I have a Virus program dilema ???

I have installed both at the same time "Avast! and Mcafee" these two coincided with each other fine for about a year, and then all of a sudden I can not get the two icons to show up in the system tray anymore I do not want to reinstall them again, can somebody help me figure out if these programs are still resident and why no icons show up in the tray ?

 

First of all, you should not have 2 anti-virus programs installed as they can conflict, best to uninstall one.

 

>> I have installed both at the same time "Avast! and Mcafee" these two coincided with each other fine for about a year, and then all of a sudden I can not get the two icons to show up in the system tray anymore I do not want to reinstall them again, can somebody help me figure out if these programs are still resident and why no icons show up in the tray? DeweyBad <<

Bladesofhalo's advice is quite correct here...

Antivirus applications typically scan for suspicious and/or potentially harmful intruders that may damage your files and most times can even remove them. Unfortunately, the only thing these security applications seem to detest more than potentially harmful viruses is other antivirus applications running simultaneously together with them.

Running two antivirus products at the same time is risky, even potentially dangerous to your system. It is simply an accident waiting to happen. Whatever "feel-good" benefits users may believe running two antivirus applications simultaneously might bring potential them; the pitfalls clearly outweigh the benefits, in my opinion. Therefore, my advice would be to pick one (or the other) to use and then proceed to Windows Add/Remove Programs to uninstall the one that you do not want to use anymore.

Running two anti-virus programs simultaneously would be sort of like watching two cops ahead of you in the line at the local doughnut shop with each cop politely saying to the other “No, no... you go first!” and the other cop replying the same thing... for eternity. (Either that or them saying to each other saying “No, I’ll go first!") <lol>

One of the neato things about using PCs are that they often allow geeks and other users try running several applications of the same type simultaneously. This would seem to be a great idea with regards to using antivirus applications because it seems reasonable to assume that running two or more on the same PC should catch more viruses, right? Wrong!

In order for Antivirus software to do its job properly; it needs to poke around the vulnerable portions of Windows, memory, and other places like in the registry. When two antivirus programs boot up together and lie in wait in your system tray; then after a while, start scanning and stalking these intruders, all sorts of problems happen, ranging from system freezes, program crashes to operating system lockups.

Because these programs typically remain on all the time, they normally need to load as soon as Windows boots, which means if you install more than one antivirus application on your PC, both programs load automatically and even though they may appear to work in harmony for a little while; at some point in the future; they will lock up the system or cause problems with other programs (mail clients in particular) that may seem unrelated; before there's a chance to troubleshoot.

Good Luck!

 

Thanks guys Which would you pick Avast! or AVG ?

 

AVG, most geeks preffered

infoseeker

 

>> Thanks guys Which would you pick Avast! or AVG? << DeweyBad

Both of these actually work very well especially considering the fact that they are available to users as freeware. As to which one works better, faster or more efficiently; it all depends upon who you ask. <lol>

My own view is that AVG seems to cause far less problems with "newbie" computer users. This is not to say that it is "better" than Avast! it is just that when you install AVG it pretty much sets itself up automatically and people who are unfamiliar w/ AV types of programs (newbies, I mean) seem to like it that way. At least that has been my experience; as a person who visits several different 'computer-related' forums on the web. However I believe both are fairly configurable and a thorough reading of the help files will go a long way in getting the most out of either one of these two freeware antivirus programs.

Note: The very best way to get a variety of different views and tips about the effectiveness, foibles, and uncover the 'idiosyncrasies' of either of these two would be to check out this link Avast! vs AVG

Good Luck!