Which Anti-virus software do you use ?

tortoiseNhare · 14th December 2009, 19:04

My office pc (WinXP SP3) has been infected. It had a regularly updated installation of Avast Home. Today I noticed explorer.exe trying to send mails to unknown addresses in the background and Avast trying to block them. But then explorer.exe must have been infected. When I checked the virus database version in use I was shocked to see one dated July 2007. It seems that some malware first stopped the automatic update and replaced the newer virus database by the an older one. I tried Malwarebyte to clean up but without much success. Any solution?

vaisakhr · 14th December 2009, 19:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by tortoiseNhare

My office pc (WinXP SP3) has been infected. It had a regularly updated installation of Avast Home. Today I noticed explorer.exe trying to send mails to unknown addresses in the background and Avast trying to block them. But then explorer.exe must have been infected. When I checked the virus database version in use I was shocked to see one dated July 2007. It seems that some malware first stopped the automatic update and replaced the newer virus database by the an older one. I tried Malwarebyte to clean up but without much success. Any solution?

The most effective solution is to reinstall your system. Since the infection is deep a re installation is recommended. Also use some other antivirus program, it may help but not sure. (try zone alarm, I've 3years of experience with it, very good program

)

jassi · 14th December 2009, 19:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by tortoiseNhare

My office pc (WinXP SP3) has been infected. It had a regularly updated installation of Avast Home. Today I noticed explorer.exe trying to send mails to unknown addresses in the background and Avast trying to block them. But then explorer.exe must have been infected. When I checked the virus database version in use I was shocked to see one dated July 2007. It seems that some malware first stopped the automatic update and replaced the newer virus database by the an older one. I tried Malwarebyte to clean up but without much success. Any solution?

there is a reason why such stuff does not happen on linux and no its not security by obscurity

anyways i am not solving your problem here, am i!

bullboy · 14th December 2009, 20:01

I'm using avast home for past 3 years or so . I update it manullay as auto update might not work always.No problems till now.

NutsNBolts · 14th December 2009, 20:48

WIn 7 with ESET NOD32 4.467 AV, Outpost Firewall, AdAware Pro. No infections since last one year, thankfully.

dockap · 14th December 2009, 20:58

tried out several anti virus programs in the past few years finally using avast home from last 3 years its the best one all you have to do is register for free on the avast website and they will send you the serial for free

lejhoom · 14th December 2009, 21:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by tortoiseNhare

My office pc (WinXP SP3) has been infected. It had a regularly updated installation of Avast Home. Any solution?

One solution is to try the free nod32 virus scan.

In all probability you had not registered your Avast, hence the program lagged behind. Even though it is a free program, it needs to be registered for effective functioning.

Good Luck

rauldsouza · 14th December 2009, 21:19

Mc-Afee seems the best to me. Its used in our office Desktops and laptops too. Keeps our 16K terminals virus free.

navan49 · 14th December 2009, 22:27

I used Norten, Macafee, Avast, kaspersky and now I am using a Bitdefender 3 users version. It works well. The virus which Kaspersky could not clean is cleaned by Bitdfender,

aaggoswami · 14th December 2009, 22:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by navan49

I used Norten, Macafee, Avast, kaspersky and now I am using a Bitdefender 3 users version. It works well. The virus which Kaspersky could not clean is cleaned by Bitdfender,

From what I have experienced, Kaspersky is not the best. It works well initially, but gradually eats resources.

Bitdefender is one of the best. As long as it was there in my father's PC, no issues. Kaspersky is more affordable but I am not sure of latest prices.

Free versions will not be as effective as fully paid version, but of all free versions/trials, I think AVG is the most effective.

SirAlec · 15th December 2009, 00:29

^^^ AVG is a memory hog. Uptil 7.5 it was a greatest AV beating even the expensive Mcafee then.

Kaspersky needs some maintainance. You need to clear temp and resudual files from time to time.

and for the price i feel Kaspersky is the best ever. only problem it never tells you what its doing. Its acts with little user intervention. which is good BTW for layman.

aaggoswami · 15th December 2009, 11:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by SirAlec

^^^ AVG is a memory hog. Uptil 7.5 it was a greatest AV beating even the expensive Mcafee then.

Kaspersky needs some maintainance. You need to clear temp and resudual files from time to time.

and for the price i feel Kaspersky is the best ever. only problem it never tells you what its doing. Its acts with little user intervention. which is good BTW for layman.

Yes, it slows down PC and after a couple of months, the PC startup and performnace suffers more. Even with 3GB RAM this happens.

Kaspersky has a mind of its own, and that is why I dont like it. I am doing disk fragmentation and this Kaspersky utilizes resources for its own work. And maintenance is something one has to do if Kaspersky is there, but that individual brain hits me.

tortoiseNhare · 15th December 2009, 15:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by jassi

there is a reason why such stuff does not happen on linux and no its not security by obscurity

anyways i am not solving your problem here, am i!

Only reason why I haven't deleted the Windows partitions is that it is a licensed version. Ubuntu is doing just fine in the other partitions.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tortoiseNhare

My office pc (WinXP SP3) has been infected. It had a regularly updated installation of Avast Home. Today I noticed explorer.exe trying to send mails to unknown addresses in the background and Avast trying to block them. But then explorer.exe must have been infected.

My question, can I delete the infected explorer.exe, accessing it from Linux and replace it by the same file from a healthy pc to get rid of the infection?

benbsb29 · 15th December 2009, 15:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by SirAlec

Kaspersky needs some maintainance. You need to clear temp and resudual files from time to time.

and for the price i feel Kaspersky is the best ever. only problem it never tells you what its doing. Its acts with little user intervention. which is good BTW for layman.

Kenden, i have been using Kaspersky since the past two years, and although i have used CCleaner to clean out the temp files occassionally, i didnt realize that Kaspersky demanded the same. why do you say we need to clean 'em periodically?

aaggoswami · 15th December 2009, 16:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by benbsb29

Kenden, i have been using Kaspersky since the past two years, and although i have used CCleaner to clean out the temp files occassionally, i didnt realize that Kaspersky demanded the same. why do you say we need to clean 'em periodically?

Kaspersky stores a lot of temp files. I was able to free up 1.8GB of disk space by removing those files.

14th December 2009, 19:04	#481
tortoiseNhare BHPian Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Guwahati Posts: 536 Thanked: 90 Times	My office pc (WinXP SP3) has been infected. It had a regularly updated installation of Avast Home. Today I noticed explorer.exe trying to send mails to unknown addresses in the background and Avast trying to block them. But then explorer.exe must have been infected. When I checked the virus database version in use I was shocked to see one dated July 2007. It seems that some malware first stopped the automatic update and replaced the newer virus database by the an older one. I tried Malwarebyte to clean up but without much success. Any solution?
	() Thanks

14th December 2009, 20:01	#484
bullboy BHPian Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Trivandrum Posts: 613 Thanked: 107 Times	I'm using avast home for past 3 years or so . I update it manullay as auto update might not work always.No problems till now.
	() Thanks

14th December 2009, 20:48	#485
NutsNBolts BHPian Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Jammu Posts: 817 Thanked: 41 Times View My Garage	WIn 7 with ESET NOD32 4.467 AV, Outpost Firewall, AdAware Pro. No infections since last one year, thankfully.
	() Thanks

14th December 2009, 20:58	#486
dockap BHPian Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Mangalore Posts: 873 Thanked: 518 Times View My Garage	tried out several anti virus programs in the past few years finally using avast home from last 3 years its the best one all you have to do is register for free on the avast website and they will send you the serial for free
	() Thanks

14th December 2009, 21:19	#488
rauldsouza BHPian Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: Bangalore Posts: 108 Thanked: 47 Times	Mc-Afee seems the best to me. Its used in our office Desktops and laptops too. Keeps our 16K terminals virus free.
	() Thanks

14th December 2009, 22:27	#489
navan49 Senior - BHPian Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: CHENNAI Posts: 1,000 Thanked: 73 Times View My Garage	I used Norten, Macafee, Avast, kaspersky and now I am using a Bitdefender 3 users version. It works well. The virus which Kaspersky could not clean is cleaned by Bitdfender,
	() Thanks

15th December 2009, 00:29	#491
SirAlec Senior - BHPian Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: zxc Posts: 3,393 Thanked: 727 Times	^^^ AVG is a memory hog. Uptil 7.5 it was a greatest AV beating even the expensive Mcafee then. Kaspersky needs some maintainance. You need to clear temp and resudual files from time to time. and for the price i feel Kaspersky is the best ever. only problem it never tells you what its doing. Its acts with little user intervention. which is good BTW for layman.
	() Thanks