Symantec updates Norton products

[dbarrow]

http://news.com.com/Symantec+updates+Norton+products/2100-1002_3-6115109.html?tag=cd.top

Symantec on Tuesday announced Norton AntiVirus 2007 and Norton Internet Security 2007, updated versions of the company's widely used security software for consumers. ...
...Symantec said. Also, the antivirus technology can now detect malicious software that tries to hide using stealth technology known as rootkits, the company said....
...Symantec has also worked to make its software nimble. The new versions are better in memory usage, boot time, scan speed, user interface launch speed, and download speed, the company said. An improved system scan feature now requires less processing power, for example, Symantec said. Performance is often criticized when it comes to Symantec products. ...

*Performance! They finally acknowledge Performance!
Does that mean the (S) will no longer stand for snail?
Remains to be seen.

[Dan18960]

Too LATE - having been a proponent of NAV for years, it is now on my dump list. While not going into the NOD camp - I am using AVG Professional. Not being the free version does make a difference and the modules are easily understood by the end users. They also like that the cost is for a TWO year subscription and is the same as NAV for ONE year.

[Seth]

Too LATE - having been a proponent of NAV for years, it is now on my dump list.While not going into the NOD camp.

Why is it on your dump list? And why not Nod?

I am using AVG Professional. Not being the free version does make a difference and the modules are easily understood by the end users.
Did they incorporate anything from Ewido into that version?

[PeteF]

Too LATE - having been a proponent of NAV for years, it is now on my dump list. While not going into the NOD camp - I am using AVG Professional.

Dan,
The problem I have is that so many people are already sold
on NAV. Often they have already purchased it and call on me
to get it working right. That's when I warn them about how
problematic it is and offer alternatives such as NOD32.
Sometimes they choose to stick with NAV.

If you have not joined the NOD32 bandwagon, I suspect it's
due to the user interface that is overly complex and user
unfriendly. I've recently been promoting NOD32 with some
success and some failure. One guy tried NOD32 and ended
up reinstaling NAV 2006. On the other hand, I have an
extremely novice type user who kept it and she calls me
when ever a decision needs to be made, but it is working
for her and successfully kept out a recent attack.

Reason I'm telling you this is that Rich is right. If the user
just sets it and forgets it, NOD32 will take care of itself.
I recently discoverd that you can place an Icon on the
desktop that only runs a single window for the on
demand scanner. Now that is simple enough to operate.
Two basic choices; SCAN or SCAN & CLEAN.
Put that Icon on the desktop and don't show them the
other parts of the program that have IMON BMON,
WXYZMON or whatever those whacky names are.
Hahhaha.

As for NAV 2007, I just hope they made the needed
improvements because I know people will continue
to call me to install it and won't want go with a
less known AV such as NOD32. Like always, I'll
report my findings.

---pete---

[mylanta]

Well I am sure hoping to avoid a "shootout " with Casey here, but where the problems with Nav 2006 become really noticeable is with dialup. I have a customer with a 5 year old HP, where she installed XP. She lives in an area where there is nothing but dialup and satellite, not far from me, and has no real choice except there is a new satellite carrier called Blue Sky that offers substantailly lower prices than Hughes net ($299 equipment vs $600 and $49.99 a month annual), and she called me when I was on vacation and when I did not respond she had her pc repaired by a local
repair shop. She originally had "Illegal Windows XP" problems from another local guy who sold her bogus XP Pro a while back so the new one installed XP Home and sold her Nav Internet Security 2006 as well. She called me she could not get on the internet within 4 weeks, and this time would wait for me.
I know Larry will blame Microsoft XP and say I should have put in Linux or Unix or sold her a Mac or some kind of logic I never grasped, but you had to see how this pc was running. It took forever to boot up so much so the first thing I did was run msconfig to empty startup to find nothing in there but Norton. I installed Spybot and Spywareblaster and ran scan with Spybot and found a little spyware but nothing earth shaking. I ran Bit Defender online and found nothing (using dsl wireless adapter). I thought this pc had 64 ram and was a P III 450 or something like that. When I saw 1.5 P4 and 512 ram, I could not believe my eyes. With nothing left to do, I uninstalled Nav totally, and the pc runs like a "raped ape" and accesses it's dialup flawlessly. There was nothing else wrong.
I was trying to not touch Nav since she had just paid him $69.99 for it, but I could not find anything else wrong with this pc. It had almost no programs on it, only Ms Office 2003 Pro. The firewall was coming up all the time for everything regardless of any attempt to make access allowed permanent and to see how slow this thing was, I fully understand why any of you including Larry, has to believe there is something wrong with me, as I cannot visualize anyone running this program in any system, but least of all a dialup older pc.

[Tortanick]

Well I support Larry, personally I recomend OSX for home use, better hardware support, recognised name & shops know what you mean if you ask "can this camera work with a mac?"

Although I can't blame XP at all for this, its clearly NAV's fault

[casey]

Funny I haven't paid more then $10 for NAV in more then 10 years..

Recently went to a lady's house that uses dialup modem and she was having trouble connecting and the
computer and dialup was slower then molasses. Checked to see that she wasn't running NAV and told her her problem was she had a old slow computer and since NAV wasn't installed there wasn't anything I could do for her.

Funny how I've been running NAV from 486 to Pentiums to AMD Opterons and all of this while running
dialup 14.4 to 56k to Broadband and have never seen all the problems associated with it. I guess I'm not having any trouble with NAV because I like it....


sold her Nav Internet Security 2006 as well. She called me she could not get on the internet within 4 weeks, and this time would wait for me.


I must have read Rich's post to quick as I didn't notice that he said NAV Internet security. I myself tried this a while back and for some reason that now escapes me, didn't like the way it worked and removed it and never used it again..

[Seth]

From the link:

"Symantec has also worked to make its software nimble. The new versions are better in memory usage, boot time, scan speed, user interface launch speed, and download speed, the company said. An improved system scan feature now requires less processing power, for example, Symantec said. Performance is often criticized when it comes to Symantec products."

In fairness to Norton, many problems associated with it can be attributed to it's popularity and the odds of probability. That is, since Norton is the most popular security software, malware coders specifically code to disable and/or be invisible to Norton. It's possible that this type of coding will cause file corruption to Norton and then one erroneously blames Norton for the ensuing problems.

Above and beyond this, I receive a disproportion amount of calls that begin with, "I just installed/uninstalled Norton and now my computer...". One that comes to mind is from about six months ago when a customer purchased Norton at Walmart. After the installation, her complaint was that the system was now "so slow". I cleared msconfig of needless items, ran Ccleaner, and purged the system of some moderate adware. The system was still way too slow. She said it ran fine before the install, and her system specs were mid to high. I uninstalled Norton and the computer ran like a dream.

I asked her if there were any errors when she installed it and the response was "no", so I ran an sfc /scannow and installed Norton. The install went fine, but the slug like performance returned. I again removed it, installed AVG with no subsequent system drag, and had to inform her that Norton was the problem and Walmart wouldn't likely issue a refund on opened and used software.

Anyway, later that day, I received a call from the Walmart manager as the customer was denied a refund, but she apparently made quite a scene in the store and insisted they call me. I explained the situation to the manager and also informed him that the problem she was having with Norton wasn't an isolated one. He admitted that others have tried to return it, and that he was going to forward the information to upper management. He then issued the refund.

So, it looks like with this new update Symantec might finally be addressing their software issues. Regardless, in my experience and tests, Norton is poor at detecting malware of any kind. Furthermore, there are cheaper and better alternatives.

[mylanta]

I think the thing that Larry has not perceived, and yes I was talking about Norton Internet Security, is there seems to be something different with the issues with Nav 2006.
Prior to this it was a matter of opinion. I felt it had poor virus detection, limited or no Trojan detection, and was a system drag. But I had it on systems and though I would not use it myself, and I would discourage others from using it, that was an opinion, but I was not removing it from client systems and sloving all kinds of problems by doing so, as I am with this version. I remember a Nav update slowing Quicken 2002 to a crawl. I also remember a Nav update not allowing Office 97 to install on Windows 98 systems...and I remember it slowing down dialup internet. But what I have never before seen is a system so badly degraded by any program that it literally made me believe it had bad hardware i.e. hdd needing replacment. There is a real difference in what I am saying here and it has to do with Nav 2006. This is not my soap box, I view it as an alarm and what Seth is saying is echoed on large international forums every day of the week.

[casey]

Rich there is a big difference between NAV 2006 and the Internet Security. I have NAV 2006 running right now on the computer I'm typing this post on and see no slow down. You keep saying that your opinion is the consensus and is all over the net and as I said before it is the still the most used AV today. You would think that all these guys would eventually, after all the years you've been telling everyone how bad NAV is would have Symantec out of business by now. I can hear you now saying my computer is running so bad and I just don't know it. I don't remember me ever saying anything bad about NOD32 unless it was to show they have problems too. One reason I guess is I don't know anyone that uses it and seeing as I don't use it I have nothing bad to say.
What's really stupid is these Computer guys sell their computers with NAV already on it and they do this so when the customer uses NAV it will slow the fast computer they sold down to a dog so when that person goes to buy another computer they will remember this dog and want another one. Get real...

How come you didn't mention to Seth what you think of installing AVG?


Rich
I suggest Avg to only my enemies...for all others Kaspersky, Nod32 or Bit Defender are world class...



I'm having to much fun playing with Vista to get myself into another of these stupid arguments...

[Tortanick]

Oh come on! Long unprovable debates that ultimately have no effect on much are fun!

Vi Rules!

[Seth]

How come you didn't mention to Seth what you think of installing AVG?

Just to clarify here:

I don't think AVG free does much of anything, but it looks good and takes few resources. I really only install it when their current antivirus is causing problems, they aren't running any antivirus software at all, or they don't want to pay for "yet another antivirus program".

Keep in mind that I also leave shortcuts to SAS and Ewido on their desktop and instruct them to use these programs at least once a week.

[casey]

I don't think AVG free does much of anything, but it looks good and takes few resources. I really only install it when their current antivirus is causing problems, they aren't running any antivirus software at all, or they don't want to pay for "yet another antivirus program".



And you install this on people's computers giving them the impression they are protected?

[Seth]

And you install this on people's computers giving them the impression they are protected?

I don't think you read my post thoroughly. Once again:

I really only install it when their current antivirus is causing problems, they aren't running any antivirus software at all, or they don't want to pay for "yet another antivirus program".

[mylanta]

.

How come you didn't mention to Seth what you think of installing AVG?

I have been changing my mind about Avg Larry, and in fact have installed it on some client pc's (including the one I was writing about). It is not in a class with Nod32, Bit Defender or Kaspersky, but it does not drag down the system and so far with the few clients I have used it on, seems to be updating well and keeping them clean. There are some who will just not buy an antivirus for whatever reason, and I would rather have them run this than nothing. There are others I feel bad for who just spent $69 on Norton, and so I give them a transition with Avg. one really nice feature about Avg is they update their install copies all the time, so if you have a pc that cannot access the internet, if you download the newest version of Avg and put it on cd before leaving the shop, I can install it to their messedup system without updating it, something I cannot see any of the others doing.



I'm having to much fun playing with Vista to get myself into another of these stupid arguments...

So the above is not really an entry into another "one of these stupid arguments" in spite of how it appears to be? OK Gotcha!

[Seth]

Ditto to what you just said Rich.

When there is no other option, and the user doesn't want to pay again, then AVG is the logical choice.

AVG free is useless for adware, and mediocre for viruses (trojans/downloaders/etc), but it's better than nothing.

[dbarrow]

Why argue? Just thank them for the repeat business and tell them you will see them in a month. In fact, just schedule their appointment in advance. Reload their machine with the image you made before you gave it back as you know they won't buy any backup software either.

One of the people I work with was having a hissy over his laptop recently and wanted me to fix it. I had to decline with " You haven't listened to a thing I've told you in the last two years. You will have the machine f'd up in a week and then it will be my fault it won't work again. I don't want to take ownership of your bad habits, thanks anyway."

[Dan18960]

OK Seth and Pete,

One - If you notice I DO NOT provide the FREE version of AVG. It is the "Professional" version.

As you noted Pete - the NOD32 interface has sent "some" of your clients scrambling back to NAV 2006. I have not had one client complain about AVG. And none have reinstalled NAV.

TWO - the clients I have are USERS! They report to work, sit down with their cup of coffee, and wait until 5. They don't want to learn how to manage their way through any application let alone an antivirus program.

The 2 year subscription for the PROFESSIONAL version (and you have to be a reseller for that licensing) is the same as NAV's 1 year sub. SO even if they have just purchased NAV - they feel they are ok since they would be paying again in 1 year and AVG gives that year "free" in their minds.

Consultants in the US who want a contact for the licensing can email me. This is NOT for the end users. You have to submit a credit app just like any of the other disty's you do business with (Tech Data, Synergy, D&H, Ingram Micro - and if you don't know those companies you are not going to qualify for the AVG distribution.).

[mylanta]

Dan,
Really what do you feel is the advantage to paid version, as it really is not highly rated. Avg typically is terrible with Trojans as is Nav, and that is most of the action these days, whereas Nod32 is ou***anding with them. I cannot see what the paid version does any differently. Again Nod's ability to catch a closed worm, is not true with free Avg at all, is there a difference in the paid version?
This is what site says you do not get:

AVG Professional for US$ 38.95!
no Faster updates
no Multiple languages
no Detailed settings
no Consent for commercial use

and I see nothing making any sense for $38.95 per pc, remember this is 1 license per pc yet!
The only real difference I see is that updates are automatic as opposed to scheduled....
More Product Features

The powerful AVG Resident Shield provides maximum protection by scanning every file opened, executed, or saved. It will also prevent the opening or executing of infected files.
The AVG Personal E-mail Scanner checks every e-mail sent or received, providing much needed protection from e-mail borne threats. AVG supports all leading e-mail clients including MS Outlook, The bat!, Eudora and all other SMTP/POP3 based email clients such as Outlook Express. Encrypted connections using SSL are also supported.
AVG Professional can scan attachments of instant message services (like ICQ, MSN Messenger) for viruses and other threats.
AVG provides support for the detection of "potentially unwanted programs".
AVG’s scanning engine uses a unique combination of heuristic analysis and generic detection methods (http://www.grisoft.com/doc/DetectionMethods/lng/us/tpl/tpl01) to detect all known viruses.
The AVG Resident Shield can include/exclude files from scanning based on individual file extensions.
Automatically attempts to heal/remove infected files and other threats such as trojans, worms, and java applets. Removed files are quarantined in the AVG Virus Vault.
AVG Professional has flexible password protection so you can select which settings you wish to protect from other users.
AVG Professional now supports Microsoft Windows 64 bit platforms.
then 64 bit use which I don't think free has...I mean but $38 per license per machine seems lot a lot to pay for something that is also freeas everything else listed here is in the free version.!