ZA.
Speedy Gonzales (78)
566958 2007-07-08 10:15:00 Avast and AVG are absolutely great and very easy to set up and use but if you are willing to pay, there's nothing like NOD32. beeswax34 (63)
566959 2007-07-08 10:53:00 I use System Suite 7 from Avanquest, which cost $55. I has a firewall and uses Trend Micro AV apart from being a really good utility suite. Also use Counterspy + Adaware + Spybot. Downloaded some music from Limewire, today and one wanted me to download a "codec", when I played it, but my Av picked it up straight away.
System Suite 7 comes with 3 serials and two are used on my dual boot XP Pro & Vista HP. If you do an operating system re-install the old serial won't work. That's where Acronis comes in very handy.
Fishb8 (484)
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