Me and my Symantec...

[oldhermit]

In my list of the wonderous little things that NIS does to my computer, I have yet one more to add after today's LiveUpdate.

On the following scan it turned my cursor into a thumbnail of some unknown document. Of course, too tiny to recognize. No matter how much I shake the mouse, the document sticks.

So pardon me if I sound a little like Cheech: "Come on February 15!"

[Ridgerunr]

Sorry,but I just 'have' to say it. Anyone who uses NIS(Symanwreck),has to have a phobia for self abuse...

Have you looked in Control Panel>mice>pointers to see what shows up there? And,,if it's wrong,try to browse to a proper one and change it?

[oldhermit]

Eh. Skepticism is of no help.
Best to not discourage questions with it. Too many users are already reluctant to ask them.

Ex-Symantec users can save their flames. This thread was intended as informational.

[Ridgerunr]

Sorry if 'your' levity was the only allowed in 'your' post. I guarantee it will never happen again. At least from 'this' poster...

Have a nice day!

[J A L]

I am going to use free online scanners now for most of my maitanence.

Ran into and used a few of them today.

Panda online scanner

Rav Online scanner

Spyware Guide Active X scanner (For Internet Explorer As It Is A Active X Scanner)

Adaware

Spybot search and destroy

Trend Micro Online Anti Virus Trojan Scanner

Smantec Online security and virus scanner

Pc Pitstop Spyware and More select the full scan

These sites will take some time to run them all but several of these sites found stuff on my computers. On one computer I run Norton Anti Virus 2003 and on another I run Anti Virus Grisoft (AVG). Both systems had trojans and all sorts of spyware on em! How depressing. Anyways I feel that when all the crap is removed from IE it runs about as fast as Firefox which I mostly run. Problem is I need IE form time to time and it keeps getting infected! Grr. Hopefully after all this I have nipped it in the bud for now! If you think Firefox runs faster then you probably have spyware malware and adware along with possible trojans. It's almost impossible not to have any of that stuff on your computer if your on the internet using IE! Ebay even has spyware from doubleclick in it's cookies.

I posted this here in this thread because I think the free stuff is just as good if not better than the stuff you pay for!

I found the Rav and the Panda online scanners to be better than most at sniffing out stuff. I never shut down my antivirus (norton anti virus) while running all the online scans. They all worked just fine with it running too.

Old Hermit sorry to hear about your pointer. I still run Norton but these days I am finding it's not enough to run one or two things and it takes a barrage of different scans to sniff out all the junk!

I loaded spyware blaster on my system as a test for now. It is designed to keep spyware off your computer before it even gets loaded on. I doubt if it will catch everything though as nothing else seems to catch everything. Most everything on the internet for defense is reactionary. The viruses/trojans/spyware/adware are out there and it takes time for the detect software to catch up!

Ridgerunr, Norton antivirus seems ok. Had systemworks long ago in my 95 days. There were a few programs in it that worked good and others you shouldn't run! I found Norton does an acceptable job with anti virus and for everything Else I use free online scanners for now.

[oldhermit]

Thanks JAL. That is an excellent post.

Norton products have a record of not working on some computers, while they serve others as intended without a single complaint. This record goes back several years, but the 04/12 update from Symantec seemed to cause the most problems since it repaired two major flaws within the firewall. At the time, Symantec just as well said: We're taking care of our clients, and this is the way it must be.

The LiveUpdates since then have shown some rather strange effects. Since I'm allowing my current subscription to run out, NIS is only installed on my backup computer. I find a good challenge in keeping it running despite the efforts of so many people who would like very much to destroy it.

You are right. The glitches are small, and amount to nothing more than annoyances, because the program itself keeps right on ticking away and doing it's job. If it didn't, I would eliminate NIS in a heartbeat.