How good is free
Anti virus protection from the internet is it wise to install it on my computer.

Some free antiviruses are very good, but many are not. Microsoft Security Essentials, Avast, and Avira Antivir are free versions from commercial antivirus companies that I recommend. They are all "real-time" antivirus scanners that provide good protection. Security Essentials is the easiest one to use--the other two are more complicated, but you need a valid version of Windows on your computer to use Security Essentials. Real-time antivirus programs scan your computer when files are put on it. ClamWin is an "on-demand" antivirus that scans only when you do a manual scan or when you have scheduled a scan, so it is not "real-time." You should use a real-time antivirus. No antivirus is perfect, so ClamWin makes a good "backup" scanner. Just make sure to exclude ClamWin's program folder, data folder, and temporary files (clamav-*) from the real-time AV's scans so your computer will not scan at the same time ClamWin is scanning. Schedule a daily scan with your real-time virus and another scan with ClamWin--but not at the same time.

Yes, you need protection while on the internet. You can get viruses (malware) in email message attachments and on some websites that you may visit, including social networking sites, porn sites, and cracked software sites. Some websites are designed by criminals to give viruses to visitors, and other web sites are "good" sites that have viruses planted on them by criminals. The criminals want to put viruses on your computer to steal banking information, take over your email account, send out spam mail, steal password, and use your computer to help attack "good" web sites.

An antivirus program should be used with a firewall program, such as the Windows firewall that comes with Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7 computers. There are some other free firewall programs--the best known one is Zone Alarm, but I think the Windows firewall is the easiest one to use. Set your antivirus for automatic updates, and keep your firewall on (the firewall default choices are usually okay to use).

Regards,

Thanks for clarifying that for us.


Another good firewall is Comodo. Although it can be a bit irritating with all its warnings and verifications when you're downloading from a trusted website. Other than that, it's been very thorough and trustworthy.

I used to use Zone Alarm, but it began interfering with other programs I was using, so I had to find a replacement. Comodo solved that problem.

How about free anti virus likes combofix .. i use it

One of my colleauges at work swears by this soft also, never heard of it before but what he says about it, is that it fixed almost everything others can't.

Thanks GuitarBob for the valuable information it will definitely help me
make wise decisions in the future concerning Free Anti Virus.

Thanks for clarifying the position re free antivirus. I have used Avast for a long time but because it was for free I was always a bit worried that I should pay for one to get a better anti virus protection.

I think it all depends on the company that is providing the software for free. If they are constantly updating it and have a good reputation with technicians that can vouch for their software and actually use it then it could be good to use. I was wondering this about Malware Bytes, it's free and a lot of trouble shooting tech forums ask you to run this as part of the trouble shooting process.

Malwarebytes is a good antimalware program. Its heuristics are at removing the most common viruses that get on your computer. They do not have a large signature database, however, so the real-time version is generally no better than the free version. It also do not do very well against rootkits. I keep it around as a backup for ClamWin with Clam Sentinel, which together are my primary antivirus.

Regards,

I've been using Avast! for years, and am quite happy with it.

There are many types for free antivirus. not all are good and not all bad. If you want to protect your computer where you spend most of the time of your day and lot of your official work is dependent on it, you should protect it like your house. I personally use antivirus as it gives security to my computer laptop as well as android cell phone. There are many other good antivirus you will find that give free version as well as paid and good package . Make sure to upgrade them on time.