Should read ANTI-virus, sorry. Dusting off old dos skills has apparently fried my brain.

I was in the process of upgrading a CPU/Mobo into an older PII233 system when I discovered a virus (W32/Weird-10240) ravaging said computer.

Can anyone recommend a few good virus programs that I can search out and try so that I never have to go through the headache of cleaning some 800+ infected EXE files again (I'll use Sophos to clear my present infestation)?

BTW would prefer not to use Norton or McAfee, but if one of either of their current offerings is the best, I might change my mind.

Thanks in advance.

I have always prefered Norton myself.  Main thing is to be careful what you open and get frequent updates on virus definitions for whatever program you get

BTT

I need as many recommendations as possible from as wide a group of users as possible. Thanks.

I love Panda Antivirus
[url]http://www.pandasoftware.com[/url]

I hate all anti-virus software.  But if I had to pick I would pick norton.  It is quite a resource pig though.  I hated mcaffe.  I still make a mean face when I type that name.  :(

I posted a similar question awhile back, and Norton was most recommended.  I have Norton, which seems to do a good job, but their support is mainly online, and I don't like it on a "one on one" basis.  Not user friendly IMHO.  Their data / knowledge base seems to be good however, if you know which particular virus / worm, etc. is causing you difficulty.

I recommend Norton (current version is 2002) to clients & find it's good at catching stuff and easy to use.  Whichever program you get, make sure you set it up to update (Norton calls it 'Live Update') itself automatically...it's the brand new virii that seem to do the damage.

The Norton security website [url]www.sarc.com[/url] has a good description of virii and instructions on how to remove them (most of the time)

hth
-hanko

If the government wants to spy on you a virus program won't help :)

I'll cast my vote for the Norton product, it is the one I've had the most experience with and think highly of it.  For a few bucks more, you can get the System Works product.  This has 12 months of Anti Virus and updates, Norton Utilities (hard disk maintenance, defrag, etc),
Clean Sweep (uninstall and registry cleaner), Go Back ( I'm ambivalent about this, I don't use it on my machine but put it on the rest of the family's systems and all my clients)  It allows you to "Go Back" to the last successful re-boot if a problem occurs and on the Pro version you get a personal edition of Ghost which allows you to make disk imaes and to move the data from one hard drive to another.  If you upgraded your current drive to a larger one you could move everything on your current one to the new one and all the programs, files and all will work.

You can usually get it through Tampa Software at a pretty good price and often the big retailers like CompUSA or Best Buy will have it on promotion.

Tampa Software is www.tampasoftware.com or 800-294-1970 or email [email protected] for a quote.  

I'm all out of stock right now or I'd get you one from here.  The PC Users group here in Atlanta cleaned me out. I'll replenish at the Computer Show in Perry this weekend.

The "Go-back" program works great.  Saved my butt a couple of times on some buggy drivers.

Any product that has support/help/documentation primarily or exclusively online is ruled out.

Worst case scenario, Windows is mangled, and how in the hell are you supposed to get online with only a dos prompt to get the support, help and docs? That's like a harware manufacturer having the installation manual for its product only on a CD and when trusty old Windows morphs into evil unusable code, as it tends to do, you can't even access the manual on the CD.

I guess I would tell you how much I would like to kick Bill Gates in the nuts right about now, but I'm sure a wet team of rabid chipmunks and mall ninjas would be quickly dispatched to cure me of my anti-microsoft sentiments if I did.

As usual, thanks for the recommendations, but I'll probably end up downloading every anti-virus offering out there and deciding for myself which I hate the least.

I work in IT.  I recomend the entire Norton Suite, but beware that you have an old system and it will slow, slow, slow it down.