Paul Doherty’s Notebook

Anyone using the free version of AVG should make sure they are on the latest version, AVG Free 2012.

AVG seems to have got bigger and more demanding of computer power over the years: I now always do a custom install and turn off everything except AVG itself.

I’m also increasingly annoyed by having to navigate through all the adverts on the CNET site (when AVG redirects you for the download) and by having to refuse all the free toolbars, search providers and stuff it wants to install. To be fair, it’s got slightly better recently.

I like simple and straightforward products, and I now prefer Microsoft Security Essentials. Simple, free, and seems to work well.

Looking back over the last year, some things have changed in the world of PCs, but many problems remain pretty much the same!

Malware — viruses, trojans, spyware and the like — continues to be a big problem. I still see a lot of PCs infected with various trojans designed steal information or money from the unwary. The writers of this stuff are very professional, so I assume there is big money behind it.  The most common still seem to be the sort that tells you that tour PC is “at risk”and invites you to download some software to cure it. Invariably the software “finds” lots of things that aren’t really there, and then invited you to register if for about $49.95 to enable it to remove them.  If you ignore it, it will get ever more persistent, until the PC becomes unusable.

Sometimes these types of software claim to find viruses or other infections, sometime “memry problems”, “registry errors” and so on.  Of course, there are quite genuine and very useful products that do all these tasks, so it’s hard for the normal person to tell the genuine and useful from the fake and harmful. Sometime these fake products every have professional-looking websites (but almost always without traceable addresses or contact details).

An example of a fake product is here.

A simple tip: before you download any software, search for its name on Google.  Ignore any sponsored links, and if almost all you find in the search results is people asking how to remove the product, and reputable sites (such as bleepingcomputer.com and techguy.com) offering removal instructions, then tread very carefully!

A new development in 2010: three of my customers who had infected PCs received a phone call to the home numbers from the “Windows Support Group” telling them their PC was infected and offering to remove the infection at a price. It wasn’t clear how their phone number had been obtained (all had their phone numbers in at least one document on their PC, though), who the caller was or who he represented, or how much this “service” would cost. Very suspicious indeed.

Everyone should have a good and up-to-date antivirus program. Two good ones (both free) are the free versions of AVG 2011 from here or (my current favourite) Microsoft Security Essentials from here.

Happy new year to all.

A user updated AVG 7.5 to 8.0 yesterday, and found that it froze her PC on reboot. (After login the desktop background appeared, but no Start button or icons.)

I found the cause was a trial copy of BullGuard which had been supplied with the PC. She had never used it but had not uninstalled it, and it duly expired. AVG 7.5 seemed to be happy to live alongside it, but AVG 8.0 most definitely wasn’t (it’s never a good idea to run two anti-malware products at the same time).

Be sure to remove all other always-running anti-virus products, whether expired or not, before you install AVG 8.0.

When Firefox updated itself to 2.0.0.14 recently, I found that many of my add-ons stopped working, among them Adblock and the British English Dictionary. Message shown on Tools | Add-ons was “Incompatible with this version of Firefox”.

This turned out not to be true. Re-installing them was painless and got them all working again.

AVG 8.0 is now out.

There is a free version at http://free.grisoft.com

This is the procedure I generally follow:

1. Download Version 8 from here.

2. Uninstall the current version (typically 7.5).

3. Restart the PC.

4. Install the new version by running the downloaded file.

I choose NOT to install the “Security Toolbar” when asked.

The new version seems to be a useful improvement — it runs quicker than 7.5 on my PC and also searches for spyware (and tracking cookies) which 7.5 didn’t.

AVG adds some anti-spyware features from Ewido (AVG has bought Ewido) which 7.5 didn’t have; for that reason earlier versions of Ewido need to uninstalled before AVG 8.0 can be installed. The AVG 8.0 installation process checks for their presence and will warn you if it finds them.