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Microsoft Launches Anti-Virus Public Beta

Posted by Zonk on from the test-out-them-patches dept.

Chris Gondek writes "The Register has a story reporting that Microsoft has released a free beta of its upcoming anti-virus application. According to Microsoft, the new anti-virus application known as Windows OneCare Live is 'like taking your PC in for a tune up at the service station'. Microsoft announced in May that it would be releasing an anti-virus application based on software developed by GeCad, a Romanian anti-virus company that Microsoft purchased several years ago." More details from InformationWeek.

3 of 290 comments (clear)

  1. Re:How long ... by this+great+guy · · Score: 4, Informative

    Has already happened, happens often, and will happen again, in many anti virus products, including MS's.

  2. Re:Screw Symantec by plover · · Score: 4, Informative
    Agreed! Norton AV has been the single largest generator of BSODs I've encountered. While it's been mostly stable since XP, it's still a huge slow-ya-down pig.

    One thing I've done to improve performance is to restrict the files it looks at to executables (and some of the more annoying scripting languages.) I still let it perform a weekly full scan on everything, but I don't real-time examine every picture or MP3. Yes, I realize I might get bit by a JPEG-delivered-virus because I'm not scanning .JPGs. But using anti-virus software doesn't mean I immediately start downloading crap from every .ru address out there anyway. I'm still mostly careful, use Firefox, disable most plugins, and keep other stuff patched.

    --
    John
  3. Re:So what happens when... by plover · · Score: 4, Informative

    It removes the "rootkit" but does not remove the DRM that the rootkit was installed to hide. The DRM is still there to restrict you to three copies. If you have their DRMware and want to get rid of it, go to sunncomm.com and click on their uninstaller.

    --
    John