AntiVirus Warning
It is a sad day when the antivirus software
messes up your computer more than the @#$& virus
you got in yesterday's email. The more complex
antivirus software gets, the more it becomes
like a virus itself. In honor of my recent
discovery of a new problem with my antivirus
program, here are a few pitfalls of popular (and
not so popular) programs:
1. "Norton Crash Guard crashes my computer."
This is the first problem I noticed with
Symantec's popular suite of computer protective
software. Norton Crash Guard immediately forced
my brother's new Compaq computer even with
errors that would normally just shut down the
program involved. (That was just the worse case.)
On other computers, loading Crash Guard slowed
down the computer so much I felt compelled to
take it off.
2. "Norton AntiVirus is keeping me from
accessing the internet."
When I first installed Norton AntiVirus, I had
to call our internet service provider AND Eudora
in order to access email again. It turns out the
program tries to route all email through their
server to check for viruses. You have to go into
your preferences and reset them in a way that
will work with your internet service provider.
I'm not the only one, either! I recently
received a message from a direct mail guru who
said he was offline for almost 12 hours because
he loaded Norton AntiVirus to delete a virus he
inadvertently picked up from an email message.
3. "Norton Systemworks is slowing down my
computer."
My Dad recently took a computer in because it
was having some problems. The technician told
him they recommended everyone uninstall the
Norton Systemworks computer monitor (the little
window that tells you how much your drive is
fragmented, how much of your CPU you're using,
etc.).
They claim the little box does nothing Windows
doesn't already and slows your computer down
10%! (I believe them. I remember how much faster
the computers were before we loaded it, and my
computer at home has been fine without it.)
4. "Internet Explorer (IE) won't work!"
This was my big problem for over a year. It
started (coincidentally) about the same time I
loaded Netscape 4.7. I've heard of other people
having problems with Netscape and IE on the same
computer, so I assumed Netscape was the problem.
I tried installing Netscape and re-installing
it. I tried uninstalling IE and re-installing
it. Nothing worked.
Sunday night, my antivirus program (Aladdin's E-
Safe Desktop) gave me an error when IE
accidentally popped up. I unloaded the program,
and IE started to work! I don't know why I
didn't think of it before. I uninstalled the
program and now IE works fine.
IE has ActiveX, a language that has been found
capable of delivering viruses, and Microsoft is
constantly using it to send update information
to users. My virus protection software shut down
the program for my computer's own good!
5. "What about McAfee?"
Well, maybe McAfee is better. It's been working
okay on my computer for about a week now.
However, I've heard horror stories about them
from some of my subscribers as well! In the
past, I've had problems with updates.
"There's always hope!"
I polled my subscribers about the best antivirus solutions, and Trend
Software's PC-Cillan won. You can download their software (priced competitively
with Norton's AntiVirus and
McAfee's Virus Shield at http://www.trend.com/
One subscriber also recommended a free solution: AVG anti-virus from
http://www.grisoft.com
Good luck!
About the Author
Dawn Gray writes Busy Marketing Tips! Subscribe
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