I know we have IT people here, and I would like your opinion please.
I just got a new ThinkPad. The first thing installed will be my paid copy of Malwarebytes.
So that got me thinking about seeing how my AV app compares with others. I use the same test results site that computer repairman uses. He says is not influenced by ads or bribery as far as he can tell.
Having the AV integrated with the OS seems like it could be a good idea for avoiding potential conflicts.
I suppose it will keep itself up-to-date by itself. I'll have to dig into the cryptic MS controls to find out where a control panel, quarantine, and/or manual scans are.
Malwarebytes premium finds things that other AV apps do not, because it works differently. So it's best to have both.
Moving all my apps from an old computer to the new one is definitely a time sink, but it needs to be done. I suppose google and I will be good friends for a few days (actually I use StartPage as it isn't voluntary spyware).
I can see a right click will allow me to scan individual files or drives like my old aftermarket AV apps did.
It'll be nice not having an additional app on the computer taking up resources and disk space. When my aftermarket subscription runs out on my other computer I think I'll just delete it and use Defender.
Great, and for the most part I haven't touched the default settings. It's never interrupted music recording, editing, flight simming, or other gaming either. I'll get an occasional message in the lower right notifications area that scans were clean which is more a reassurance than an annoyance.
We use an offsite IT company at the office which is a CPA firm and security is very important. I had a long conversation with them when I bought my latest computer.
I was told Defender is integrated with the OS and most importantly you need to use Edge with it not another browser if you really want the best security. The IT company will not allow us to install another browser. Edge is not IE. When folks talk about how IE has issues they're using an older version of Windows, not Win 10. This is why I've harped continuously on these forums that folks need to upgrade to Win 10 AND do the automatic updates. That's very important according to our IT guys.
Now, I started a thread about problems with the latest October update and what MS is doing about it and now it's been delayed again. Some will take that and say see, MS is crap, these updates will hose my system, I'm not doing it. Wrong. Nothing's perfect and this is another example of folks needing to be on top of it and be aware that's all. When the update is finally ready, let it happen.
People like to trash MS because they are the Alpha OS. And yes, they have made their fair share of mistakes, but so has Apple and probably just about every other complex computer app. Look how many bug fix updates the good folks at PG Music supply us with.
Computers are complex, and there are so many different variations out here with an almost infinite array of apps running on the OS. I doubt that two computers have exactly the same things on them. Plus some of the apps running on the OS are not written properly and have taken 'illegal' short-cuts not approved by MS or Apple, so real world testing is impossible.
I have several months remaining on my paid Avast. After that expires, I'll not renew and go to Defender exclusively.
My question ... Is it not advisable to use both at the same time? Does that create potential issues, create conflicts, diminish to effectiveness of my protection, or just slow things down?
My (desktop) computer - the one I'm referring to - is pretty dang fast (I5-6th gen, 8 Gigs DDR4) and both AVs are running right now. When I pose the question on Google, the "answers" are all over the place. I appreciate any thoughts you knowledgeable folks might have.
Thanks. I may give it a try. I have several desktops and a laptop still on W7. My wife's laptop and All in one are W10 so I will likely set those up first.
No. In Win 7 Defender is not integrated with the OS and it's not as robust. Because of this our IT company had to install and run a separate AV program on each workstation and according to them it was a PIA. That was one of many reasons they pushed us for several years to upgrade all the workstations to Win10. Win 10 has it's automatic update feature that some folks hate. Well, the update includes Defender along with whatever else.
I'm not the expert but I work with some and know some others and I read a lot. An OS is sort of an island unto itself. You can do lots of things on that island but you're restricted to what's there. When you're able to move to another island (upgrading to a new OS) you have lots of new things that you can do that you couldn't do on the old island. Or, something like that haha.
Lots of folks are still on Win 7. If it ain't broke don't fix it. I get that, I believe in that too for almost everything but computers. Computers have a useful life of about 3-4 years. Then regardless of it still "working" perfectly, no hangups, no BSOD, it's time has expired because of too many things to list here. If it still runs great that means you can sell it or give it to a friend with a clear conscience but I would still tell them to upgrade it to Win 10.
Another very important element is the integration between the OS and the CPU/Mobo. Intel is coming out with new versions of their CPU's every year or two. And now AMD has re-entered the fray with their new Ryzen series of chips. Security is a big part of the new chips if not the biggest part. Mobo's change to support the new chips.
Hacking and security is as serious as a heart attack. I can tell a story about how hackers got into a business and cloned their hard drive by piggybacking on a wireless printer. Because the printer isn't on all the time it took them almost a year to do it but they did it and then got busted which is how I know about it.
Here's another tidbit I just saw yesterday when I was watching a bunch of DAW related vids on Youtube. The guy was testing a Surface Pro 6 with different DAW's and mentioned he had been having issues with low latency audio output when stressing the system but the night before he did the vid there was a Win 10 update. After the update he was doing some music work on the system and his problem was gone. He then tested it further and it was truly gone. The update fixed something with the audio output and a latency of 128 samples which is about 5ms.
Yet another reason to just let the updates happen.
Malwarebytes is the only other protection app that I know of that you can work along with another Anti-Virus/Malware app. The way I understand it is they work in completely different ways, so they do not interfere with each other.
Malwarebytes pro IMHO is well worth the price you pay for it.
... Malwarebytes pro IMHO is well worth the price you pay for it.
Insights and incites by Notes
Concur (re:Malwarebytes) Larry
Win10Pro,i9,64GB,2TBSSD+20TBHDDs,1080TI,BIAB'24,Scarlett18i8,Montage7,Fusion 8HD,QS8,Integra7,XV5080,QSR,SC-8850,SPLAT,FL21&others,Komp.14,IK suite&others, just a guitar player-AXE FX III &FM9T, FishmanTP, MIDIGuitar2, GK2/3'sw/GI20
I think you've offered some very good advice. I very reluctabtly upgrade from Win 7 to Win 10 two years ago. Now, I am very happy I did.
I can't speak with any authority about the technical IT issues you've commented on, but I think it's common knowledge that Win 10, when consistently updated, is the safest and fastest Windows OS ever. Most people are simply resistant to change by human nature. Familiarity is a warm and fuzzy thing, ya know! But to them, I would suggest you would get that same warm and fuzzy after a few months on Win 10.
I'm still using Chrome but plan on going to Edge real soon. I'll take your word about the advantages of the OS and web browser integration - makes sense. My main issue is that Chrome is becoming very invasive.
Enough of my blabbering. Thanks for all the good info you give us on these matters.
I shy away from Chrome for the same reason why I use StartPage or DuckDuckGo instead of Google. IMO it's voluntary spyware.
Now I wouldn't mind them tracking me and selling the information if they would give me 20% of the take.
I know, if it's free, you are the product, not the customer. But after some of the abuses I've read about data collection on PC Mag, CNet and other pubs, I decided to minimize what they know about me.
I have been paying attention to his thread being an Avast free user. and wondering if I was missing something with Windows Defender.
The UK computer mag PC Pro has its front cover heading this month with Dump Windows Defender now. They give it a high false positive rating of 3.1% They seem to think it affects computer performance as well and award it one star.
Labs winner is Kaspersky (paid) and best free they say is Panda free antivirus.
I suppose at end of day it boils down as to what you feel works for you. I won't be changing from Avast to Panda at the moment, though Avast got a reasonable rating but too many pop ups they say which I totally agree with.
Windows 10 (64bit) M-Audio Fast Track Pro, Band in a Box 2024, Cubase 13, Cakewalk and far too many VST plugins that I probably don't need or will ever use
I have been using Eset NOD32 AV literally for YEARS. I'm not going to say what the results have been out of fear that something goes awry. But the number "one" has a big part to do with my story.
I also have Win Defender running along side NOD32 because if on occasion one misses something the other picks it up.
I have been watching this thread with some interest for some time. Years ago Defender was not ready. At least in a corporate sense. But, I have been out of the protection world for a few years now and the game changes in weeks.
What is important is that you have protection. (Be it Saturday night for young folk. Or any time on your computer.) What is critical is you have only one fire wall (if you have two which has the correct rules). When it comes to a virus defence two good virus protection platforms may help but often you will only increase the number of false positives and/or slow your systems down,
At least be careful where you go and what you download. I reckon 80% of the folk I help these days have installed something “free” and got more than they thought. (This can also happen with free VST downloads (and even some not free)). A lot of free stuff comes with unwanted add ons (nuffin comes for nuffin so let’s all look on the bright side of ....j.
Be careful, get protection (even Defender) but most importantly as my mum (mom for those that don’t understand mum) don’t look at things you should not. As my wife says if you look don’t touch. Only take freebies from folk you know and can trust.
Last but not least. Keep backups of everything you can’t get elsewhere easily. (20+ years ago I had a chap (doing his doctorate) who had almost finished his book on mathematical principles come to me for advice. “My internal disc drive makes funny noises” he said. I said “back up onto floppy all your critical data.” A day or so later he came to me with foam coming from his lips “I’ve lost my whole bloody book. I backed up Word (just released) and backed up MS DOS (the operating system) But it was important I keep my book private”. My response was “it is now very private. No one can get it”.
Back up your music into different places. Onto external systems if at all possible.
My experiences and thoughts
Tony
Last edited by Teunis; 11/10/1802:49 AM.
HP i7-4770 16GB 1TB SSD, Win 10 Home, Focusrite 2i2 3rd Gen, Launchkey 61, Maton CW80, Telecaster, Ovation Elite TX, Yamaha Pacifica 612 BB 2022(912) RB 2022(2), CakeWalk, Reaper 6, Audacity, Melodyne 5 Editor, Izotope Music Production Suite 4.1
I'm with you on the backup advice Tony. I found out the hard way. Took my PC in for a very much needed upgrade last year. The only thing I didn't have to change was my second drive (drive D). I took it home and turned it on. Had a look at the D drive... all that I had on there were files... pictures, documents and the like. No program files. Almost started to cry when I saw that the guy formatted the D drive. Every picture I had taken in ten years were gone. All my music stuff was gone. Actually, my whole life was on there.
I'm certainly not going to put any blame or show any anger towards the guy. If I let stuff lay on that drive for as long as I did without backing it up then it's my bad.
I did learn from it. I now have a Seagate 3 TB external drive ($100) and it takes a half second to plug it in and another second to transfer copies of my stuff over to it. It also takes about 5 minutes to burn all this stuff onto a CD for added protection.
If you are using Windows, you can download ThinkToy from Microsoft. It can synchronize data files from your C drive to an external with a couple of mouse clicks.
At the end of a session, run it, and it will see which files have been either added or changed on the C drive and make the adjustments on the external drive. It also puts overwritten files in the recycle bin.
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