[radiorunner]

i mentioned to an IT tech that i was removing older norton av from my home computer & was going to install avira free av on it. he said the problem w/ the free av is that once it detects an issue it will send you endless messages telling you you need to upgrade to fix the problem, and the upgrade will cost you money. has that been anyone's experience with the free av from avira? if so, it may make more sense to buy an av program like norton 2009.
thanks!

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Hi radiorunner, good to see ya again,

I can tell you that from my experience that is not true at all. I use all free programs for my security and I don't get any messages like that in which I would consider annoying or a problem. They seem to act just like any other program I had bought in the past. Every once in a while you might get an advertisement asking if you would like to upgrade, but it is pretty simple, you just click on "NO" And this doesn't pop up out of no where, it is generally when you start the program, but again, it isn't very often.

Hope that helps!

And keep in mind, if you don't like what you are using, you can always upgrade or switch to another product. Not all programs are as hard to get rid of as Norton.

[Ferrari]

Hi radiorunner, good to see ya again,

I can tell you that from my experience that is not true at all. I use all free programs for my security and I don't get any messages like that in which I would consider annoying or a problem. They seem to act just like any other program I had bought in the past. Every once in a while you might get an advertisement asking if you would like to upgrade, but it is pretty simple, you just click on "NO" And this doesn't pop up out of no where, it is generally when you start the program, but again, it isn't very often.

Hope that helps!

And keep in mind, if you don't like what you are using, you can always upgrade or switch to another product. Not all programs are as hard to get rid of as Norton.

[Broni]

I second that. Avira displays invitation to an upgrade only once, when it's updating its definitions (once a day).

[radiorunner]

ok, based on your recommendations, will begin removal of norton & then download avira. thanks broni & ferrari!

[Ferrari]

Glad to help radiorunner,

Just to add something, I have recommened some of these free security programs to friends and family and it doesn't go over as well as I thought it would. Meaning, people seem to have more trust in something you buy, they make the false assumption that since it is free, it must not be good. So that makes sense why that guy would say something bad about Avira. People that arent "into" computers seem to be quite hesitant about freeware.

[mkau]

That's pretty true. The funny thing is, a lot of the Freeware antimalware programs are some of the best (Avast, Avira AntiVir, AVG, MBAM, SAS free edition, etc.) and are far less bloated than say norton or McAffee are.