Advice for a thicky....

Forreal

I bought a laptp recently which had a free trial of Norton Antivirus 2006 for three months.

Times almost up so what do I go for now? I'm not a computer expert so uninstalling programmes fill me with dread. I want to save money and use freebies but would it be better to make my savings buying through Amazon getting Norton 2007 at 50% off and be done with it???

reehsetin

i would never recomend norton, i had norton always upto date yet caught viruses that were all over the papaers etc at the time, there were hundreds of them, and i dont go to dodgy sites either
you can get free anti viruses which ive heard are still better than norton but i dont know much about them, ill let someone else fill you in

scheming_gypsy

once you've 'done with it' you'll need to renew your subscription next year.

Uninstalling Norton is easy, into control panel, add / remove programs and remove from there but make sure you remove all the Norton bits.
You can get AVG and others free off the net.

kat21

there are two ways to uninstall your programs one is by clicking on the start button bottom left of your screen, then select the control panel icon, then once that link opens look for add remove programs icon click on that scroll down the list of installed programs and left click on the program you wish to uninstall. once you have uninstalled the program click ok to go out of that screen or alternatively some programs have there own uninstaller, if that is the case click on the start button bottom left, then select programs, look for the program name click on it and look to see if it has an uninstall option . Freeware programs, AVG, Outpost, ZoneAlarm,
kat

Alfonso_Skinarelli

I don't wish to alarm you unnecessarily but downloading the Norton Removal Tool may come in handy if you choose to remove the program. Norton has a habit of throwing the dummy out when asked to uninstall itself.

For what it's worth, Norton has very good detection rates when compared to most of it's opposition but the likes of Kaspersky and NOD32 anti-virus offer far better protection and value for money in my opinion. That said, there are some perfectly adequate free programs available that suit most users needs. It just depends on the level of protection you require at the end of the day. If you only use your computer for the odd surf of the net and email, a free program such as AVG or Avast will happily fill the void left by Norton.

mazz1953

From my experience, Norton programs are a pain to completely remove because they leave entries all over your system that can interfere with any new anti-virus that you put on. The best way to uninstall Norton is by using a special tool supplied by Symantec. You can find the link here: http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039

Poppycat

Norton does leave a lot of registry entries in the system registry also in

C:\Documents and Settings\[user login]\Application Data (I think that folder is hidden). It can cause problem when it come to reinstall the application if you want it in the future.

I agree with other posts about unisntalling it the two ways

Zahc

Alfonso_Skinarelli wrote:

I don't wish to alarm you unnecessarily but downloading the Norton Removal Tool may come in handy if you choose to remove the program. Norton has a habit of throwing the dummy out when asked to uninstall itself.

For what it's worth, Norton has very good detection rates when compared to most of it's opposition but the likes of Kaspersky and NOD32 anti-virus offer far better protection and value for money in my opinion. That said, there are some perfectly adequate free programs available that suit most users needs. It just depends on the level of protection you require at the end of the day. If you only use your computer for the odd surf of the net and email, a free program such as AVG or Avast will happily fill the void left by Norton.

Well said. Kaspersky for me.

Zahc