Norton security suite good?

[Neurodilation]

My opinion only: I still don't believe you know anything about Norton's capabilities and are just boasting about your IT background (why, I don't know.) I am very, very picky about the products I use...settling on any particular AV suite is an ongoing deliberate process where I've audited pretty much everything.


Now more to your points:
Even if Norton Enterprise solutions use a ton of resources, the consumer version does not. Also I don't buy that a small gain in effective threat reduction is worth trading away better resource usage, compatibility and ease of use...not when businesses are prepared to restore ghost images to eradicate malware infestations.

Here is a snapshot of the two Norton processes in my Task Manager.



That's a resource hog, eh? If you want I can snapshot Resource Monitor too. In terms of disk activity, those processes usually sit at zero unless there is a new file being scanned. <1% CPU, 12MB RAM, zero disk access...I'd like to see proof that Norton is anything other than a well-behaved background daemon.

Like I also said, the right solution for you isn't the right solution for someone else. That's why I named 5 different AV suites, each better at certain things.

Free: Comodo, BitDefender Free
Easy to use: NOD32, Norton
Fast: NOD32, Norton, Comodo
Resource usage: NOD32, Norton, Comodo
Advanced options: BitDefender, Kaspersky, Comodo
Compatibility: Norton

I use Norton because my ISP provides it for free and my previous selection (Comodo) broke. I suspect I might use it even if I did have to pay for it. I have considered going back to truly free options like Comodo, Panda, Sophos, etc., but honestly a year of Norton can be purchased on sale or after rebate for the cost of a fast food lunch. If/when Norton breaks, I will likely switch to something else. Inertia will keep me using it until then.

I'll actually do the right thing in this discussion and admit that perhaps in its current incarnation on your computer and at least some others that Norton doesn't hog resources, screw with system stability, and slow things down to a crawl. Perhaps Symantec's corporate solution really is just that far behind its breaking-edge home virus protection technology. But that's where my admissions stop.

Why do I mention my credentials? To give credibility to what I say. It's people who have credentials and who work in the industry and write the reviews on these products that function as sources of information. It gives people a lot more of a reference when I and others in this thread state our background rather than just saying things like, "I look into this stuff a lot and am meticulous about what I use on my computer." So are we! We just have more than that behind our opinions. I'm not sure whether you're being purposefully ignorant and argumentative when you say that you'd take a higher failure rate of virus detection over other cosmetic issues. I'm not even sure why you're still focused on garbage like ease of use and compatibility anyway. These are non-issues. Let's not be dishonest and try to state otherwise. And let me tell you, re-imaging computers is a pain in the ass and a last resort when getting rid of viruses. Aside from backing up and restoring a user's files, they complain if anything at all even looks different including placement of desktop icons and shortcuts. So no, I would rather have a solution that detects more viruses than one that tries to trumpet useless non-issues as reasons to use it and makes more busy work for me.

Opening up my AVG and looking at its resource usage shows very similar picture to what you're showing from your Norton. So the way it seems to me is that maybe we better both get off the resource usage train and focus on the important points here. I already gave you that maybe Norton fixed its years-old home virus scanning software to the point that it's at least usable.

I'm glad you get Norton free. Not everyone does. I will continue to never recommend any paid AV solution when there are equal or better free options out there. But hey, you keep dismissing all the IT people in this thread in favor of your superior Google skills.

[Deleted]

Hey, Vess mentioned 3 extremely sophisticated worms, which by the way gets mentioned every single "security thread" he is in, therefore MSE must be as good as anything else even though it's lacking. Perhaps we shouldn't be using those sophisticated worms as a measurement?

Besides the zero-day protection which you say don't matter there is also things discovered in the last 2-3 months and malware removal in MSE is atrocious. That it comes with Windows 8 doesn't make it any better or worse, just slightly more convenient.

And lowest impact you say? The main reason MSE is doing well performance wise is because it's not doing anything. Seriously Bitdefender (that I use) might be slowing my boot time by roughly ~2 seconds, that's something I can live with.

@Kodoku

As far as I know you don't know Kidsafe's background, so maybe chill with your condescending "Google" remark. Also we are not talking about AV only here but a total solution, so "AVG free AV vs a complete solution" is kinda pointless. Getting one "set and forget", non-intrusive, all in one solution for $20-40 might not be for everyone but personally I don't see the big deal, after all you paid maybe $800-1600+ for your system. Of course if that amount will break your budget, make you go hungry or you simply prefer getting/installing X different programs of your choosing then by all means go for it.

Edit: I thought this was funny considering the whole worm discussion https://www.facebook.com/bitdefender...88656297819705

[vesseblah]

Hey, Vess mentioned 3 extremely sophisticated worms, which by the way gets mentioned every single "security thread" he is in, therefore MSE must be as good as anything else even though it's lacking. Perhaps we shouldn't be using those sophisticated worms as a measurement?

If all heuristic scanners failed for years it means those aren't really effective against zero day threats.

Besides the zero-day protection which you say don't matter there is also things discovered in the last 2-3 months and malware removal in MSE is atrocious.

MSE is about as good or bad as any other free AV program to catch known viruses that are going around. What it doesn't find is new variants to old threats but as I said before those don't really matter as long as you keep OS patched. New variants work only against people who never update anything, or people who are running pirated windows and can't update anything.


For me it's really simple: I choose to take zero advertising popups (MSE) because there's about one in a million chance some other free program would find a virus in a fully updated system that neither NoScript or MSE can see before it hits me. I had something free starting with an "A" in use before but the advertising and startup time got on my nerves really badly. Somebody else might choose to be little bit safer and get popups, and that is their choice to make.

[Deleted]

If all heuristic scanners failed for years it means those aren't really effective against zero day threats.



MSE is about as good or bad as any other free AV program to catch known viruses that are going around. What it doesn't find is new variants to old threats but as I said before those don't really matter as long as you keep OS patched. New variants work only against people who never update anything, or people who are running pirated windows and can't update anything.


For me it's really simple: I choose to take zero advertising popups (MSE) because there's about one in a million chance some other free program would find a virus in a fully updated system that neither NoScript or MSE can see before it hits me. I had something free starting with an "A" in use before but the advertising and startup time got on my nerves really badly. Somebody else might choose to be little bit safer and get popups, and that is their choice to make.

Already touched on the zero day threat, not sure why you keep using the argument, hoping eventually people just give up?

Did you see the link I provided you? Duqu ~September 2011, Bitdefender "Win32.Duqu.A that tripped a heuristic", October. That's not "years later".

As for MSE, again we are not talking about "other free AV programs", we are comparing to a paid for "Security Suite". Torrented Windows can be updated as well but that's probably not a discussion for this forum. There are zero advertising in the security solution I have, yes if you compare to other free options you're probably right but that's really not what we are debating is it. You can just say Avast or AVG or whatever you're referring to with "A".

Of course everyone is entitled to their own opinion and they can choose whatever security solution they want and feel comfortable with but to go as far as saying Norton (which the topic is about) is worse than having a virus, it's a huge memory hog etc. that's just silly and show lack of knowledge. (Not directed at you Vess)

[Twoddle]

Of course everyone is entitled to their own opinion and they can choose whatever security solution they want and feel comfortable with but to go as far as saying Norton (which the topic is about) is worse than having a virus, it's a huge memory hog etc. that's just silly and show lack of knowledge. (Not directed at you Vess)

I feel I have to chime in again here. Opinion is only as far as anyone can go in this area, everyone has lack of knowledge.

But saying that Norton is worse than having a virus isn't actually far wrong in the grand scheme of things. Viruses and anti-viruses are two sides of the same coin and many viruses were and are written by the same people who write the anti-viruses. The UIs have quite similar characteristics in many cases.

Have you wondered why the vast majority of viruses and malware are actually benign and do no damage to your computer or data? That's because their main purpose is to make people install an anti-virus engine and perhaps purchase the full version. It also boosts statistics for the latest AV charts. Why doesn't anyone ever get malware that completely destroys a hard disc or corrupts random files without telling you? You hardly ever hear of that, you could write some seriously bad stuff. Some AV developers (can't mention names) openly admit to releasing malware into the wild in order to put their AV engines to the test, it's no secret.

[Metallikiddd]

Really, can you elaborate on this?

Like someone said bursts in HDD activity. Also uses a ton of memory. I've noticed this with Vista, HDD always spinning and too much memory being used up.

[Deleted]

Like someone said bursts in HDD activity. Also uses a ton of memory. I've noticed this with Vista, HDD always spinning and too much memory being used up.

Is this "burst of activity" slowing your system down noticeable? Like how much CPU power is it draining?

How much is "tons of memory"? Can you screenshot it please?

People have 4GB and probably closer to 8GB RAM on average, if Norton is draining so much memory it's using it all up or making other programs suffer because of it then there is some memory leak or a corrupt installation. So far the only proof I see in this thread is proof of it running just fine.

<Bunch of stuff...>

Alright I'm done with this topic, now you're mentioning conspiracy theories and what not. Lets not get all paranoid here. Sure you can mention the names of these devs, go right ahead. Of course there are hackers that release stuff just for the sake of testing various solutions but those are not malicious. Believe what you want and keep spreading the misinformation that Norton is worse than having a virus, good luck with that. Hopefully the thread will die out quick.

[Neurodilation]

@Kodoku

As far as I know you don't know Kidsafe's background, so maybe chill with your condescending "Google" remark. Also we are not talking about AV only here but a total solution, so "AVG free AV vs a complete solution" is kinda pointless. Getting one "set and forget", non-intrusive, all in one solution for $20-40 might not be for everyone but personally I don't see the big deal, after all you paid maybe $800-1600+ for your system. Of course if that amount will break your budget, make you go hungry or you simply prefer getting/installing X different programs of your choosing then by all means go for it.

Edit: I thought this was funny considering the whole worm discussion https://www.facebook.com/bitdefender...88656297819705

No I don't know his background. But when all you do is say that you "research things" and then knock other people who even mention that their knowledge comes from a professional history, I'm going to assume the worst.

So I'll keep having the discussion I'm having, and you can take your white knight act somewhere else.

[Deleted]

No I don't know his background. But when all you do is say that you "research things" and then knock other people who even mention that their knowledge comes from a professional history, I'm going to assume the worst.

So I'll keep having the discussion I'm having, and you can take your white knight act somewhere else.

Not a single reply to any of the relevant (relevant to the topic) parts of my comment to you. You're more worried about coming across as being condescending, know it all, "look at me I have IT experience" than actually providing useful information regarding this topic. I think it's great you have IT experience and peace be with it but please stop acting like a jerk, "white knight" comment pfft get out of here.

[Twoddle]

Alright I'm done with this topic, now you're mentioning conspiracy theories and what not. Lets not get all paranoid here. Sure you can mention the names of these devs, go right ahead. Of course there are hackers that release stuff just for the sake of testing various solutions but those are not malicious. Believe what you want and keep spreading the misinformation that Norton is worse than having a virus, good luck with that. Hopefully the thread will die out quick.

I didn't say that Norton is worse than a virus I said that it's not wrong for someone to suggest that it is because viruses and anti-viruses are two sides of the same coin. There are ulterior motives at work.

And no I can't mention any names because naming and shaming is against the forum rules and I'm not taking any chances.

[Neurodilation]

Not a single reply to any of the relevant (relevant to the topic) parts of my comment to you. You're more worried about coming across as being condescending, know it all, "look at me I have IT experience" than actually providing useful information regarding this topic. I think it's great you have IT experience and peace be with it but please stop acting like a jerk, "white knight" comment pfft get out of here.

Lol. It's amusing watching you revert to ad hominems. Oh yeah, I'm just flinging my expertise everywhere willy nilly and not addressing any points. Go back and read my previous posts. I've already said what I had to say about the actual topic and don't feel the need to repeat it for you. One thing I will say is the more people like you and kid attack people who mention anything about having credentials, the more insecure you make yourselves look. Just stop. The only ones obsessed with that aspect of this discussion have been you two. The rest of us who have made any mention of it only have so that people could understand where we were drawing our opinions from.

Anyway, back on topic, we're all discussing AV solutions here. Maybe you're sub-discussions have morphed to include "complete solutions" and not just virus scanners, but the OP was not so specific. He asked a general question about Norton being a good AV to keep his PC safe. Splitting hairs on semantics isn't making your position any stronger. Besides, I hadn't taken issue with anything you said before you decided to step in and white knight for kid. I'll tell you the same thing I told him. I'm glad you don't think anything is wrong with Norton. I think based on its history and its cost/comparison with today's free solutions that it isn't worth it. I have also personally seen it miss more viruses than any other AV solution. Anecdotal as that may be, it matches the experiences of many others. At a certain point, observations that are corroborated multiple times become worth mentioning.

Use what you want, and I'll do the same. As far as I'm concerned, there is little left for us to discuss.

[Defengar]

Norton AV is like a person planting their entire yard with poison ivy as a burglar deterrent. A bigger hassle for the property owner than any thief.

I typically don't use paid AV, but my new computer came with a free year of Kaspersky AV, and I gotta say its pretty good. Uses hardly any resources, especially when your not doing a full scan, and unlike norton, it doesn't fuck your computer while updating, and it has a nice safe money feature for those of us who do a lot of online banking.

[vesseblah]

Did you see the link I provided you? Duqu ~September 2011, Bitdefender "Win32.Duqu.A that tripped a heuristic", October. That's not "years later".

September 2011 is almost year and half after Stuxnet was outed. That's year and half until heuristic scanner found a variant of already known virus. At that point it should be trivial for heuristic scanners to pick up any and all Stuxnet variants, but it didn't pick up the third variant Flame. All three of those were probably released at the same time over five years ago.

Torrented Windows can be updated as well but that's probably not a discussion for this forum.

I've personally seen Windows XP activation crack getting destroyed by installation of SP1 (all leaked VLK's were blacklisted at that time), and at least one paid AV program removing the hacked activation files as a virus.

[noteworthynerd]

I'm gonna go ahead and close the thread at this point. We've gone from answering the OP's question, to pedantic arguments, to conspiracies about who programs viruses.