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Does reliable PC security have to cost money?

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iphigenie:
I guess it depends on what you call "cheap enough"

Apart from bitdefender and avira we are talking £60/year/machine on many of the top ones. Not quite feasible if like me you keep many machines for testing, faffing around with.
Also feels a bit pricey for my mum etc.

icekin:
Well, after iphigenie's tips on layered security, I downloaded and tried almost all those programs (and some others). I've gone with a solution of AVG Anti-Virus + AVG Anti-Spyware + AVG Anti-Rootkit Scanner. I also have Spybot S&D for a weekly scan with IESpyAds to block bad sites.

I tried SpywareGuard, SpywareBlaster and Winpatrol, but didn't feel they added anything extra to the AVG suite + Spybot S&D. I am also hoping that using all products from one company (Grisoft) will eliminate any conflicts between the programs. What I could have really used would have been a second Anti-Virus solution, but that causes conflicts except with ClamAV (without the Winpooch). So, now I've got ClamAV Portable installed and set to do weekly scans, but I think this will be mostly useless since ClamAV is always behind (even Avast is faster) when it comes to updating definitions. Its really only good as an anti-virus for a UNIX machine where viruses aren't really a concern.

Darwin:
Thanks for the tip about ClamAV, icekin. Not sure if I'm going to risk it (YEARS of repeating the mantra about not running two AV solutions together have programmed a severe startle response in me at the mere thought of it) but it's nice to know that it's possible. If I want a second opinion, I just use an on-line scanner - BitDefender or TrendMicro. I still have a valid licence for AVG Pro and wish I keep it installed to backup Webroot's AntiVirus with Spysweeper (yup, they changed the name). Sophos provides the engine and definitions for Webroot and it's not let me down yet (fingers crossed, knock on wood).

Darwin:
PS - went the Webroot route about three months ago for similar reasons to icekin's decision to go with Grisoft: I wanted a suite that worked seamlessly together and sought to reduce resource overhead. Price was right too - $10 for two years as an upgrade to my existing SpySweeeper licence!

iphigenie:
A lot of people have 2 AV solutions. The trick is you can only have ONE active as a resident, on-access scanning and use the other one only for full scans every night.

People who want the absolute best spend a lot of time on places like the wilders security forums and have multiple solutions for everything, own licenses to several av and switch around which one they use as the resident solution as the flavor of the month changes... They try to use the one they think is best as up-front detection for the resident one, and the one which is best at disinfection as the full-scan solution...

I think it is overkill, as I am rather careful by nature, but on a shared pc where some teens or children might bring their friend's USB drive then it might just be a good move.

For most of us, we can stick with one.

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