So the fact that MSE stays near or at the bottom of AV reviews doesn't bother you? During the few months I had it, MBAM got frequent hits. Since I replaced MSE with Avast free, MBAM rarely gets any hits. I also had problems getting MSE to automatically update. I had to do it manually. That is not acceptable for one's first line of defense.
Not surprising since MSE and MBAM look for different things - but you knew that. (e.g. MSE allows the Conduit crapware. MBAM does not.) And MSE sets the bar really low (or high, depending on how you look at things). A file has to be really bad or from a company that is not likely to sue* before MSE will try and stop it.
*just guessing as to why MSE stops some really trivial junk that has not clear company behind it and yet lets stuff like (and worst than) Conduit install/run. MBAM only calls Conduit a PUP. That classification alone might be how to avoid litigation. I just wish MSE would go after the likes of Conduit and call it a PUP - if need be.
~~~
2. Being a guy that simply doesn't get almost any viruses to begin with,...
I still install MSE for others, but I'm not sure that you can know that you don't get infected - especially with MSE watching over your computer. MSE does not seem to scan for root kits.
This computer is still infected with a root kit and MSE still says that it is clean. Also, too many infections go undetected by the majority of tools.
Source.
Nick Harbour's team completed the DEFCON race in just over six hours; the fastest team managed completion in about two-and-a-half-hours. Nick Harbour's team came out on top when the viruses were tested and all 10 of his modified viruses eluded virus detection.
Nick Harbour did not know he was going to enter the Race to Zero contest when he attended the DEFCON 16 hacker conference in Las Vegas.
"It was kind of funny," Nick Harbour said. "We were just flipping through the program and saw a list of contests and thought this one looked interesting. Most of the other teams had prepared for weeks."
There are infections that hide for years before any company finds them. And there are just too many known infections that MSE does not catch. I've cleaned up after some pretty nasty stuff that MSE let thru. I've moved two "clients" away from MSE and over to Panda Cloud Antivirus because PCA stops Conduit and MSE does not. I had cleaned conduit off for these two "clients" twice in recent months, so.... MSE had to go.
Here is one annoyance with MSE:
http://www.sevenforums.com/system-s...-uninstall-microsoft-security-essentials.html
...and another small annoyance:
http://www.sevenforums.com/system-security/280043-ms-security-essentials-2.html#post2305617
..and another one:
Issue with Microsoft Security Essentials - can someone try to - Microsoft Community
MSE did not honor OS environment variables. That one cost me hours and hours on the phone with MS. Even with them remotely controlling the computers (more than one) they could not fix. I had to endure each support tech starting the scripted list of things to check. Each one started from square one. It was painful. They were had to understand and they never learn how irritating it is to hear them repeat the platitude, "Do not worry, we will resolve this for you." NOT!
I write scripts. I'm not a programmer by any means, but some of my scripts do get pretty complicated. I know that it annoys user to have every error popup, so some errors just get written to log files. I suspect that updating MSE is a lot more complicated than any of my scripts, but MSE should have at least logged that fact that it could not find the temp folder for a particular file operation. MSE was putting the log file into the correct temp folder (along with some other files) but apparently, someone hard coded the path to the temp folder in some part of MSE updating code. It took several years for them to fix that. And even after I (and others) figured out what was going on, there was no path for us to provide this feedback to MS. Well, I should say, no path that got things changed.
BUT - then there is this:
http://www.sevenforums.com/system-security/308472-mse-worries-6.html#post2573490
MSE heuristics are very weak. It should never let anything write to that registry key without warning the user. Also, MSE could not clean up after this very simple infection. The DAT file was not even locked. If I renamed it soon enough, the shell was not taken over.
If you will notice - in that first video - MSE says that the file is clean, MSE lets me run it and then something (heuristics?) says that the same file is bad. MSE proudly announces that is has cleaned the infection. A closer inspection shows that MSE failed to find the file to be cleaned. It never could cure this type of infection during the weeks that I played with that morphing file. Feel free to read thru that entire group of rants of mine in that thread. I welcome any comments (really!) on how I could have done things better. Let me know if you see flaws in my simple methods. I'm not a pro at testing AV tools either.
I've found dozens of infections that MSE did not catch. And some that my "clients" find have been very nasty. The type that replaces every document, image and EXE with a copy of itself... and it did so to a file server :-(
So - why on Earth would I still install MSE for my "clients". Its like you said, MSE gets along with other apps. For instance, MozyHome seems to be picky about the AV tools that it will play nice with. Excluding Mozy's EXEs is not enough. It is having two apps that use low level filters to watch for file changes that causes barfs. Not that fully understand LSPs - but that seems to be the issue.
Panda is looking good from the compatibility stand point, but it too has failed to find some infected files that I threw at it. Also, Panda has some settings for it Data Shield (app white listing) that people need to leave alone or fully understand before they change them. Panda can be put into a state that silently prevents temporary internet files from being deleted.
I could go on an on - on this topic, but I'll end by saying that MSE is a good tool to use while attempting to solve problems with a computer. It provides a great alternative if one suspects that a forum member's problem might be caused by their choice of AV tool.
edit:
"clients" = family, friends, non-profits, a few businesses and way too many friend of friends - 'cuz I don't charge my "clients".
). Even with Avast having a good reputation, I've had it negatively affect boot times and system performance in daily use that I had to at one point completely uninstall it from my system to get something that needed doing done. MSE is the first AV solution I've used that has managed to co-exist peacefully with its host and surrounding environment, and I credit this to the devs behind MSE being more aware of how Windows works and is designed than any 3rd-party devs can hope to be.
