Running two or more antivirus programs

[Mike Henley]

Yes, I'm a little paranoid, but anyway, it all started when I had a
bad experience with the Norton(?) antivirus I had on my previous vaio
computer, I kept it well updated and regularly run and all but then
one day, out of curiostity, I tried avast and ran the trend micro
antivirus and lo and behold, there were three on my system that norton
did not detect!

So I switched to avast, which I quite liked and used for a year or
more now, but lately I've read quite a lot of praise for trend micro
internet security 2004, which I'm evaluating right now, and it seemed
to detect TWO virus that avast failed to detect. Yes it may be that
one of them was only a STAR_DIAL but still.

So, for the past day or two, I've been running both, even as resident.
I've not had any obvious clashes and conflicts, and avast doesn't seem
to be acting any different as it's scanning away the files happily in
real time as i can see in its last_scanned field. I don't know where
trend micro provides info about its last updated fields but anway,
it's running resident/realtime as well as far as I can see.

Considering that It also has a firewall, this means i'm running 3
firewalls right now! the XP SP2 firewall (guess it doesn't really
count much), the Kerio personal firewall 4 (the free), and this trend
micro on I'm evaluating.

Is there a downside to this?

I'm not really worried about performance/resources as I have plenty of
them on my machine.

P.S. I should also mention that using spybot S&D and Adware (free)
were precursors to this multi-tier idea. Also, having read a thread, I
also got F-PROT for DOS (free), which I may use instead of trend micro
if there's a downside to running two residents/realtime scanners
(though it doesn't really count as it's a DOS rather than
resident/realtime). I really really want two resident scanners if
there's no downside, is there anyone out there using two residents?

 

[null]

I really really want two resident scanners if
there's no downside, is there anyone out there using two residents?

Your best bet for that is to use a product that has multiple scan
engines integrated. Here's a couple of good ones:

http://www.wilderssecurity.org/avk.html
http://www.f-secure.com/


Art
http://www.epix.net/~artnpeg

 

[Mike Henley]

Your best bet for that is to use a product that has multiple scan
engines integrated. Here's a couple of good ones:

http://www.wilderssecurity.org/avk.html
http://www.f-secure.com/

Thanks, that's very interesting. I was just reading about it. It
turned out that I can't use that DOS antivirus after all, f-prot,
because it's not recommended for NTFS.

By the way, what antivirus engines are known to tolerate each other
and peacefully co-exist, and what are known to disasterously
antagonize each other?

I've been running avast with trend micro for the second day now, both
resident, with not a complaint from each about the other or any
problem *touch wood*, but i've been reading that panda hates company
and can freeze the computer necessitating a reinstall of windows.

What do you guys know that you've tried or heard of?

Also, how good is trend micro internet security 2004? I'm evaluating
it now but I'm not really charmed so far, eventhough it detected a
couple of viruses that avast omitted. I'm just not really sure it's
worth buying. I don't care for the other features, I'm just curious
how good of an antivirus it is.

 

[null]

Thanks, that's very interesting. I was just reading about it. It
turned out that I can't use that DOS antivirus after all, f-prot,
because it's not recommended for NTFS.
True.

By the way, what antivirus engines are known to tolerate each other
and peacefully co-exist, and what are known to disasterously
antagonize each other?

That I don't know. Wouldn't even bother to try it since it's a lousy
way to go.

I've been running avast with trend micro for the second day now, both
resident, with not a complaint from each about the other or any
problem *touch wood*, but i've been reading that panda hates company
and can freeze the computer necessitating a reinstall of windows.

It's generally not a good idea because of conflicts, as you know.
And I've already suggested a much better way. You'll get top notch
detection with either AVK or F-Secure, both of which use the KAV scan
engine plus others..

Also, how good is trend micro internet security 2004? I'm evaluating
it now but I'm not really charmed so far, eventhough it detected a
couple of viruses that avast omitted. I'm just not really sure it's
worth buying. I don't care for the other features, I'm just curious
how good of an antivirus it is.

Trend's av has pretty good detection rates. Not as good as some others
such as KAV and McAfee. You should be looking at test comparatives.
Check out both av-test.org and the Uni Hamburg VTC. Links are here:

http://www.claymania.com/anti-virus.html


Art
http://www.epix.net/~artnpeg