[PuffGussy36]

I was just on Scot Finnie's site and he basically recommends running only one antivirus program, one spyware and using one kind of firewall. I have the following on my machine:

Free version of Zone Alarm
Avira Antivir Personal Edition antivirus protection (free)
HiJackThis
CWShredder
Windows Defender Beta 2
Ad Aware SE
Spybot
and
The Cleaner (Trojan remover by Moosoft)

Is there anything I can remove? More importantly should remove? Of the spyware programs, which one is the best real time protector? Thanks.

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You've got one firewall, one antivirus, one anti-trojan, and several antispyware programs. The only antispyware program that protects realtime is Defender. Ad Aware, Spybot, CWShredder, and HiJackThis all run on demand and I wouldn't get rid of them. Just be careful with HJT, since you can do some serious damage if you delete the wrong stuff. I'm not too familiar with The Cleaner, but it looks like it will run fine with everything else. If you aren't experiencing any problems, I'd just leave it as you have it.

[fructose]

You've got one firewall, one antivirus, one anti-trojan, and several antispyware programs. The only antispyware program that protects realtime is Defender. Ad Aware, Spybot, CWShredder, and HiJackThis all run on demand and I wouldn't get rid of them. Just be careful with HJT, since you can do some serious damage if you delete the wrong stuff. I'm not too familiar with The Cleaner, but it looks like it will run fine with everything else. If you aren't experiencing any problems, I'd just leave it as you have it.

[PuffGussy36]

My system has been running fine. I did reveal a CoolWWWSearch variant on a recent Spybot scan but was able to remove it using Spybot (if Defender is real time, it didn't do a very good job of detecting/blocking CWS). I'm probably going remove HJT and Lavasoft (Ad Aware). I appreaciate the input.

Edited by PuffGussy36, 18 August 2006 - 07:14 PM.

[fructose]

Defender still isn't top notch, so it misses some infections. And I would recomend keeping both Ad Aware and Spybot. I've had one program catch things the other missed.