A question re: PC security /anti virus software and its operation

[freethought]

Greetings folks!

I have situation here and I need input and opinions. Some days ago a trojan horse nearly got on to my PC, A Dell. The security software I had, AVG version 8.0 (the free version) stopped it. This particular trojan horse seems to disguise itself as security/anti-virus software. If you let it in your background on your desktop displays a big biohaz symbol and basically your screwed.

I performed a number of file, and total computer scans back to back. In the last scan using AVG the only thing that turned up was a number of tracking cookies. My roommate, someone more well versed in PCs than me, excoriated me for using something other than Norton Anti-Virus or McAfee. So following their advice I purchased and downloaded of McAfee Total Security plus one year subscription. As soon as the software was downloaded and installed I ran a first time scan using the McAfee Anti-Virus Scan.

That was Tuesday, it's now Thursday, and the scan is still running. By some time tonight (Aug 1) the scan will be running nearly 72 hours continuously. Last I checked it had scanned about 20,000 "items". I'm no expert but I am fairly certain that the number of "items" on a PC can easily be in the upper 6 figures. At this rate the scan will likely complete sometime the end of August.

Somehow my instincts are telling me that something is not right with the rate of speed of this scan. My roommate says just let the scan run its course however long it takes. Their explanation was that since this is a first time scan using McAfee, the software is checking nearly every line of code, in every program, on this PC and that next time a scan is initiated it will proceed much faster maybe taking and hour to two hours since the software will not need to check every bit of code.

I still tend to think something is quite wrong and maybe something got by my AVG anti-virus? Should I be worried? Should I follow my roommate's advice? Or should I take my PC to the local PC doctor. I really need some words of PC wisdom here.

Thanx in advance,

Freethought




I am not even using my PC online, rather I am using my laptop until this scan is complete on the PC.

[RoyGBiv]

1. No offense ...

But your roommate is an idiot.

Antivirus products do not scan "lines of code." That is one of the most absurd things I've ever heard.

Furthermore, if this person knew thing one about antivirus products, they would know that AVG and Avast (free versions) are among the top rated products on the market, rated *higher* than Norton's protection racket. McAfee isn't bad, but it's not necessary for a home user to pay that kind of money.

Norton is utter garbage.

So, you're saying your computer has been on and "scanning" for three days solid? Unless you've got an old, old, old processor, very little memory, and a full terabyte drive, that's also absurd. I've had a complete scan take hours, but not days.

What I would do in this situation is not what I would advise anyone to do because it may well mean a disc wipe and reinstall in the end. But, yes, something is wrong.

For starters, see if you can pull up the Task Manager (CTRL-ALT-DEL > Task Manager) and shut down any process that is associated with your virus scan. If that doesn't work, we'll go from there, or perhaps sager words of advice will be forthcoming from others.

[hobbit709]

2. Did you uninstall AVG first?

Antivirus programs do not play well with each other. You can't have more than one running. You got screwed on MacAffee. Tracking cookies come from your browser activity and don't necessarily have anything to do with a virus. Shut the PC down, boot up in safe mode, remove the Macaffee and start over. Set your browser to accept cookies for current session only. If you're not using Spybot Search & Destroy-download and install it.