Antivirus & Firewall suite, recommendations?

liquidguru said:

I am using Eset Smart Security and have never had a problem with it. Unobtrusive, lightweight on sys resources, excellent integration and great detection and firewall. I've been using it for over three years and have never thought of using anything else.....

....though if I hadn't just paid for a two year license I may have looked at Microsoft's free Security Essentials that has just come out

The one problem I found with ESET Smart Security 4.x on Windows 7 x64, was trying to add a rule to the firewall as a non-adminstrative user produced a "Failed to change settings" error. In other words, as a non-administrative user, running a program which accesses the internet, the firewall would popup (interactive mode) and ask if access should be granted, if you check the box to allow ESET SS to remember your choice, it would popup with the error. I always run Windows as a non-administrative user and this error would come up every single time a piece of software accessed the internet. I also noticed a manual virus scan would sometimes come up with "ESET GUI has stopped working" and the entire screen would freeze.

Zardoc said:

That's a good point. I don't use Smart Security 4. Only Anti Virus.

Can't you create a rule?

No, it wouldn't work. I don't know if ESET expects users to run their systems as under an administrative account, but I usually have the Administrator user enabled for software updates or installations, and my daily-use account which at most is a Power-user. Reason being if under any event a virus or spyware did make it on my system, the damage would be limited.

Working under the Administrative user ESET works fine on Windows 7 x64, I couldn't fault it, but under a non-administrative user it couldn't change any of the settings for ESET nor could I create a rule. I tried changing the settings for ESET, and of course I got an error. But no, if the ESET firewall pops up asking if to allow XXX piece of software to access the internet, and I check the box for "remember" then Allow, I get an error, every time.

Crypto said:

• MSE
• Comodo (firewall only with Windows firewall Off)
• UAC

So far no probs

Thinking of going this route after my KIS license expires.

Seems to be the lightest combination of AV + Firewall out there right now.