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Windows Security Essentials
JavaJones:
Cool, thanks for the info. Looking forward to Avast 5! Is there any news on when it might be released publicly?
- Oshyan
grandpastan:
I tried it out a couple weeks ago. It really screwed up my comp. Maybe because I have a LOT of progs installed. Maybe coincidence. I don't know. All I know is I had to uninstall it and am still trying to straighten things out. I am running XP SP3
Bamse:
I think I have seen mid-November as a goal, pretty sure october was first date missed. Check current situation at their beta forum http://forum.avast.com/index.php?board=15.0 I bet mid/late December. Remember it is brand new program so quite a few minor bugs. And behavior blocker not enabled yet. Main functionality seem stable. Some risk when testing of course but try it out if in the mood. You can install/uninstall MSE without reboot, think it also goes for Avast. Or search Youtube for "Avast 5" if curious about new look.
Will be interesting to see what Avast meant when they said version 5 was "compatible" with MSE 8) As a min. it must mean both can be installed (regardless of what MSE advice) - but only one resident towards filesystem. Why declare compatibility if program is not used? Perhaps finally some real use of all those modules and options in Avast. If MSE is resident then Network/webshield shield could work. I believe they have started with IP blocking now, always nice to have. Just Avasts bootscan will be nice addition to MSE. Will soon work on 64 bit, still some 32bit leftovers. There will be much testing going on once it is officially released.
grandpastan, I hope you mean Avast 5 and not MSE. Check beta-forum for possible solution to whatever problem is/was, can't remember any evil alpha bugs with this but who knows.
IainB:
Re: Updates to Microsoft Security Essentials virus profiles
If you are running this anti-virus proggy, then you will probably have seen in the "Update" tab of its control window that it says:
"Microsoft Security Essentials updates your virus & spyware definitions automatically to help protect your computer"
--- End quote ---
I read a Lifehacker post yesterday about how someone had written a proggy to force MSE to update its virus profiles on a regular basis. That would seem to be a redundant app. They apparently thought that MSE only updated with MS Update, and that if you had not got MS Update on auto, then your virus profiles would not get updated. That looks like a wrong assumption, as MSE seems to persistently attempt auto-update (if connected to the internet) if its virus profiles are >24 hours old. If it has not been able to connect to the internet and update, then after >24 hrs elapsed, it's systray icon goes a reddish-brown colour (normally, it is green) and if you open the control window there is more of the reddish-brown colour and it says its virus profiles need updating, so you can reconnect to the internet and then press the "Update" button to force an immediate update.
Feedback so far: I have only good things to say about MS with their MSE. I have had it running for a while now, and it is fuss-free and has cleaned out 5 bits of malware that Avast! had not found (as reported above). The only fault I could find in it is that it occasionally overloads the CPU, but then it does not seem to insist on taking foreground priority in the queue so, though the CPU might briefly overheat, there are no appreciable delays in the foreground response time.
IainB:
A Peek at MSRT November Threat Reports - here.
By continuing to include new variants of the existing threat families, the MSRT has removed malware from more than 1.5 million machines three days after its release on 10 November. This month we’ve also added Win32/FakeVimes and Win32/PrivacyCenter to the MSRT detection and have removed these new rogues from more than 110,000 machines.
--- End quote ---
I just emailed the feedback bit (above post) to MS at their MSE website. They probably don't need the feedback. Whilst I was there I saw the above (quoted). Read the rest of it at the link - it makes for pretty interesting reading. There's also on that site a link to Windows 7 consumer security software providers
That lists all the well-know anti-virus apps, including Avast!, AVG, etc.
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