malwarebytes VS Mcafee

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  1. Posts : 165
    Windows 7 Ultimate x86 and x64
       #21

    Lady Fitzgerald said:

    That's not always true. Multiple AV/anti-malware programs can be chosen to "play well" with each other. The ability to do so is one of MBAM's strongest points. While running two or more AVs at the same time is a bad idea, MBAM is designed to be run with an AV. It will NOT interfere with anything except what it is supposed to interfere with. One can have multiple layers of protection and not have any slowdowns, etc. I run Avast free, MBAM Pro, SAS (SuperAntiSpyware) free, Spybot S&D free, ZoneAlarm Free Firewall, Secunia PSI, and WOT (Web of Trust). All except SAS and Spybot (those are scan only) have been running full time on both of my machines for quite some time and they do not slow them down one bit that I can tell. The only time I can tell they are running is when they detect and/or block a nasty or are otherwise doing their job. ZoneAlarm's firewall will throw up frequent alerts for the first week or two but, as it gets trained, it tapers off dramatically; I get alerts from ZoneAlarm far less frequently than I do from UAC (I run UAC at full strength).

    As long as they are carefully matched, there is no reason not to run multiple AV/anti-malware programs. If carefully chosen, they will be more effective than most, if not all, security suites and will have a lighter footprint.
    Wow! That's quite an arsenal!
    You are, of course, correct. However, the people utilizing my services are not capable of this sort of intelligent selection and evaluation. If they were, they wouldn't need my services.
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  2. Posts : 9,600
    Win 7 Ultimate 64 bit
       #22

    MrWhoopee said:
    ...However, the people utilizing my services are not capable of this sort of intelligent selection and evaluation. If they were, they wouldn't need my services.
    That's what's known as job security.
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  3. Posts : 165
    Windows 7 Ultimate x86 and x64
       #23

    While I am generally a fan of free software, I have avoided MSE for two reasons. The first is the poor reviews it receives. The second is Microsoft's general inability to improve upon (or even equal) a good idea once they have stolen it. As I have stated many times, if Microsoft did their job better, I'd have to find another line of work. Now that's job security!

    Edit: Jinx! You posted while I was typing.
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  4. Posts : 548
    Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP1
       #24

    Lady Fitzgerald said:
    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.
    1. AV reviews, and frankly any "reviews" in general, are dubious at best. I personally take them with a cupful of salt. In fact, I had to test a file for viruses a few weeks ago (I was checking a file for a game-making community that I frequent) and McAfee gave a clean bill of health while Avast, AVG, Symantec, eset, Kaspersky, and MSE (among others) all flagged the file as containing Virut.

    2. Being a guy that simply doesn't get almost any viruses to begin with, MSE is more than adequate for my needs (and MBAM also gave a clean bill of health when I ran a scan the other week, if you're curious).

    3. I've never had MSE act badly. Even Avast has given me its fair share of grief over on my Windows XP machine, such that I had to uninstall it at one point, but MSE has always just sat in the background minding its own business and having tea with its Windows 7 host, only asking for my attention when it really needs my help.

    4. MSE, alongside Avast and AVG, is still strongly suggested in these forums whenever anyone asks for a good free AV solution. Whatever the reviews might say, MSE has an extremely good rep within the Windows/Microsoft community.

    5. MSE auto-updates just fine either shortly after boot up or every 24 hours after boot up, in addition to any automatic Windows Update routines (MSE pulls updates through Windows Update). There was one event where auto-updates weren't getting pushed out, but that was just a one-time hiccup in Windows Update and nothing bad to do with MSE itself.
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  5. mjf
    Posts : 5,969
    Windows 7x64 Home Premium SP1
       #25

    Lady Fitzgerald said:
    mjf said:
    I gather Norton went through a slump but I've been using Norton NIS, 360 for ~6 years and keep renewing it based on personal experience. I wouldn't call myself knowledgeable in this area!
    I do have MSE on one PC that is generally offline.
    MSE is as bad, if not worse, than McAfee.
    MSE just happened to be free and the PC in question is rarely online plus it has Malwarebytes (free).
    It didn't seem that long ago that senior members of this forum were singing the praises of MSE as a good free option.
    .
      My Computer


  6. Posts : 9,600
    Win 7 Ultimate 64 bit
       #26

    mjf said:
    Lady Fitzgerald said:
    mjf said:
    I gather Norton went through a slump but I've been using Norton NIS, 360 for ~6 years and keep renewing it based on personal experience. I wouldn't call myself knowledgeable in this area!
    I do have MSE on one PC that is generally offline.
    MSE is as bad, if not worse, than McAfee.
    MSE just happened to be free and the PC in question is rarely online plus it has Malwarebytes (free).
    It didn't seem that long ago that senior members of this forum were singing the praises of MSE as a good free option.
    .
    When it first came out, it was worthy of praise. After a while, M$ let it go downhill, which was a crying shame.
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  7. Posts : 20,583
    Win-7-Pro64bit 7-H-Prem-64bit
       #27

    mjf said:
    Lady Fitzgerald said:
    mjf said:
    I gather Norton went through a slump but I've been using Norton NIS, 360 for ~6 years and keep renewing it based on personal experience. I wouldn't call myself knowledgeable in this area!
    I do have MSE on one PC that is generally offline.
    MSE is as bad, if not worse, than McAfee.
    MSE just happened to be free and the PC in question is rarely online plus it has Malwarebytes (free).
    It didn't seem that long ago that senior members of this forum were singing the praises of MSE as a good free option.
    .
    And it's still recommended and used more than any other av out there,
    I use it and love it,
    Despite what others post,
    These are all opinions and most coming from here/say articles,
    Malwarebytes pro is universally loved = common ground
    MABM free does not provide real time protection so it's not recommended to count on to prevent anything it's mostly after the fact scanning,
    Cheers.
      My Computer


  8. Posts : 10,485
    W7 Pro SP1 64bit
       #28

    Lady Fitzgerald said:
    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.



    King Arthur said:
    ~~~
    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:
    Unable to cleanly uninstall Microsoft Security Essentials

    ...and another small annoyance:
    MS Security Essentials

    ..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:
    MSE worries
    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".
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  9. Posts : 25,847
    Windows 10 Pro. 64/ version 1709 Windows 7 Pro/64
       #29

    Well now so many opinions and that is good.

    To start off I use Microsoft Security Essential and Malwarebytes Anti Malware Pro.
    As far as I can tell Microsoft Security Essentials does not stop any PUP's and does not catch them in a scan. It keep Microsoft out of court rooms.
    Malwarebytes Anti Malware Pro doesn't stop PUP's but will find them with a scan.
    PUP's are not considered a infection by such programs. They are to me.
    Anything that enters my computer without my knowledge and or permission is a infection but security programs can't do things in that fashion unless they want to spend the rest of the companies life in court rooms.
    I'm surprised some company hasn't taken the industry to court for a name change. From Potentially Unwanted Program to Maybe Unwanted Program.

    Microsoft will never have a security program judged as a quality security programs by the firms doing the testing. Those testing firms don't want to bite the hands that feed them. It will never matter to these firms whether Microsoft Security Programs are at the top, middle or bottom of the quality list in actuality.
    Stop and think other than Microsoft Security Essential who offers a free anti virus program that also doesn't offer a paid for version. Microsoft Security Essentials is free with no paid for version.
    That stops companies that make a paid for anti virus program from taking Microsoft to court to some degree. Why take Microsoft to court one might ask. It's simple, Microsoft has deep pockets and some countries just don't like Microsoft. Just look at what has been done in the past. Microsoft has to offer competing browsers with their Windows 7. That is like General Motors having to offer a Ford to sell you in their General Motors show rooms.

    Which anti virus is the best; I have no idea. By the time one would do the honest testing three newer version and updates would be out and you would have to start all over. The difference between a good and bad anti virus program is one update away.

    Now what I would like to see offered.

    Malwarebytes to make a anti malware, anti spyware, anti virus, anti PUP all in one program. A paid for Professional version.
    Judging by the quality of their anti malware paid for version that would be one killer program.
    To the best of my memory Microsoft Security Essentials or Malwarebytes Anti Malware have never caused a BSOD with Windows 7.

    Layback Bears long winded thoughts.
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  10. Posts : 548
    Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP1
       #30

    UsernameIssues said:
    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.

    <snip>
    All good points, but if we keep endlessly worrying about threats that MSE and other security software aren't finding we eventually get to a state of being fear mongered and not being able to do anything constructive.

    I personally draw the line that a given system is safe when:
    1. The system does not blatantly exhibit unstable or dangerous behavior. Stuff like BSODs, driver crashes, strange file/directory names, and so forth among others.
    2. Reasonable effort has been spent in looking for (and destroying) any threats, including a complete reformat+reinstall (where practical) depending on the severity of any threats.
    3. Routine checks of the system (such as reading the Event Viewer entries) do not reveal anything needing immediate attention.

    Another thing I value in an AV software besides its potency is whether it itself acts like a virus or not. The Symantec/Norton of ye olde days come to mind as an AV suite that was just as bad as the viruses it protected against, in terms of how bad of an impact it had on system performance and stability. After all, what's the point of having an AV solution installed if it's just as bad as the viruses you want to keep out, aye?

    I've mentioned that I use Avast on my Windows XP machine (MSE is too heavy for my poor Pentium IV ). 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.

    To sum up my thoughts on MSE, MSE is an AV solution that does its job of dealing with viruses adequately with no additional bloat or fluff (Avast by comparison has gotten bloated nowadays) while co-existing peacefully with its Windows host and neighboring software used by the user without causing any riots or dragging the host's feet. This is why I will recommend and stand for MSE in discussions like this where the topic is the merit of the various AV solutions available and how they compare.

    To be clear, my statements are all opinions driven from personal experiences (like many others' I'm sure), and some may agree and some may disagree with what I say. This is good. Differing opinions promote discussions, especially in a frontier like AV solutions where nothing is rock solid for long.
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