So, what antivirus do you use?

[aesling]

Mac


/thread

[mirkosp]

Mac


/thread

OS X was even worse than Windows under this point of view because it generally took months if not years to fix any security hole. It's just how much Apple cared about it; gotta save the mass opinion that "OS X doesn't have any viruses" which has slowly built up, can't just release security updates too often, would be too suspicious. Like viruses are the only security issue an OS could have. I should be damned for losing the links to a couple things at least, but will make sure to find them.
EDIT: http://allthatiswrong.wordpress.com/201 ... -insecure/
There we go. That should actually be enough seeing how it points to various other references. As old as it is, it shows what OS X had. For all we know, even Lion could still have other yet undiscovered issues and exploits. Lion improved things, but well, so did 7 over Vista and so on. I don't think saying you're on OS X alone says too much, really...

[BasharOfTheAges]

It's certainly telling to see how fast they drop in the pwn2own contests, that's for sure.

[Jnzk]

Microsoft Security Essentials

This.

I use MSE too, but it did let me down recently by letting through some fake virus scanner which took an evening to remove.

[TEKnician]

Shits and giggles aside...

What are some negative impacts of having an anti-virus software installed on ones computer? Being on a mac I've never had a problem with either viruses nor the anti software, but what/how does it affect the overall performance?

I'm kinda curious...

[Jadecavy]

I use ME. I don't need antivirus software, the operating system does more to itself than any virus could do! ;P

[Mr. Fuzzyflippers]

I use avast and kaspersky.

[Qyot27]

Shits and giggles aside...

What are some negative impacts of having an anti-virus software installed on ones computer? Being on a mac I've never had a problem with either viruses nor the anti software, but what/how does it affect the overall performance?

I'm kinda curious...

A traditional anti-virus is one which is used after-the-fact to remove a virus that got in. This would have almost no detrimental impact on anything else, unless it keeps getting false positives and tries to remove non-infected software. It wouldn't be running in the background, so it wouldn't use up any resources except when it's actually scanning. Also, having it there doesn't actually keep you safe, because it can't stop things from getting in; it only removes things that did get in. Sort of like the difference between calling an exterminator to get rid of the rats in your attic, versus chopping down the tree in your backyard that's drawing the rats in in the first place.

Most modern anti-viruses have some sort of real-time protection which runs in the background. If your computer is new enough, you probably wouldn't notice the resource drainage, but since their client computers are progressively newer and newer, it gives them bigger excuses for poorly-designed interfaces and daemons that eat up far more resources than they should. This means that older computers are pretty much SOL in a lot of cases, and if users want to stay safe on them, they have to find alternatives that are still good for their setups and/or get really performance-savvy about their security regimen.

[TEKnician]

How/what does that scanning process look/feel like? Can it scan while you work on a video?

This might be a stupid question, but is it possible to have 2 types of anti-virus software?

This is actually quite useful to know. I'm glad I found this thread.

[Qyot27]

How/what does that scanning process look/feel like?

If it's running in the background, it won't look or feel like anything, unless the computer doesn't have enough CPU power or memory to spare, in which case you'll notice a lag. How bad that lag is depends on how big the disparity is between what the antivirus needs and what the computer has available. Sometimes the antivirus will announce when it's done scanning or if there's an update or some such, but that's similar to other system notifications you may see.

Can it scan while you work on a video?

Yes, but see the explanation above as to why that might become an issue.

This might be a stupid question, but is it possible to have 2 types of anti-virus software?

Possible, yes. Recommended, probably not. The more normal situation is to have an antivirus as part of a larger set of anti-malware or general system maintenance software, but the roles and scope of each program differ.