(rant) Anti-virus Software
<div class="IPBDescription">What do I need viruses for?</div> I've really had it with anti-virus software. Today I figured I ought to scan my entire hard drive incase some nasty surprises might have slipped in through mail. This should be a simple *click*-*click-*scan*-*results*-operation, right? Well, not anymore, it seems.
I fired up Trend PC Cillin, of which I have a registered version that came with my Asus A7V333 motherboard. Upon startup the software informed me that I had some sort of a virus on my computer. Naturally I got frightened and decided I ought to make a full scan to make sure that nasty bug won't spread any further. Alas, PC Cillin decided to crash before it started up properly. After trying to make it work for 15 minutes (the pop3trap froze every time it started, crasing the entire program), I finally managed to start the HD scan. To my surprise the program decided to freeze mid-scan and repeated retries of the procedure produced the same result each and every time.
"Okay", I thought, "PC Cillin sucks. There's gotta be a better alternative."
I started Netscape and headed to Tucows, where I found the latest Norton AV waiting to be downloaded. After downloading I ran the setup, which informed me that since I have PC Cillin installed, Norton will not finish the install. It kindly requested me to remove the offending software. I would have done so, but Cillin's uninstall froze every time and would not complete, no matter what. So, no Norton AV for me and back to the drawing board.
Next I attempted to reinstall PC Cillin and actually managed to get it to work. When the scan was finished some 20 minutes later, no trace of the virus was found. Hoorray. On top of this, when I rebooted the computer, Windows started giving me BSOD upon login. Booting to safe mode and uninstalling PC Cillin (yeah, the uninstall finally worked without crashing) helped, but now I was left without any AV software whatsoever. And lo, Norton will STILL NOT INSTALL, claiming that PC Cillin still exists on my computer.
On a side note, I would have dumped both programs and switched to F-Secure AV, but the memory-resident part of that program always casts the stasis spell on my computer. If it wasn't so sad, it would be funny watching a mouse cursor lag on a 1,5GHz Athlon. So, in conclusion: Viruses have never, ever caused me as much harm as these conflicting pieces of binary feces did today.
Okay, rant ends here. Does anyone know any AV software that actually works?
I fired up Trend PC Cillin, of which I have a registered version that came with my Asus A7V333 motherboard. Upon startup the software informed me that I had some sort of a virus on my computer. Naturally I got frightened and decided I ought to make a full scan to make sure that nasty bug won't spread any further. Alas, PC Cillin decided to crash before it started up properly. After trying to make it work for 15 minutes (the pop3trap froze every time it started, crasing the entire program), I finally managed to start the HD scan. To my surprise the program decided to freeze mid-scan and repeated retries of the procedure produced the same result each and every time.
"Okay", I thought, "PC Cillin sucks. There's gotta be a better alternative."
I started Netscape and headed to Tucows, where I found the latest Norton AV waiting to be downloaded. After downloading I ran the setup, which informed me that since I have PC Cillin installed, Norton will not finish the install. It kindly requested me to remove the offending software. I would have done so, but Cillin's uninstall froze every time and would not complete, no matter what. So, no Norton AV for me and back to the drawing board.
Next I attempted to reinstall PC Cillin and actually managed to get it to work. When the scan was finished some 20 minutes later, no trace of the virus was found. Hoorray. On top of this, when I rebooted the computer, Windows started giving me BSOD upon login. Booting to safe mode and uninstalling PC Cillin (yeah, the uninstall finally worked without crashing) helped, but now I was left without any AV software whatsoever. And lo, Norton will STILL NOT INSTALL, claiming that PC Cillin still exists on my computer.
On a side note, I would have dumped both programs and switched to F-Secure AV, but the memory-resident part of that program always casts the stasis spell on my computer. If it wasn't so sad, it would be funny watching a mouse cursor lag on a 1,5GHz Athlon. So, in conclusion: Viruses have never, ever caused me as much harm as these conflicting pieces of binary feces did today.
Okay, rant ends here. Does anyone know any AV software that actually works?
Comments
Why let viruses erase your hard drive when you can do it yourself, for free!
Should do it.
Should do it. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Did that already. Add/remove didn't help and there were about a billion registry entries. I removed them but Norton still won't love me. *Sigh*. **** you PC Cillin, and the pig you rode in on!
Thats the same thing, just bundled with more useless Cr*p.
<a href='http://housecall.trendmicro.com/' target='_blank'>http://housecall.trendmicro.com/</a>
Pure anti-virus, no frills, no crashing.
Honestly I just went through some simmiler stuff (upon getting home sometihng decided to start screwing with me)
few things:
1) do you have a firewall? if not I would suggest getting one (mine consists of a Linksys router that stealths all my comps)
2) honestly, you really should have some sorta virus scanner, and PC cillin is a good one. It sounds like something borked in your comp (would be amuzing if it was from a virus). I honestly would sugest a reformat (if you have time/patience/honest need for it)
I recently ran Housecall on my comp and cleaned it up and am now waiting for my dad to get me a copy of PC Cillin (I sorta forgot to reinstall my virus stuff last time and I normaly get it for free from my college, but I am now at home and can't)
oh well, good luck man, try running housecall though (I might bork on you, it took me ALONG time, if it seems to freeze up give it a few it might just have hit a large file or something)
Honestly I just went through some simmiler stuff (upon getting home sometihng decided to start screwing with me)
few things:
1) do you have a firewall? if not I would suggest getting one (mine consists of a Linksys router that stealths all my comps)
2) honestly, you really should have some sorta virus scanner, and PC cillin is a good one. It sounds like something borked in your comp (would be amuzing if it was from a virus). I honestly would sugest a reformat (if you have time/patience/honest need for it)
I recently ran Housecall on my comp and cleaned it up and am now waiting for my dad to get me a copy of PC Cillin (I sorta forgot to reinstall my virus stuff last time and I normaly get it for free from my college, but I am now at home and can't)
oh well, good luck man, try running housecall though (I might bork on you, it took me ALONG time, if it seems to freeze up give it a few it might just have hit a large file or something) <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Housecall works perfect for me, And it wont screw up your comp <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif'><!--endemo-->
The particular move you're showing us there is called the "Microsoft".
"Virus found and identified. Please restart to finish removal."
...
"Deinstall of Windows complete."
I recently ran Housecall on my comp and cleaned it up and am now waiting for my dad to get me a copy of PC Cillin (I sorta forgot to reinstall my virus stuff last time and I normaly get it for free from my college, but I am now at home and can't)
oh well, good luck man, try running housecall though (I might bork on you, it took me ALONG time, if it seems to freeze up give it a few it might just have hit a large file or something) <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--Thansal+--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Thansal)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->1) do you have a firewall? if not I would suggest getting one (mine consists of a Linksys router that stealths all my comps)<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yeah. I have the Norton Personal Firewall. I believe in sufficiently protecting my costly DSL connection, especially when I run file sharing programs.
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->2) honestly, you really should have some sorta virus scanner, and PC cillin is a good one. It sounds like something borked in your comp (would be amuzing if it was from a virus). I honestly would sugest a reformat (if you have time/patience/honest need for it)<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
PC Cillin seems to have nice features, like the autoupdate. It just has never worked well on this comp. I installed it first about a year ago and the scanner's subprograms seem to be very crash prone on my system. I don't know why, though.
Oh, and either Trend's products just hate me or Housecall doesn't like my Netscape. I've installed the software it asks but the page still says it's not installed. Dunno why.
Well, I hope to have enough money next month to buy another 40GB HD. Then I can finally get rid of this Win98 piece of crap and install a fresh Win2k in its stead. I'd install the 2k on top of win98, but since the system registry of this comp has been in use since early 2001, and this thing has hosted 2 motherboards and a plethora of odd software, I'll be happy to start with a fresh install. Might give me some extra speed too.
Oops! Our daily virus pattern file update from Symantec that gets pushed to 6000 PC's had gotten corrupted but still passed CRC and was pushed out. Now we are just finishing up figuring it all out, getting a replacement virus definition that does NOT cause blue screens of death, and having me write a utility to run out and wake up hundreds of PC's, fix their anti-virus definition, and shut them back down. All over 56K frame relay connections! oh wait, did I say 56K? I meant 16K that burst to 56K! Sometimes!
AAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!!!
Scinet, yah, I tihnk it is time for a reformat/reinstall
Personaly I like doing a clean sweap when ever I do an upgrade, simply b/c I am odd, and also b/c it tends to make oyur ocmputer run better.
Oh and as for installing one OS over another, hehe, bad move. I have seen way tomany problems when people tried ot 'upgrade' their OS, it just dosn't seem to work.
I am assuming that you have a legal version of PC Cillin, if not pick one up and have it on standby to install once all is good.
So yah, go to your local comp store, find the largest spool of CDrs for te least amount of money and start burning back ups of everything (at the same time find all of your installers)
/me pokes MonsE what is the 'best' personal virus scaner out there? I have grudges against Mcaffy and all things nortan (exept NCD for dos, but thats a diff story <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif'><!--endemo-->) so I personaly go with trenmicro's stuff.
Oh and for all people who have a good firewall up go to <a href='https://grc.com/x/ne.dll?bh0bkyd2' target='_blank'>shields up</a> for a quick laugh (just the description of stealthed <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif'><!--endemo-->)
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Your computer at IP:
24.90.125.42
Is being 'NanoProbed'. Please stand by. . .<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->21 FTP Stealth! There is NO EVIDENCE WHATSOEVER that a port (or even any computer) exists at this IP address! <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<img src='http://home.attbi.com/~charlie-yasuda/pics/virusadmin.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image'>
*EDIT* yes I am very unhelpful.
when you need a quick virus scan, just head here.
Thats the same thing, just bundled with more useless Cr*p.
<a href='http://housecall.trendmicro.com/' target='_blank'>http://housecall.trendmicro.com/</a>
Pure anti-virus, no frills, no crashing. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
you son of a... beat me to the punch