Kaspersky or ClamWin?

I recently lost just about everything on my computer and the computer engineer who fixed my computer installed ClanWin anti virus and Malwarebytes anti malware.

Previously I had Kaspersky which was free from my bank but lost with everything else.

I can easily get Kaspersky back from my bank with activation codes but the engineer said ClamWin and Malwarebytes was better.

Never having heard of it before I would welcome any advice from all you experts out there.

I have Windows XP

Thanks.
Brian

First time I've heard of ClamWin I must admit, however it doesn't look great to me:-

http://www.clamwin.com/

You might like to have a look through this for a few pointers:-

http://forums.thinkbroadband.com/security/f/4174048-...

I just use Microsoft Security Essentials and have never had an issue to worry me......

http://windows.microsoft.com/is-IS/windows/security-...

Never heard of Clamwin but over the years I've paid for Norton and for McAfee, tried AVG and other freeware, and first bought Kaspersky five years ago. It has worked very well for me and I'll buy it again when it's due next month.

A few points: this year's version can be bought under £20 online and upgraded to 2013 as usual. Don't overwrite an existing version, remove it and do clean install. Don't waste time asking Kaspersky for help (they won't) but do go to their excellent forum where most questions can be answered in minutes.

It sounds like the Windows version of ClamXav, an AV widely used on Macs.

The Mac version works pretty well.

Having looked at the web site it says this

Please note that ClamWin Free Antivirus does not include an on-access real-time scanner. You need to manually scan a file in order to detect a virus or spyware.

An AV that doesnt do real time scanning is of limited value and a user base of "600,000" isnt brilliant for an AV package!

I don't know how long it's been available- it's certainly new to me so can't really comment on the user base but judging by the version number (0.97.6) it's pretty new. The Mac version is 2.3.4.

The Mac version uses a "Sentry" mode where you define folders to be "watched"- any file new (or, I assume, modified) that it finds in there will be scanned. Maybe that will come on the Windows version, I've no idea.

eset nod antivvirus and malware bytes

i too use kaspersky KIS 2011 but the above combination is very compatible with all specs of computers

nowadays you find AV solutions don't half slow down computers

In reply to a post by Stanman_24:

nowadays you find AV solutions don't half slow down computers

On my iMac, during a scan ClamXav shows a CPU of ~80%, but that's spread across 4 cores where max'ed out shows as 400%.

So it's not minimal footprint but not particularly intrusive either, I don't notice any significant slow-down.

I read "an on-access real-time scanner" as checking files when you open them, and executables before running. I expect it does a real-time scan as things are received from the net.

Edit - I still wouldn't go near it!

Edited by RobertoS (Wed 12-Dec-12 17:13:48)

ClamAV is open source & cross platform, usually used to scan windows files on servers, scan emails or for fixing virus riddled windows machines from a bootable linux environment.

I don't really think of it as a modern Windows desktop protection product.

Thanks everyone for your replies although a lot of it is way over my head!

I have now got Kaspersky 2013 installed free from my bank but my computer is soooooooooo slow now that earlier trying to get the BBC news it took 45 seconds to appear and everything else seems to take forever as well.

I still have Malwarebytes installed, would this be working against Kasperski?

That is the problem with a free lunch. I always found KIS strangled the system, especially when installing software or scanning. I shifted to Kaspersky Pure 2.0 alongside Webroot SecureAnywhere complete which is cloud based, lightning fast and has turned out to be one of the best, so i will probably drop kaspersky Pure next year. You can get a free trial here http://www.webroot.com/customerSupport/trialRegistra... try it with Kaspersky shut down and be amazed at the speed, or run alongside and compare the performance.
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2411616,00.asp
http://www.comparedandreviewed.com/total-security-so...

Edited by professor973 (Fri 14-Dec-12 09:03:49)

I still have Malwarebytes installed, would this be working against Kasperski?

the free version of Malwarebytes doesn't have a resident component, as I understand it. It scans when you run it. The paid for one has some sort of protection layer and at least one AV used to ask for it to be removed before it would install due to incompatibility.

You can only really run one proper AV on a system at once, but some other malware products may be complementary.

As Yarwell says, Malwarebytes only runs when you run it to clean up a virus - it has no background service and so won't be 'competing' with Kaspersky.

Like I said earlier, I have found Microsoft Security Essentials perfectly adequate and it has no slowing effect. Maybe try using something other than Kaspersky????

Thanks again for your advice and have been researching MSE which seems to have mixed reviews but for some reason my computer is working much faster this morning so will see how it goes and if it does start crawling along to such a speed that it is all but unusable I will have to change.
I wish I was about 55 years younger then I would perhaps understand all this stuff!

Age isn't really an issue - my son is 24 and only knows how to switch his computer on. Any problems and it's a call for his 60+ year old Dad!!