Computer Virus Question

[JJHardy7]

I recently bought a Dell laptop and was wondering what some of the best computer virus protection programs are. The laptop came with a month of McAfee, but what should I use after that is up? Are there any free programs out there that will do the trick or do I have to fork over money for something better? Thanks in advance!

[sgtcluels]

AVG Free does a decent job. free.avg.com

[LouisEly]

Before you take sgtcluels (Sergent Clueless? No offense, just wondering if that is what it stands for) advice, I highly recommend that you look at T Bone's thread posted just the other day:

 

http://forum.brewerfan.net/viewtopic.php?t=16943

 

Doesn't exactly look like AVG did its job there. The fact that it's free scares me - my experience has been with most things ultimately you get what you pay for. "There is no such thing as a free lunch."

 

My anti-virus is from Computer Associates, which I got free after rebate last year with purchase of H&R Block Tax Cut. Every year at Staples (I think Office Depot and Office Max have the same deals) you can get free (after rebate) anti-virus software with the purchase of any tax software. I was at Staples earlier today and they have the same deal going on right now. I didn't see CA's software, but they had free Norton and Webroot anti-virus and anti-spyware software with tax software purchase.

 

CA is very good - it intercepted a virus that I accidentally started downloading the other day on a P2P network and immediately quarantined it without infecting my computer. The downside is that it is very slow to scan my computer - takes 10 hours! I have a 2-month free trial of Norton 2009 on my new computer I got from Woot (the HP Media Center with Vista that everyone on Woot says is horrible but works great for me), and it works very fast and is not the RAM hog that the older versions of Norton were.

 

Also, CA has a computer protection guarantee where they will basically insure your computer for up to $2500 if it fails and your computer gets damaged. I think Norton has the same thing. Something to keep in mind.