Pros' Takes On Multiple AV Programs?

Hey guys,

I have a question about running multiple antivirus programs.

Do you recommend it?

I have heard mixed answers about this. Some have said yes, some have said no. From what I have seen, the consensus seems to be, “Not a good idea, because they can conflict with each other;” yet, I know many people who use more than one antivirus program in attempts to protect their computers.

What do you guys think? I know there’s a lot of experienced “malware fighters” out there who could give some insight on this. Any insight from those who know better than the average computer user is appreciated.

The short answer is NO it isn’t recommended to have multiple resident anti-viruses installed at the same time.

There is too much chance of conflict when scanning files, even if you disable the resident function they will still have low level drivers running.

Throw a none into a room with three dogs and they will fight over the bone, same for three AVs trying to fight for control over the file. The file has to be locked first in order to be scanned.

I see. Thank you, DavidR. That makes sense to me. What’s your take on multiple firewalls? (I knew a lot of people who used multiple firewalls back in the day, and I was always curious about it).

You can’t, you shouldn’t run more than one antivirus at a time in the computer.
They will conflict, sooner or later, and the last result will be much worse than having only a good one.

Otherwise, you can have other on demand (not resident) scanners.

Firewalls are a little different and some of them could coexist, specially with Windows ones.
But, generally, it is better have only one good, with inbound and outbound protection.

Never install two antivirus (see reply from quietman7)
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/index.php?s=7c8217673a726b92cfc91ecfd4294a29&showtopic=260844&view=findpost&p=1441638

Hi Tech,

Thank you for the link. The article was very informative. About firewalls–would you say that the windows firewall is sufficient?

Rather depends on your Operating System, XP no as it has zero outbound protection, the Vista and Win7 firewalls have outbound protection but it is disabled by default. However, even even when enabled it isn’t very user friendly and you may need another interface to make it more user friendly.

OS…??

Windows 7.

For W7 the answer is: Yes.

Inbound protection, yes. It’s a very good firewall.
Outbound protection you need advanced configuration (it’s not user friendly) or a 3rd party firewall. There are good freeware for that.

Is ZoneAlarm a good free firewall?

Does the job… But in my personal opinion:
Comodo
Online Armour
OutPost Free Security Suite
will do it better.

Thank you so much for your recommendations. I have heard of Comodo, but not the other two (at least, until I came here). I shall check them out. Your input was appreciated, Tech!

You’re welcome lareinatortura.