Re: OFF TOPIC: Antivirus software for Windows

[Ed Cray cray@xxxxxxxx]

Folks:

Like Judith Davidsen, I too would like to air this subject (and other
compatible-with-XYwrite issues) on the XYwrite list.

After going bare for about two months, I installed just yesterday Norton
Anti-Virus Corporate Edition 7.6 on my home computer. (The university
purchased a license which permits this.) The trick to installing it was
to remove ALL traces of the previously installed McAfee 3.0.

Two days before, in anticipation of my wife's purchase of a Dell, I
purchased McAfee's VirusScan Professional 6.0 to load on her unprotected
machine. (The $50 program had a $20 rebate, and comes with a firewall,
thus saving me the slight trouble of downloading and installing the
excellent Zone Alarm firewall.)

So I am poised to compare the two systems, and will report further.

In ostensibly going without anti-virus/worm protection, I was not entirely
foolhardy. The university uses an industrial strength anti-virus program
called Cheyenne to screen everything that comes into its many servers.
My broadband provider also has an anti-virus program of undetermined
efficiency, or so I think. In addition, I use Zone Alarm's free firewall.
Finally, on no circumstances -- not even if it is from maiden Aunt Tillie
(especially if it is from that innocent soul) -- will I open attachments.

As to the efficacy of XP about which someone asked earlier this morning: I
am told by a colleague who seems to dote on new technology that it is
_the_ platform for the next six years. He described it as "very stable"
(that the failure of Windows 95, partially corrected by Windows 98, which
I use). He further insisted that other programmers/companies will be
writing their software to be compatible with XP, and increasingly will not
bother to make their programs "back-compatible."

Mr. Chairman, I have now plumbed the depths of my computer knowledge and
turn the floor over to the next speaker.

Ed