Thanks for clearing the mod for us.

All business ploys aside, do you think there is actually anything wrong with Norten? I use it for my computer. I have never had any problem with getting infected with viruses. Norten has been good at finding, and deleting them. My records show Norten has deleted thousands of trojans.

I agree with your false positive thing.

Avast is good and bad. It has given me many false positives, but I still use it. I got the same virus hit from Avast a few months ago when I DL FORS, but found it clean....

Well, the first thing wrong with Norton is that it holds your computer hostage. Try uninstalling it and see what I mean. Oh, I should tell you that your computer won't work if you do, unless they changed it recently. Norton hooks into your operating system so that any disk operation points to Norton instead of the Windows disk read/write procedures. When you uninstall Norton, the pointers still point to Norton. Guess what happens when you try to start your computer?

The government forced Norton to post a true uninstall on their website. They aren't exactly trumpeting why it's needed or helping you to find it. Actually they do their best to make sure you can't find it unless you know what you're looking for and why, plus know how to do site searches. After all, they aren't trying to protect you, they're trying to force you to pay them every year.

Then like the car dealership who sends a junk mail ad disguised as an IRS refund, after tricking us into installing their junk for the protection of their "valuable customers" they ask us to trust them to sell us a car, or another year of Norton. Bye-bye Norton. You're otta here! Permanently. Your kind of service I will do without. My computer is mine and I will run it as I choose.

Either of the two free anti-virus programs, AVG or Avast! do as good a job and don't hold a gun to your head for ever increasing amounts of money every six months or a year. There are other free alternatives that are just as good.

Tonight I will be installing FOTRS to see what I have to do to defang Avast! I just want it to ignore that specific file and leave normal protection alone. I'm thinking there's an option to do that on first detection. Stay tuned...

A false postive....go figure:hmmm:

Every computer that had Norton on it that I know of had to be reformated to get rid of Norton.

NORTON is the VIRUS. :yep: :down:

Before the feds made Norton make the Norton Removal Tool, I manually edited the registry, individually removing dozens of hijackers that pointed disk input/output routines to Norton. Once I was sure I had them all, I backed up my system, uninstalled Norton and all was well. To this day Norton does not provide the Norton Removal Tool as part of its uninstall process or anywhere on its install disks. You have to go to their website armed with a separate search engine to dig it out to use it. They are conforming to the law as begrudgingly as possible and now they wonder why we don't love them.

From now until the end of time no computer I own will ever have a Norton product on it again.

Avast:yeah: Norton:down:

Besides the un-install issues of Norton, it is a resource hog and it is IMO a poor Anti Virus program.

Everyone remember the "Blaster Worm" thing a few years back? Well both computers in my home at the time got it before any of the AV programs had recognized and scanned for it. My PC at the time had Panda AV, my then girlfriend had Norton. To remove it with Norton you had to go online, get a removal tool. Turn off System Restore, boot into safe mode, run the tool, boot into normal mode, enable Sys Restore, boot again blah blah blah. With Panda, on the same day, it said "would you like to remove?" I said "Yes" and it was done. Sorry to people who have paid for Norton, but it really is the worst AV option.

Avast is best antivirus for me :) norton ***s

I can honestly say I have used Norton for years. I have also paid for Norton for years. I can honestly say Norton was ok and never caused any problems. I have found though that there are plenty of fee AV programs and do not use Norton anymore. I use Avast on my new computer and my old computer still has Norton but I will not renew the program....it will be removed and Avast installed. :up:

The last good product of Norton was the Norton-Commander. Everything that came afterwards with the label Norton on it was a pain for pc admins :D

Wow. I'm surprised to see so many people having problems with Norten. I've had to uninstall Norten several times (for upgrading purposes, and a mess up with my new computer), and I've never had a problem with my computer starting or anything.

I'll ask again, other than having to pay, business practices, etc., has anyone ever gotten a virus while using Norten?

Another question, where do you guys find these free programs? If they are free, wouldn't they be worse? Do they update all the time to recognize the latest threats? Have you always been virus free while using these programs? Which one would you recommend for me to possible switch to? I see Avast is popular.

RR is right, Norten is a hog on resoures. It's not that it's that bad as a virus tool in itself, it's just loaded with junk that tracks everything your cp does, plus it's expensive. Avast does a great job, updates are great, no complaints. However, it is sensitive, but I prefer to be safer than sorry.

I used Perfect Installer to rid myself of Norten......

Yoshi, with the world of Linux, especially Ubuntu Linux, the world is changing. Free software of the quality of commercial is running all over the place. Much of it is migrating to the Windows world. Sir Gates better watch his step if he wants to charge us $200.00 for a garden variety Windows 7. The ground has shifted under his feet and it could eat him up.

In ten years I've never had a virus with AVG or Avast!

A computer with AVG or Avast! antivirus, Free Comodo Firewall, WinPatrol, Secunia Software Inspector, CCleaner, ERUNT and other great free protectors is better protected than a computer with commercial software simply because you would never have the cash to buy the commercial equivalents. If you did, you wouldn't have better protection.

Folks, I'm thinking Avast! is going nuts over the installer of the patch. I'm downloading the carrier upgrade patch to see if I get a similar hissy fit. Nope, no squawking from Avast! on the Carrier Upgrade, so it's something peculiar about the patch. I'm going to install the patch and the carrier upgrade, delete the installers and see if I get an alarm.

Yikes!!! What a slow download FOTRS is!!!

OK, I'm a chump who uses Norton, and has for years. Currently I'm using Norton 360 and formerly used Norton Internet Security. NIS was a big resource hog, but 360 is much better about it from my non-professional viewpoint. I've never had any real problems, or use issues, or viruses. And besides, if you want you can turn off you cable modem and unload it.

Buddahaid