anti-virus program problems

My sony VAIO desktop came with a bunch of anti-virus crap and it is really getting annoying. Its Norton Anti-Virus and Norton Internet Security. On many websites it causes the pages to load very strangely, sometimes with no pictures, and sometimes not at all! I know its caused by these programs because if I disable them the problem is fixed. However, if I set it to not run on startup, programs that need to connect to the internet can no longer do so, ie) games and such. I really doubt that uninstalling them would help either, but who knows. They are also taking up a lot of my system's resources and really slows down booting and shutdown. Any ideas?

 

I always had nothing but trouble with Norton, even slowing my system to a near crawl on a fresh install.
I know it's not a lot of help, but I solved it in my case by uninstalling it and purchasing Kaspersky and Zone Alarm Pro.
Sorry it's not much help, but Norton is CRAP!
This page may offer you some more constructive help.
http://www.phoenix360.com/help/norton-issue-resolve.html

 

thanks, i think i may just try uninstalling it and if that just makes things worse ill do a system restore. Thanks for the help. If anyone else has any ideas, plz tell me.

 

Could be that your Windows XP firewall is trying to run in additon to Norton which can cause all sorts of probs. One firewall and one AV program is the golden rule. That said I am not a lover of Norton either so if you do deinstall it make sure that you have an alternative AV program installed and if not using the Xp Firewall an alternative Firewall. I use a freeware version of Kerio as a Fw and the wonderful and free Avast as my AV prog. There are others of course but those two freebies are AOK IMHO
HTH
Robert

 

Free antivirus
Antivir http://www.majorgeeks.com/AntiVir_Personal_Edition_d955.html
Avast http://www.majorgeeks.com/Avast_Home_Edition_d1968.html
AVG http://www.majorgeeks.com/AVG_Free_Edition_d886.html
Shareware but highly rated:
NOD32 http://www.majorgeeks.com/NOD32_Antivirus_System_d3704.html
Avast and AVG are available in shareware Pro versions which may have features you may be interested in.

Free firewalls
Zone Alarm http://www.majorgeeks.com/ZoneAlarm_Free_d388.html
Sygate http://www.majorgeeks.com/Sygate_Personal_Firewall_Free_d3356.html
Outpost http://www.majorgeeks.com/Outpost_Firewall_Free_d1056.html
These also have Pro versions which offer more features for a price.

 

When I uninstalled Norton it broke Windows Update, I was able to fix it with this: http://majorgeeks.com/Dial-a-fix_Full_d4899.html