I'm currently using Windows Defender. Is there any reason to switch to a better free antivirus?

[djdelarosa25]

If so, what AV would you recommend?

[thisforumsucksassdeletemya]

Do you have valuable data or anything that you absolutely can't afford to lose? Defender is just kind of OK, it's really hard to tell it to do anything like ignore a file or scan a specific area, because microsoft tried to make it fuckwit-proof. It's not bad, but I would certainly go for something with better performance (infection-prevention-wise) if I had valuable data either sentimental or worth actual money.

[djdelarosa25]

Just now, violentnumeric said:

Do you have valuable data or anything that you absolutely can't afford to lose? Defender is just kind of OK, it's really hard to tell it to do anything like ignore a file or scan a specific area, because microsoft tried to make it fuckwit-proof. It's not bad, but I would certainly go for something with better performance (infection-prevention-wise) if I had valuable data either sentimental or worth actual money.

Not really, though I am kind of OCD when it comes to things like this and I absolutely hate the idea of my laptop getting infected.

 

What do you think of Bitdefender Free?

[Canada EH]

Microsoft Security Essentials

Malwarebytes

CCleaner

Any free A/V

Bit Defender

 

[MaxBunny]

Just now, djdelarosa25 said:

What do you think of Bitdefender Free?

Not as good as Kaspersky Free. I'd wait on going AVG/Avast until they consolidate both programmers into one. Pretty much any zero-day is gonna rock your world so at least Kaspersky has their cloud network even in the free version for faster response times.

 

Your main problems will be trackers/spyware. SUPERAntiSpyware Free is your best bet for that. You'll see why after you run your first scan with it.

[Oshino Shinobu]

Most anti-virus programs pull from the same or similar repositories, so pretty much all of them will have the same information on current viruses, making them all about the same in terms of protection. The main difference comes in how they deal with it. From my experience, Windows Defender is one of the least intrusive and well implemented anti-virus programs for Windows (as it should be, considering MS makes it). 

 

I'd advise also downloading Malwarebytes to run system scans with. Between the two of them, they will catch most things. From a security standpoint, there's not much reason to switch from Windows Defender to another free anti-virus, but if you have particular things you don't like about it, then you may want to try out others to see if they do it in a way that you prefer. 

[ARikozuM]

I can recommend Kaspersky, Malwarebytes, and commonsense.bat. You'll have to pick up batch script for the CS.bat, but it's worth it.

[Hiitchy]

7 minutes ago, Being Delirious said:

Ugh kaspersky is crap

No u

 

I literally had kaspersky internet security block 5 network attacks. Though I will say, the fact that Russia has been doing some sneaky stuff, I did uninstall it at one point.

[NTDaws]

Just now, Hiitchy said:

No u

 

I literally had kaspersky internet security block 5 network attacks. Though I will say, the fact that Russia has been doing some sneaky stuff, I did uninstall it at one point.

The only thing i trust is malware bytes and bitdefender.

[Hiitchy]

Just now, Being Delirious said:

The only thing i trust is malware bytes and bitdefender.

I do recall using mbam and hit man pro at one point to remove a nasty virus so yeah, definitely. Bitdefender is really good as well.

[ARikozuM]

Just now, Being Delirious said:

The only thing i trust is malware bytes 

Poor wife. 

 

Inclusion of space makes this really funny. 

Spoiler

Only trusts malware. 

 

[NTDaws]

Just now, Hiitchy said:

I do recall using mbam and hit man pro at one point to remove a nasty virus so yeah, definitely. Bitdefender is really good as well.

I've always had it blocks any nasty shit. My server watches all the network activity and blocks foreign addresses unless I allow it otherwise.

[kirashi]

38 minutes ago, djdelarosa25 said:

Not really, though I am kind of OCD when it comes to things like this and I absolutely hate the idea of my laptop getting infected.

 

What do you think of Bitdefender Free?

If you don't want to be infected, or even the thought of it scares you, then you'll need to Air Gap your technology. Otherwise, carry on using Windows Defender, buy MalwareBytes Premium each year, and acquire the CommonSense™ Security Suite by spending tons of time working with computers so you know whether a PC is infected within 20 seconds by scanning Task Manager's process list. Yes, I realize things can hide from Task Manager, buy my point is just that if you get really familiar with what infections look like, you'll be better off preventing them before they happen rather than dealing with the cleanup.

 

15 minutes ago, Being Delirious said:

Ugh kaspersky is crap

Please provide reasons why, rather than simply calling something crap for the sake of calling it crap. I'm not defending Kaspersky, but we do need to know why it's not something that you would use.

 

Personally, the only current free security software I'd recommend is Kaspersky or ESET. Why? Kaspersky and ESET are the only free (or paid, even) security softwares (so far) that haven't nuked any of my clients' internet connections due to faulty firewall drivers or overzealous firewall rules. BitDefender, Norton, "M" Security, Comodo, F-SECURE, Panda, Sophos, and Webroot have all blocked EVERY network connection at some point during their use, usually after faulty updates.

 

Now, if the security companies included an easy way to remove their software, such as putting a removal tool in the install directory during installation, I'd be less hard on them. But because I've had to manually acquire removal tools and run them from a USB drive due to the PC's having no internet connection, I can never recommend them for my clients as that is not how you build a piece of software and makes for a very poor user experience.

[NTDaws]

Just now, kirashi said:

If you don't want to be infected, or even the thought of it scares you, then you'll need to Air Gap your technology. Otherwise, carry on using Windows Defender, buy MalwareBytes Premium each year, and acquire the CommonSense™ Security Suite by spending tons of time working with computers so you know whether a PC is infected within 20 seconds by scanning Task Manager's process list. Yes, I realize things can hide from Task Manager, buy my point is just that if you get really familiar with what infections look like, you'll be better off preventing them before they happen rather than dealing with the cleanup.

 

Please provide reasons why, rather than simply calling something crap for the sake of calling it crap. I'm not defending Kaspersky, but we do need to know why it's not something that you would use.

 

Personally, the only current free security software I'd recommend is Kaspersky or ESET. Why? Kaspersky and ESET are the only free (or paid, even) security softwares (so far) that haven't nuked any of my clients' internet connections due to faulty firewall drivers or overzealous firewall rules. BitDefender, Norton, "M" Security, Comodo, F-SECURE, Panda, Sophos, and Webroot have all blocked EVERY network connection at some point during their use, usually after faulty updates. Now, if the security companies included an easy way to remove their software during installation, I'd be less hard on them. But because I've had to manually acquire removal tools and run them from a USB drive due to the PC's having no internet connection, I can never recommend them for my clients as that is not how you build a piece of software.

I recall last using it in 2008 on Windows XP. It had horrible activation issues, and never detected viruses I downloaded. I was a big fan of Windows Themes back then. But it never detected them once.

[kirashi]

1 minute ago, Being Delirious said:

I recall last using it in 2008 on Windows XP. It had horrible activation issues, and never detected viruses I downloaded. I was a big fan of Windows Themes back then. But it never detected them once.

I can't disagree that their activation processes used to be bad. Now a days, they offer to have users create an account so licensing can be tracked and transferred between computers, and it makes recovering your license easy too. If you were intentionally tampering with Windows themes, such as using patchers to patch uxtheme.dll, imageres.dll, or other core Windows library files, then I'm not surprised if you acquired a theme pathcher containing malware that slipped past Kaspersky, let alone other security providers.

 

The nature of Windows themes requires software that can patch native Windows libraries core to the operation, security, and stability of Windows. In order to do this, the patchers have to hide the code they're trying to patch these files to avoid detection by Windows own Security Essentials (when it was released) and that of security companies software, mostly because users never followed the "disable your security software to install this" instructions. To be fair though, I blame Microsoft for this, since if they just let users customize the look and feel of the OS from the start, this problem would be mitigated. (You know, like how Android and Linux are the only 2 consumer OS's that let the user decide what launcher or desktop environment they want to use.)

[GoodBytes]

2 hours ago, Canada EH said:

Microsoft Security Essentials

Malwarebytes

CCleaner

Any free A/V

Bit Defender

And how CCleaner protects anything? Might as well say Notepad.

Sorry, but I just found that funny.. like why is it here

[GoodBytes]

Windows Defender should be seen as a basic anti-virus. The real reason why it is there, is is really for systems that people buys, that comes with some trial version of one, which expires and don't renew. Or their subscription is over, and don't renew. The user might thing they are still protected, or forgets, or can't, or just don't want to. They are many reasons. Windows Defender is there to give some level of protection. The goal of Windows Defender is to give protection to the system while being the least taxing as possible. Basically, performance is little to not affected.

 

While Microsoft is continuing to work on Windows Defender, with features like ransomware protection (which needs to be enabled) being added, it doesn't try to compete with paying variant of A/V and security solution out there, which features more features, and provides better protections, and some with minimal increase of performance loss over Windows Defender, making them an excellent compromise.

 

So it depends on you.

[johnukguy]

WD has several times failed certification as a functioning antivirus/anti malware program. It's a placeholder pretty much until you can put something that does work in it's place. Just about any of the big name, free anti virus programs, together with Malwarebytes, will do a better job. It's basic, as GoodBytes put it and that's all. Try something like Avast (good and fairly low resource usage) but keep an eye on AV Comparatives, as AV performance changes regularly.

[Jmackley]

Windows Defender is the built in equivalent and, as with most of the other built in software, there are better equivalents. Proper antivirus will include more features and may have better protection against more kinds of attack. There are free antivirus programs like Avast, AVG, Malwarebytes, etc while you can pay for much better equivalents. av-test.org have antivirus test results if you need them. As always, make sure you know exactly what you are installing and loading- knowing what you are doing can be even better at preventing the malware to begin with.

[GodOfKnockers]

I myself use Windows Defender and Malwarebytes. I find that the two compliment each other very well and do a good job of protecting my PC.

 

I would stay away from Avast. The free version I removed from all of my PCs, as it spent more time throwing ads up and trying to buy extra features I don't really need. Did it even when I set it to Silent mode.