Often you come across files with wacky names, which make you wonder, ’’ Is it a joke?? Is it some sorta game??’’ Above all, ’’ What on earth is it doing on my hard disk???’’ Well, think again and the stark reality would definitely dawn upon you. Say Hi to the virus. A system getting infected by a virus is not a fantasy, nor is it impossible. Even while you’re reading this, viruses could be messing around with your system (or even mine, for that reason). So what could you possibly do?? Enter Antivirus (AV) Software. The AV Software detects potentially harmful viruses and eradicates them from your system. But you’d ask ’’ There are loads of AV softwares out there, which one should I go for??’’ Well, if I were you, I’d spend my money on Norton Antivirus 2001(NAV)
NAV has a good virus detection rate, detecting more than 90% of the present day deadly viruses. An added feature of NAV is that it allows u to detect viruses even in compressed format and performs brilliantly in this section, detecting up to 85% of common viruses. Add to this the features of scanning e-mail’s, boot up checks, scanning before you download. Moreover, NAV’s auto-protect feature works even while working with folders. A user could also schedule a virus scan, live update or even another program to run.
NAV is fairly easy to use, as it has one of the best and most user-friendly interfaces. Also, NAV offers a number of configurable options. To keep track of new viruses popping up every day, NAV’s Live Update feature allows you to download updates from the net. A user can also select what he wants to update - anything from the virus definitions to even the scanning engine. NAV even supports a feature wherein you can send a suspicious file for scanning at NAV’s research labs.
But NAV has its flaws as well. It takes hell of a time to scan for viruses. I found myself twiddling my thumbs for 30-45 odd minutes it took to scan. Moreover, it eats up a lot of system resources. NAV’s boot up checks takes close to half a minute. Thus, I would advice all performance freaks to disable the boot up check option in NAV.
On the whole, Norton Antivirus 2001 has excellent features, a good detection and cleaning rates coupled with Live Update, which puts it in a class apart from other AV softwares. Sure, its a memory hog and carries a nice price tag with it, but no pains, no gains!!!!