Topic: Spybot false positive on Vortex

[Scyphi]

Surprise! I'm not going to give Thomas an earful about his take on the need for firewalls.

I dunno, dad, in posted text terms, I'd call that an earful.

[Thomas]

Surprise! I'm not going to give Thomas an earful about his take on the need for firewalls.

I dunno, dad, in posted text terms, I'd call that an earful.

Yeah, but I can cope with it. ;-)

At the end of the day, this is a discussion forum. In plain English: Discussions welcome.

Pick up your sword, TechPro, and fight like a man...

[TechPro]

Now and then, I wonder just how far from the truth this might be ...

Sherman's Lagoon.  This was published in September 2004.  You can see more Sherman's Lagoon here.

Thomas, You're right that there is room for doubt with what anti-virus programs are actually "good" because they ALL have their issues and weaknesses.  I consider "good" to be the ones that have the higher average record of performing better than the rest (catches the bugs better than most), consistently good customer satisfaction, reasonably priced, not too much of a burden on the user's system, updates silently and automatically daily.  Anything else just doesn't cut the mustard.

That said, I consider AVG and Avira among the better choices because they have proven to perform well consistently, do not load down the user's system excessively, price is very reasonable (both have free versions for personal use), and catch the bugs more often than at least 85% of the other anti-virus choices.

I consider running an anti-virus program a good computer practice for all people.  I'm not going to say someone is stupid for not running one because I do not know that person's Internet and computer habits.  Perhaps the person has the habits that tend to keep that person clear of the bugs.  Perhaps the person doesn't, and that's why I recommend it for everyone.

As for Firewalls, it all depends on your needs, what you do, how your system connects to the rest of the world, and what other computers are in proximity to you and how those computers are setup and how they are used.  A lot of variables there.  So it's very simple to just recommend users be running a firewall if there is any question about what might be nearby.

From time to time I'm cleaning up other people's computers, updating their systems (because they couldn't manage that simple step) and so on ... which means I cannot always ensure how clean the computers next to mine may be ... so it makes sense to protect my systems.  Once the customer's system is cleaned up, it's no longer a concern ... but until then, it's a good idea to be protected.

Hmmm... We've gotten a bit off-topic from what this thread started about.  Wonder if we need to split it?  Of course, it may be that as soon as we split it, the conversation may trickle off...

[-<WillyP>-]

Yes, I think we've beat this horse...