I use the free version of AVAST.
I recently installed Webroot AV. So far, so good.
Going by the amount of advertising they do, it is prolly the last product you should ever consider using.
I’m using Zone Alarm Extreme. I like it.
What is your beef with AVG? I’ve used it for years without issue.
I use “System Mechanic” and it seems to work well for me. Here’s the link:
http://www.iolo.com/products/system-mechanic/
Don't use PCMatic.
I used PCMATIC for a couple of years. It cleans your machine and speeds it up nicely.
Once I got it clean, I didn’t need it anymore. At least I didn’t need it bad enough to renew and pay every year.
It is a PC cleaner/optimizer not an antivirus.
Oh, I misread that. Your problem is using the paid version of AVG. It is bigtime bloatware. Slows everything to a crawl.
I’m using WinZip Malware Protector but lately when it cleans the system I loose my ability to connect to the internet, even though I’m showing a connection. I have to restore to a previous date. Any suggestions?
I use AlVIRA
PCmatic is India based software. Read some of the online reviews for it, they are either 5 star or 0 star, so you know what is going on there.
malwarebytes
I do this stuff for a living.
I haven’t had any real problems with AVG free version. The tray notifications can be a pain, but you can turn those off (which I usually do).
At work, we use an enterprise version of Vipre, which is OK I guess, but it won’t stop a lot of stuff, especially when the users click on e-mailed links they’re not supposed to.
Everybody should have 3 types of virus protection on their Windows PCs (all of which can be found for free on http://www.download.com):
1. A constantly running virus blocker. The free versions of AVG or Avast should work great there, though you can pay for Trend Micro or Norton or McAfee is you really want to (I wouldn’t).
2. An on-demand virus scanner. The best all around scanner is Malwarebytes; I use it extensively at work. It’s a free product, and they have a pay version too.
3. A registry cleaner. The one I use practically everyday at work is Ccleaner, mainly the first two lefthand tabs in the program (”Cleaner” and “Registry”). You can speed up your computer quite a bit with a couple of passes of the Registry portion of Ccleaner.
ABOUT PC-MATIC:
I would never, EVER recommend using any PC speed-up product in a TV commercial. If they have to advertise on TV, they’re not worth installation. Their target audience is senior citizens who don’t know anything about computers.
These products, if they work at all, take up huge amounts of resources on start up, and sometimes go out to servers on the Internet to store settings, making them that much slower.
Installing PC-Matic or similar product IN ADDITION TO a constantly running virus blocker like Norton will bog down your computer until it’s practically impossible to run anything.
Avast, MalwareBytes, CCleaner
Switched from AVG to Avast a few years ago when I encountered a virus that turned off AVG and masked itself. MalwareBytes picked it up immediately. AVG was getting bloated anyways if I remember correctly.
You also have to be sure you have gotten all the security updates for Windows, Adobe, etc. Avast does a good job of notifying you that you need to get security updates. However, malicious software can still sneak through and even turn off your antivirus. You have to be aware of what you have and check that it is running. I have often helped my sister in law get her laptop cleaned up, but she still gets malware and viruses because she is clueless about checking that things are running right and doing the manual scans. Internet Explorer seems very vulnerable to attack and using Firefox with security add ons stops a lot of junk from getting through.