Antivirus for Windows

[spencerhs5]

Hi all,

I've been using Ubuntu for the past couple years now so I'm a bit out of the game as to what I need to install on someones XP system to keep them current.

Looking for:
1) Free
2) Protected

Thought AVG free would do the trick but the PC contracted "XP Antispyware 2012" Virus last night- what a pain that was to remove!

Is there a combination that needs to be run? Malwarebytes? SuperSpybot? Ad-Aware? AVG Free? Avast? etc.

I just dont know which are the better ones around right now.

Thanks for the input.

[Chronus]

I use Avast and it seems to work pretty well. I got one virus but I was able to clean it up fairly easy. CNET just listed their favorite free anti virus software and it included Avast, AVG, and Panda Cloud.

Here is a link that has reviews for all three of them:

http://download.cnet.com/security-st...b_content;main

[DaveF]

I'd use microsoft security essentials and malwarebytes.

[panther]

If the system has a legal version of Windows, I recommend Microsoft Security Essentials. To my knowledge, it won't run on pirated copies of Windows. I've never had a problem with it and regularly recommend it to friends. Used to use AVG but it got bloated, though they could've improved it by now. Avast seems to be decent too.

Malwarebytes won't protect against spyware in real-time unless you buy the software. I'm not sure that any of those free programs do. It's good to have one of them and scan the system every now and then.

Friends recommended Microsoft Security Essentials. I haven't had any problems with the laptop that has run it for a year (nor the one that has run it for a day) but we don't use that laptop all that much, so not a conclusive test.

I can say that it's not annoying, and doesn't seem to prevent stuff I want to run from running. Oh, and it's free, of course.

[ahow]

I generally go with Microsoft Security Essentials. MalwareBytes for cleaning up a mess if you get something nasty.

[Brad Gile]

Originally Posted by ahow

I generally go with Microsoft Security Essentials. MalwareBytes for cleaning up a mess if you get something nasty.

I totally agree. MSE is (1) free, (2) uses minimal resources, and (3) is quite effective. For many years I used paid Norton (which became a pig over the years), AVG, and others.No app is perfect, but none of these paid apps stood up to MSE.

[Brad Gile]

Originally Posted by ahow

I generally go with Microsoft Security Essentials. MalwareBytes for cleaning up a mess if you get something nasty.

Thanks, ahow. I just added MalwareBytes Pro to my arsenal.

[Mojo]

Microsoft Security Essentials +1.
It is not just quite effective, it is top ranked and free. I guess all that experiences of plugging Windows security holes and receiving insults from Apple/*nix crowd really helped.
If MS wants to, it could really put the hurt on Norton and Mcfee with big time promotion on MSE. But they don't.

[Colonel Smoothie]

Woaaaaah they're still using XP?

As an Ubuntu user, did you try convincing them to make the switch to Linux?