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Norton - I didn't believe it

Al_Mac
Al_Mac Posts: 5,519 Forumite
Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
in Techie Stuff
Took the plunge and got rid of Norton yesterday.

Startup time has halved. Opening my "special" spreadsheet takes a tenth of the time. Opening outlook a fifth of the time.

I hadn't realised how much impact it was actually having.

I'm sticking with my free stuff :cool:
«134

Comments

  • imho
    imho Posts: 2,515 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    If you got any [SIZE=-1]McAfee i would get rid of that as well as that hogs your computer as well .
    [/SIZE]
  • Quasar
    Quasar Posts: 121,720 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    Well done Al! :)

    I used to have Norton too and was happy with it until I decided that £40 or so per year could be saved, after hearing the praises of free software.

    So I got rid of Norton and installed Kerio, AVG, spybot and ad-aware, plus CCleaner for basic "housekeeping". Never looked back since. And yes, the 'puter runs much faster.
    :)
    Be careful who you open up to. Today it's ears, tomorrow it's mouth.
  • Conor_3
    Conor_3 Posts: 6,944 Forumite
    NOD32 from https://www.eset.com is an excellent lightweight AV app. Annual subscription but it's dirt cheap and consistently comes out top in the Virus Bulletin tests.
  • sco0ter
    sco0ter Posts: 2,476 Forumite
    The new Nortin Internet security suite 2008 has drastically improved the Norton product. Load up times are around the same as with NOD32 installed and doesnt impact game playing or any other tasks the old 2007 version used to.
  • nullogik
    nullogik Posts: 467 Forumite
    Well done Al Mac for uninstalling Norton - if only more people had the courage to do this then it would really force Norton to really tackle the load its programs place on systems when it sees sales are down drasitically.

    However, don't tar all "paid for" programs with the same brush. Kaspersky and NOD32 are both incredibly light on systems and have class leading detection rates.
    Lack of money is the root of all evil.
    George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950)
  • mascherano
    mascherano Posts: 649 Forumite
    lol Al Mac thats exactly what happened to me. I then moved to Mcafee and found it to be absolutely dreadful, but better than Norton. Then I moved to AVG and found it abysmal, although better than Mcafee. Then 2 years ago I realised that having anti-virus software on your computer is a complete waste of time and totally got rid. Guess what? no viruses for almost 2 years. I would say, however, NOD32 is the least-awful ofthe anti-virus progs
  • martin57
    martin57 Posts: 774 Forumite
    Hello,

    Well how do you know that you got no virus if you got rid of the antivirus software?

    Same as others with an old computer a few years ago I had to get rid of Norton too, a real slowdown!

    Martin57
  • ManAtHome
    ManAtHome Posts: 8,512 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture Combo Breaker
    martin57 wrote: »
    Well how do you know that you got no virus if you got rid of the antivirus software?
    LOL - quite...

    AVG and Avast (depending on your O/S) are pretty good anti-virus programs, ZoneLabs/WinXp firewall are pretty good firewalls (as well as the hardware firewall in your router).
  • x_Wilco_x
    x_Wilco_x Posts: 283 Forumite
    Just bit the bullet and got rid of my trusty systemworks... Now I knew Norton was a system hog but... my god - didn't realise by how much! Just gotta do Ma's and Sis's now...

    Cheers guys... Great advice...
  • GoofyGAT
    GoofyGAT Posts: 1,835 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    Al_Mac wrote: »
    Took the plunge and got rid of Norton yesterday.
    Three years too late :eek: :rolleyes: :p - that's when I did the switch anyway :D, G
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