On Wed, 19 Mar 2008 09:46:01 -0700, asmodeus
<asmodeus@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

> Could someone give me some plain language help please? When I bought Norton
> 360, I thought it would replace the Windows defender series and that this
> would be a good thing to do. Clearly some people do not rate Norton, so would
> it be best for me to:
>
> 1) Use Windows Defender only, for firewall, anti-virus etc etc, or


No. Windows Defender is neither a firewall, nor an anti-virus program.
It is an anti-spyware program.



> 2) Use Norton for anti-virus and windows for everything else?


No. In my opinion, Norton is the worst security software on the
market.


> 3) Find another
> anti-virus and use it alongside Windows Defender for everything else?



Yes. I recommend the freeware Avast! anti-virus. Or if you want to pay
for a product, NOD32 or Kaspersky are well-respected.

But that's not enough. A single anti-spyware program like Defender
isn't good enough. Note what Eric Howes, who has done extensive
testing on Anti-Spyware products, states:

"No single anti-spyware scanner removes everything. Even the
best-performing anti-spyware scanner in these tests missed fully one
quarter of the "critical" files and Registry entries" See
http://spywarewarrior.com/asw-test-guide.htm



> Should
> I then also discard the other packages I have bought, including my registry
> organiser


What's a "registry organizer"? Specifically, what's the name of the
program? Is this a registry *cleaner*?

If so, note that registry cleaning programs are *all* snake oil.
Cleaning of the registry isn't needed and is dangerous. Leave the
registry alone and don't use any registry cleaner. Despite what many
people think, and what vendors of registry cleaning software try to
convince you of, having unused registry entries doesn't really hurt
you.

The risk of a serious problem caused by a registry cleaner erroneously
removing an entry you need is far greater than any potential benefit
it may have.



> and the ant-Spyware package.


*Which* anti-spyware package? There are many and they are not all
equally good. I recommend having at least two good ones. See the quote
from Eric Howes above.

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience
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