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Posted by Leythos on January 2, 2006, 8:05 am
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cquirkenews@nospam.mvps.org says...
> On Sun, 01 Jan 2006 23:57:08 GMT, Leythos wrote:
> >cquirkenews@nospam.mvps.org says...
> >> On Sun, 01 Jan 2006 20:33:12 GMT, Leythos wrote:
> >> >cquirkenews@nospam.mvps.org says...
> >> >> On Sat, 31 Dec 2005 03:32:59 GMT, "Phil Weldon"
>
> >> >> 2) Whether the settings were as default, and what they were
> >> >Several Systems as follows:
> >> No, I meant the NAV settings...
>
> >Default, only the AUTOMATIC Startup Scan was removed if added by the
> >default install.
>
> OK. Does it scan all file types, or just ones it expects to be risky?
The default IS ALL FILES, in the OLD DAYS it was defaulted to specific
files, they learned their lesson many years ago and the default is ALL
FILES.
>
> >> >Both systems responded the same after the initial startup - meaning that
> >> >one the system was booted, loggeded in, and had time to complete loading
> >> >the background apps, there was no detectable difference between the
> >> >systems running with/without Norton 2006 AV.
>
> >> Did starting up take longer?
>
> >Yes, and I fully expected it too - when you add something that inserts
> >itself into the load it's going to take longer.
>
> Well, that's one of the "bloat" factors; let's not gloss over that.
> Is the adverse impact of NAV 2006 greater thabn other av?
You could say that about many things, the more you load at startup the
longer startup takes - since this is true with EVERY application like
it, NAV is no better/worse, non-issue.
> Another bloat factor is memory useage, in the pure sense, rather than
> how well it works with recommended amounts of memory. Testing on XP
> with 128M RAM would be a good metric there. That's not only relevant
> to such systems, but a better predictor for systems with "enough" RAM
> that have other underfootware or foreground-app bloat factors.
Wrong, Windows XP needs 128 just for itself, anyone using Windows XP
with 128MB of RAM is not doing anything with the computer or just
doesn't really care that the machine is SLOW. 192MB is the real Minimum,
256MB if you don't want to hit the swap file on boot, and 512MB if you
leave all the eye-candy enabled and want to do anything with MS Office
2003.
So, anyone testing on 128MB of RAM will find that ALL AV real-time
scanners that provide quality protection will be a problem.
> >> Did you try switching between OE user identities?
> >
> >We don't use Outlook Express, only Outlook 2000/2003 or Thunderbird, so
> >switching was simple.
>
> Cool. I and mine generally use Eudora rather than OE etc. and the way
> this stores attachments obviates the need for mail scanning heroics.
> The issue with changing identities in OE was so severe that the user
> elected to abandon the NAV they paid for and use AVG instead.
I've never seen NAV (or any other) cause a problem with OE or Outlook
while doing real-time email scanning. I know that it's caused problems
for people (based on Usenet reports), but I've never seen it.
> >LOL, I don't think that Adobe Acrobat 7 is faster than 5 was, in fact,
> >it's had a lot of problems. I also don't think that NAV 2006 is faster
> >than NAV 2003 was, but it also does a LOT more than 2003 did.
>
> OK. Sometimesa reputation for bloatedness can persist after the
> bloating trend is stopped, allowing better performance as hardware
> catches up. I found this to be the case with MS Office, with Office
> 2000 as the last "yuk" waypoint. There was a time that MS Office
> raised the hardware bar significantly higher than the OS of the time;
> I think that is less the case these days.
>
> Acrobat Reader 6.xx was a pig, after 5.xx; I don't expect 7.xx to be
> as light as 5.xx but if it's better than than 6.xx, that's good. My
> mileage suggests that it is so, even with the sneaky "run the bloaty
> stuff at OS startup" feature ripped out.
>
> Also, Adobe finally got there act together on point-version
> distribution. With the 7.0.1-3 updates (mandated by exploitable
> defects), you had to first download 7.0.0 and then serially apply the
> updates. When 7.0.5 came out, it was; install 7.0.0 then 7.0.5, you
> can skip the .1-3 at least. Right now, you can download 7.0.5 as the
> complete package as nature intended, plus (from ActiveX-killing
> Firefox) you can download the whole thing without passing through some
> ghastly "live-install" stub or proprietary downloader.
>
> So it seems that dumb-ass vendors *can* learn old tricks (i.e. the
> same tricks everyone else got right from the time the earth cooled).
>
> >> I'd still avoid NAV, in view of post-"uninstall" remnants and DRM.
>
> >To each his own :)
>
> Well, let's discuss each of these in turn.
>
>
> It's well-known that Norton uninstallation is a PITA; in fact it can
> be very difficult to getr your installation back clean after it's been
> "Nortoned". I logged one such case; first I did the "front door"
> uninstallation methods (Add/Remove etc.) and it woulldn't uninstall
> unless I waved the CD at it. Then it left a ton of junk, so I
> downloaded and ran the post-uninstall cleanup tool from their web
> site. This still left a ton of junk in the registry, in fact I had to
> manually search and kill more stuff than the tool had cleared.
Sorry, while I've seen the reports myself, I've not experienced it in
the 28+ years I've been using computers (yea, norton was not around back
then). Norton has always uninstalled on every system without a problem,
same for Symantec - talking ONLY of AV products.
> I've heard folks seriously suggest a need to "just" wipe and rebuild
> to get rid of Norton. Now I know there are folks that suggest "just"
> wipe and rebuild whenever a gnat farts in the vicinity; these aren't
> the usual gang of idiots, but folks who I respect at the tech level.
>
> Now the loss of an installation is something I see as a Grade-A
> disaster; basically the outcome that maintenance tools such as av are
> there to prevent. Any software that precipitates this crisis is unfit
> for use, and certainly not worth paying for.
I've not had this experience, and we've got 1500+ systems running
Symantec Corp or NAV (2003+) on them.
> So when it comes to (re-)evaluating core software, this issue needs to
> be tested. Can its uninstaller wipe its own butt at last?
Norton AV and Symantec AV seem to remove the application just fine for
us. While I don't really care if they leave traces in the Registry, I
have not found any uninstall to fail yet.
> DRM concerns are two-fold. First, a vandor who is prepared to damage
> your interests on the assumption that you may be damaging theirs - and
> to automate this, as well - is not a vandor I want to depend on, much
> less support through any sort of payment. The trust isn't there.
Sorry, Symantec/Norton have not caused any problems with the kiddies
that use P2P apps, not caused any other problems with their AV products
that I know of, so I don't see the DRM issue at all.
If you want to worry about DRM, check the new laws that are specific to
HDTV Signal Retransmission.
> Second, and especially with an antivirus, there are specific practical
> considerations. Malware is software that adds unwanted functionality
> by stealth, and it's ironic to choose an anti-malware product that
> does exactly this. There are two practicalities:
Well, I've not seen Symantec / Norton Add anything unwanted to my
systems, please be specific about what you have that you didn't want.
> 1) Increased (exploitable?) fragility
>
> Once there is a poison-pill payload built into the product, this can
> be triggered by malware - just smash up something that triggers the
> DRM logic to assume the license terms are being broken.
>
> 2) Complicated manual malware management
>
> You may have to go after something "by hand", either because it's too
> new for the av to detect, or the av doesn't consider it malware, as is
> the case for much commercial malware and many bots.
>
> When you do, you will have to ask; is this unexpected intrusion into
> the system's integration or file set a part of the malware I'm after,
> or the av's DRM? If I leave this, will I leave the malware in place?
> If I kill this, will I find my av has died?
>
>
> Finally, we come to whether the putative better efficacy is worth the
> hassles and/or extra cost.
>
> I saw a study of commercial malware (cm) scanners that indicated the
> difference between using a compitent free product and the best fee
> product was smaller than using a compitent free product and two
> compitent free products. IOW, better results were obtained using two
> free scanners vs. one best-of-breed feeware scanner.
>
> This has long been the case with AdAware and Spybot; just about any PC
> infected with multiple cm will have some that are detected by one and
> not the other, and vice versa. Adding MSAS Beta as a backstop often
> brings to light a few more that both missed - but I'd never assume
> MSAS would catch everything that AdAware and Spybot caught.
>
> When it comes to interventional (clean-up) scanning, I'm finding the
> same applies to av. AntiVir 6 detects the most stuff, especially bots
> and droppers, but I would not assume that it finds everything that
> F-Prot, McAfee, SysClean andeven Stinger would find.
>
> So rather than chase the prefect av, I'd reduce dependence on av as
> far as possible, then corral all incoming material through a subtree
> that can be manually scanned via additional on-demand av, such as
> BitDefender, AntiVir in manual mode, SysClean, etc.
>
> The other drawback of feeware av is that it dies once a year. All the
> extra malware the feeware scanner may have caught in the last 12
> months, may be outweighed by the amount of stuff that can walk in
> between the time the av refuses to update, and management gets their
> act together to renew or replace the expired product.
>
> In my market, the only value I'd find compelling enough to pay for,
> would be a vendor-supported formal scanning and cleaning facility,
> such as encapsulated as Avast for Bart. Many av had "rescue" scanners
> that ran from off-HD DOS boot, but this isn't enough in an age of NTFS
> and HDs over 137G in capacity.
While I understand your concerns, I don't see how this applies to Norton
AV, it works on a marginally maintained system, works well, and is as
good as any of the others, better in most all cases, and is easy to
understand and use.
I can make this statement - I've never had a system running a Updated
version of Norton AV or Symantec AV that was compromised. I can not make
that statement about McAfee or AVG as I've had machines compromised
while running those products with updated definitions.
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