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"Oh, and Microsoft locked out the other antivirus companies so you can't use your reliable security programs with it even though it's very lame."

I had not heard this. Is this a perm. situation?

I had not heard this. Is this a perm. situation?

That's their intent. Looks like some lawsuits and legal wrangling are forthcoming from Norton (ugh-bad) and McAfee (only a little better). Norton's corporate stuff under the Symantec label is quite good though, nothing like the horrible versions for home users of Norton.

Norton and McAfee aren't popular with techies because they're slow resource hogs and don't do an especially good job at detecting viruses, no better than some of the free or lesser known AV programs. Norton is particularly bad because it can crash your machine permanently if you simply try to uninstall it.

I recommend AVG Free and Spybot Search And Destroy, both free. If updated regularly, they do as well as anything. Both free, both well-known, neither one a resource hog. Intel now owns AVG. For technical users, NOD32 is probably the finest AV software out there. But it requires more knowledge and tending than AVG with only a slight advantage in security for most people.

I run e-Trust on my work machine, and F-Prot on my home systems. McAfee has a version of Anti-Virus and ePO for Vista. Not sure about Symantec, but I wouldn't use their stuff for free.

More FUD crapola from the haters. Don't believe a word of it.