Ask a dozen who owns a computer or laptop what their preferred anti-virus software is, and two names are going to pop up regularly – Norton and McAfee. In fact, you can get into a heated debate with some people over those two programs. Why? Well, for a lot of those in the tech industry, they use one or the other on their company servers, so when they give advice to end users as to which is better, they tend to side with the one they’re the most comfortable using.

Now both of those programs are fine for anti-virus software in their own right; however, I prefer something that doesn’t cost me an arm and a leg to own. I don’t have a major server network, and I don’t need phone support 24/7. What I need is an anti-virus program that does what I need it to (stop bugs from getting into my system) and is cheap – or in this case, free.

That’s why I go with programs like Avast!, AVG, Panda and others. Now, out of that list, the one I personally prefer (currently) is Avast!. Why? Well for several reasons. First of all, they’re a smaller company, which means they have to try harder than the big dogs to impress me. That means they’re going to work harder at catching everything they can. Secondly, they have one of the few Anti-virus softwares I’ve ever seen that can install on an infected system without corrupting the program in the process.

I recently installed it on a client’s laptop, rebooted and discovered over 200 viruses on their computer – all of which were caught and quarantined. After the reboot completed, I let it update the virus database and ran the scanner under Windows – to find over 100 more viruses on the system. All were caught and quarantined by Avast!.

Now are these programs truly free? Not exactly (you knew there was a catch, didn’t you?). Most of them require you to register with the company, so they know who’s using it. This means they get to have your email address. Considering how many places require us to register with our email address, I don’t really consider that much of a fee – but you might. So just be aware that most will require some form of registration in order for you to enjoy your “free” software.

Another downside is that most of them require you to agree that you’re using it only for your home system and not in a company computer. That’s an important distinction and one I support fully. If you’re going to put an Anti-virus program on a company system, do it right. When you pay for it, you’re not just paying for the program, you’re paying for the support that comes with it, should anything nasty happen.

So in short, don’t let a professional box and a network guru fool you into thinking you need professional grade software for protection on your home computer. As a computer tech myself, I can assure you that free software often works as well, if not better, than the stuff you can buy in stores.

Download Avast Anti-virus here

David Gillespie

Related posts:

1. Free Alternative to MS Office
2. Speed Up Your Computer – Part I

Here is how I managed to speed up my laptop

1. Hit ctrl+alt+del. This will bring up the task manager

2. Click on the processes tab; Here you will see all the processes running on your system, sapping out all your resources. Most of these processes you don’t even need. It is just running without you knowing about it. So where does all these processes come from. Most of them are Windows related and they need to be there to keep your operating system running but some of them are actual programs running on the background.These are usually programs that you have installed that are opened automatically when your system boots up. We say, these programs are on the start-up.

3. The first step to improve the speed of your laptop is to remove all unwanted programs from the start-up.

4. For step 3 and steps to follow you will need a free program called CCleaner. Click here to download

5. Start CCleaner after you’ve installed and downloaded it

6. Click on the tools icon

7. Click on the start-up tab

8. Go through the list and uncheck all processes you don’t want to run on start-up. ( Don’t remove any processes that are in the Windows folder. The programs you will uncheck will usually be in the program files folder

9. After step 8 you system will only load the necessary programs on start up. This will have a dual affect.

• Windows will start-up quicker
• Your system will have more available RAM. This will increase your systems general performance

10.Let’s move on to the next step. Still under the tools section, click on uninstall and uninstall all programs that you don’t use often. Don’t be a hoarder. Get your house clean. Uninstalling programs will have a major affect on your system’s performance

11. Now will be a good time to restart your system before you proceed to step 12. You will already notice drastic improvements.

12. Read and apply “Speed up Your Laptop – Part II”

Related posts:

1. Speed Up Your Computer – Part II
2. Free Alternative to MS Office

When you open up your new laptop for the first time it is a great feeling. Everything is quick and you cant wait to get busy on your new machine. That is until you open the the My Programs folder in the start up menu and realize you have no software on your new laptop. One piece of software you would like to see standard on your computer is the MS Office suite. Unfortunately you will not get it unless you’ve dished out extra cash for it. Luckily in the software world for every paid software package there is a free one. Most of these alternative are just as good as the paid version.

The free alternative for MS Office is Open Office, a free office package developed by Sun Micro Systems. I have used this package before and to be honest there is little difference between the Sun and Mirosoft office. I will strongly encourage you to download it and give it a try. The Open Office suite includes the following Programs

* Calc – Spreadsheets
* Writer – Word Processor
* Impress – Presentations
* Base – Data Base
* Draw – Graphics

Download your free copy here

Related posts:

1. Free Anti-virus Software.
2. Speed Up Your Computer – Part I
3. Speed Up Your Computer – Part II