A Neophyte's Questions

Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security
1

As a relatively new user of Avast 4 for home use, I have some questions which I hope someone in the forum will be so kind as to answer for me.

  1. what is the difference between iAVS update and program update?
  2. which should I update first, or just one of them?
  3. everytime an update occurs, are all of those bits of data cumulative to the existing program - ie., does the program file just grow and grow in size?
  4. what is the VRDB generator, and when/how would I use it?
  5. periodically, should I do a scan of my hard drive (anything else?) with avast? If yes, what frequency and how to do this?

Thanks in advance for your help…Jim

2

hi

  1. iAVS is virus definition updates…while the other is program version updates

  2. both…you can set it to be automatic…

  3. it’s incremental…so as to keep each updates small in sizes

  4. vrdb is for virus recovery purposes…keeping backups of 3 versions back of files in an attempt to repair if any files is infected…search in this forum and you will find tons of info

  5. i do it weekly…it depends on how paranoid you are

sorry for the brief but prompt reply…coz it’s bedtime for me… ;D

3

Hi and welcome, SlimJim,

If I may expand on shgoh’s reply just a little – for most of us the default setups (auto for definitions updates, advise-when-available for the program itself) work just fine.

More importantly, any time you do a program update (or check to see if there is one) it also checks for new definitions at the same time. So if you’re doing manual update checks, all you really need to check for is the program.

Best,
Mike

4

SlimJim -

Welcome to avast! and to the forums! :smiley:

5

Thanks to shgoh, MikeBCda and CharleyO for responding to my questions. I’ll do a search on this forum to learn more about the use of the VRDB generator…

As a side note, I’m really appreciative of having available to use a program such as Avast - and of having this forum where we all can learn more about how to protect ourselves from viruses…Slim Jim