Fixing Kaspersky / Better antivirus?

[anon5123]

So for a long time now, I've been having issues with Kaspersky Antivirus eating up CPU. Out of nowhere, it'll suddenly start using 25-50% CPU, and there seems to be absolutely nothing I can do to stop it.

I open it up, and it's not doing anything. No scans, no updates, nothing...yet it's using 50% CPU. Closing the program does nothing, the process is still in the process list. Can't kill process because it's under SYSTEM, so I just get a "access denied" error. I brought this up on the Kaspersky support forum, and after talking with one of the support reps, the solution seemed to be updating my graphics drivers or something; can't really remember what, but it did fix the problem...for a few months, now it's happening again out of nowhere.

Only reason I'm using Kaspersky is because my college gives it to students for free; are there any other good antivirus that won't randomly eat 50% of my CPU for no reason? Only thing I really use it for is scanning downloaded files that I'm not sure about, just to make sure they're not a virus.

[Nami]

I used Kaspersky before and it always used way too much memory for no apparent reason. I never figured out how to fix it so I ended up switching to ESET NOD32 and I've never looked back.

[unbound]

I went with Webroot SecureAnywhere AntiVirus after I was done dealing with Kaspersky's program. It is very fast, very lightweight, and has been well-rated for a number of years now.

[Kuntantee]

avira free does the job perfectly well. When I was using windows, I never had problems in terms of both performance and security.

[Acidbaron]

360 total security seems to be one of the better free suites these days for more premium services i use ESET their security suite.

[Twoddle]

They all have their quirks and disadvantages so at the moment I'm not running any AV. If I download something I'll scan it at virustotal before running. If I get a virus via a website then so be it.

[smackyslap]

They all have their quirks and disadvantages so at the moment I'm not running any AV. If I download something I'll scan it at virustotal before running. If I get a virus via a website then so be it.

what do you do if what you are downloading is bigger then what virus total will take?

[chronia]

I open it up, and it's not doing anything. No scans, no updates, nothing...yet it's using 50% CPU. Closing the program does nothing, the process is still in the process list. Can't kill process because it's under SYSTEM, so I just get a "access denied" error. I brought this up on the Kaspersky support forum, and after talking with one of the support reps, the solution seemed to be updating my graphics drivers or something; can't really remember what, but it did fix the problem...for a few months, now it's happening again out of nowhere.
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I find that solution pretty weird, as it is best practise for AV programs not to be killable by external processes or the user, as the process being killable would make it alot more vunerable to virusses / malware that actively try to sabotage AV solutions to disable them, so they can do their dirty work.

[mauserr]

ESET Smart Security is what I use right now. Never failed me, never looked back.

[Mister K]

Avira is what I currently have, pretty decent AV considering its free. Could be little more lightweight and more UI friendly but hey...

[Twoddle]

what do you do if what you are downloading is bigger then what virus total will take?

Then I would do some research and if it's not from a trusted source or signed with a security certificate I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole.

[Zysin]

The best antivirus is yourself. People think they get viruses because someone "hacked" their computer, but in reality it's because they clicked on/downloaded something sketchy and unsafe. A legit hacker isn't going to go after a no-name home computer user. Be smart about how you surf the web and any antivirus will be fine. If you want an exhaustive comparison of all the top antiviruses, go to: http://www.av-comparatives.org/

[mirix]

I worked retail and we always pushed ESET, mainly because of the margin, but it's probably the best there is. I've never personally used it, but a good friend I worked with has tried pretty much all of them and he says ESET is amazing. It's not a resource hog like Norton. It's lightweight, easy to use, and just an all around great piece of software. I'd definitely recommend it (and I don't work there anymore).

Ditto what Zedren said. I don't use an antivirus, mainly because I don't download stupid stuff. If I decide to torrent something, I'm always very careful and read the comments, etc... Just pay attention to what you're doing.