Vagrant0 Posted January 2, 2007 Share Posted January 2, 2007 I'm currently using Spybot and Norton Antivirus, but have noticed my browser and other things to be acting a bit more screwy lately. I've already done scans, updated windows, and would prefer not wasting 13+ hours of my life reformatting. I was wondering if anyone knew of any free (reliable) programs which might catch something that these two are missing due to their algorithims (sp). I know there are alot of people using both, so there are bound to be people trying to work around these two. Any information would be great. I know that there isn't any such thing as a perfectly safe system, I'm just trying to prevent some lucky script kiddie from screwing me over. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marxist ßastard Posted January 2, 2007 Share Posted January 2, 2007 perfectly safe systemhttp://www.openbsd.org/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vagrant0 Posted January 2, 2007 Author Share Posted January 2, 2007 Yes, but seeing as how I'm not going to start learning a new OS, and it doesn't support my platform, it isn't much of an option. That and it's UNIX based, which means that you have to have some idea as to what the hell you're doing just to get it working. In my case, it would only be 100% safe because I wouldn't be able to do anything with it. I was looking more for a tool or something I could just download and install. Not something that I'd have to spend a few weeks trying to tweak, code, and adjust just to get any benefit. If I had that kind of time to spend, I'd probably just burn every semi-important file I have to CD/DVD, and just do fresh formats every time something goes wrong. I'm looking for an alternative. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SerpentofShadow Posted January 2, 2007 Share Posted January 2, 2007 I was looking more for a tool or something I could just download and install. Not something that I'd have to spend a few weeks trying to tweak, code, and adjust just to get any benefit. If I had that kind of time to spend, I'd probably just burn every semi-important file I have to CD/DVD, and just do fresh formats every time something goes wrong. I'm looking for an alternative. I use spybot (which you already listed) and Ad-Aware SE Personal. The two of those seem to catch just about anything in my experiance. Always worth a try (seeing as it is free). I'll ask a couple more tech savy friends of mine if they have any other suggestions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Switch Posted January 2, 2007 Share Posted January 2, 2007 You could always get a router with a hardware firewall. I've had one for a while now and hardly anything seems to get through it. They can cost a bit though, and take a bit of setting up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vagrant0 Posted January 2, 2007 Author Share Posted January 2, 2007 You could always get a router with a hardware firewall. I've had one for a while now and hardly anything seems to get through it. They can cost a bit though, and take a bit of setting up.I'm pretty sure I do, the problem is keeping me safe from my own occasional blindness and stupidity. Installed ad-aware, the only thing it caught was the little spyware thingy from filefront. So either there's something all three are missing, or I have something else wrong. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cactoblasta Posted January 3, 2007 Share Posted January 3, 2007 This may sound like a dumb question, but is there a lot of dust inside the case? I had similar stability problems with no apparent reason - until I opened the case and realised the thing was suffering under 5mm of dust. The fans couldn't work properly and dust was in all the connectors so it became unstable. Try having a look to see if a bit of cleaning doesn't fix things up. If it's software and you really must use windows then my only advice is to use an obscure browser and don't be an internet girlfriend. Just because there's plenty of experiences on offer doesn't mean you should open your legs to the world. Chastity is a virtue. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vagrant0 Posted February 21, 2008 Author Share Posted February 21, 2008 Reviving an old thread since Ad Aware seems to have some significant issues with their latest version and older versions havn't been updating. Other than spybot (which has some security holes due to being used more commonly) and Norton, what free software (Norton isn't free, but that isn't the issue) do you people know of that can detect harmful software or cookies which are transmitted from various sites or online actions? Anything that would make a good second or third line defense to catch what others miss would be what is being asked for. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheTerminator2004 Posted February 22, 2008 Share Posted February 22, 2008 How about using a proxy service? Unless you're willing to pay a couple of quid a month, speeds are generally quite slow, but they can really help. http-tunnel is one option, free service is capped at 1.5kb/s (you'd be surprised how well it works, actually), pay one runs at 40kb/s. Personally, I prefer your Freedom, free service is 64kb/s, but it disconnects you every hour, and it has several different pay services, the cheapest of which runs at 256kb/s, the most expensive is something like 4mb/s. Other than that, depending on what you plan to do, you should seriously consider Linux. Get one of the easier to use distributions, such as Ubuntu, and set up a dual-boot, which is easy. It'll come with firefox already installed (I assume you use that for windows already, btw? if not, switch, it's much more secure), and if you don't try and do anything complicated, such as compile software or whatever, it's very easy to use. Finally, CCleaner could come in useful - it is an excellent tool for cleaning out the thousands of old, unused registry entries that have undoubtedly built up over time, which not only speeds up your PC, but if any viruses/adware/whatever are in the form of a registry entry, which quite a few are, it'll get rid of them too. I'm not sure of the link though; I got my copy off the PCGamer cover disk. Another idea is to use Autoruns, (which i also got off the pcgamer disk), which is used to find out what things are run automatically when your PC starts up, as well as disabling/deleting them if necessary. It was instrumental in getting rid of some spyware that had hidden itself as a dll file in my windows system directory, where i would never have found it otherwise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Storm Raven Posted February 22, 2008 Share Posted February 22, 2008 Finally, CCleaner could come in useful - it is an excellent tool for cleaning out the thousands of old, unused registry entries that have undoubtedly built up over time, which not only speeds up your PC, but if any viruses/adware/whatever are in the form of a registry entry, which quite a few are, it'll get rid of them too. I'm not sure of the link though; I got my copy off the PCGamer cover disk. Another idea is to use Autoruns, (which i also got off the pcgamer disk), which is used to find out what things are run automatically when your PC starts up, as well as disabling/deleting them if necessary. I concur with The_Terminator on CCleaner but there is a trick to using it, which I will add to my PM. Autoruns is great but if you know how to use the Computer Management utility in Windows, you can control a lot more without the problems associated with terminating processes. --- 8) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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