Symantec sucks
- November 18th, 2005
- Posted in Software
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Norton Antivirus is at it again, and by 'it', I mean sucking.
This customer's machine has OVER 70 GIGABYTES of viruses QUARANTINED. They are all the EXACT SAME FILE. 47,713 BYTES times a kajillion. I couldn't even tell you how many files there were because it would have taken hours to get a directory listing. I've begun an rmdir /s /q (because explorer.exe is too slow for this).
What is wrong with Symantec? Why do they continue to make (and furthermore, how are they continuing to sell so many copies of) a program where the quarantine folder can take up your entire hard drive (ruining Windows completely)? Why is it always impossible to install or uninstall their products, and why does it usually break the BITS service (ruining Windows Update, which Dial-a-fix can fix, thankfully) when you try to use their horrible SymNRT to remove their horrible product? Why do their products break each other, and why is it nearly impossible to install a new version of one of their programs after an older version has been removed? Why does every brand new product of theirs (such as Antivirus 2006) already have 30MB of core updates, right after it was shipped (not including virus/spyware definitions)? Why isn't there yet a symantecsucks.com or something? :P
It's been deleting for ~5 minutes, and I have 2.5 GB of free space back so far… ~67 more gigabytes to go. :(
Edit: This is why I use avast! (on customer machines; on my own personal machine I don't use antivirus or spyware protection)
Edit 2: 2:37 PM (EST) and 20 GB has been deleted thus far.
Final edit: It took approximately 6 hours to delete ~75 GB worth of the same exact 47,713 byte file.
Bought "EndPoint Protection" for a client, spent a bundle of time and money. It was a near-disaster. All kinds of network problems, drives filling up with quarantine data, etc. Symantec rep claimed that he had never heard of such problems. Nonetheless, Symantec issued a full refund even though it was past their "no-exceptions" evalulation period. The client wouldn't even consider going back to the previous good version, the corporate "Symantec Client Security" v10.x (which is, in fact, pretty good, and much better than their resource-hogging consumer stuff). The corporate version, mind you, has many fewer "features" but it's been fine for corporate and most home use for years.
Twice I've contacted the Symantec help for 2 different viruses Norton 360 couldn't identify. Both times I just got a bunch of "drop down selection" answers. They wanted an extra $99.99 to remote access my computer to have a technician remove the virus. Isn't that Norton 360's job?
I Didn't pay, but now need to find a real program that will detect and delete any virus.
Only wish I had read this before I installed the lame program, looks like I'm in for a fight just to remove 360.
i have avira anti virus which works absolutely fine…i recommend all of you out there to use it.
i am in the same boat as the rest of you…as an IT professional who has to work on many different people's computers, i have seen NORTON fuck up sooooooo many things. where to start…..
1)resource hog
2)totally ineffective antivirus scanning
3)it blows up random apps such as :
autocad, photoshop, windows!,
4)impossible to fully uninstall
5)shitty customer support
6)YOU HAVE TO PAY FOR ALL OF THIS!
point is: i would rather cut off my own nuts with a rusty spoon than use ANY norton/symantec product!!! get a real antivirua program…..AVG, avast….or dont even bother…still better than norton!
**
There are 10 people that think jokes about binary are funny. I'm not either of them.**
Norton 360 2010 will trash your puter… oh it protects alright… from anything you want to do. no more movie previews, no more java, no more anything. AND they will not help with their ethiopian workers. No refunds.. buyer beware. slow your puter down totally.. Crap ala Norton .. If you wanna toss out a $100 spot.. send it to Hataii
Thanks steven "mcaffee" ;)
The negroe John W Thompson, currently chairman of Norton, promoted from being its CEO for the past decade, received his position as a result of stockholder vote. After he received his position, he received an honorary degree in something (the Norton website doesn't say what, but from the context I would guess business management or administration); after college he obtained a master's degree in management science. There is no evidence on the website that he actually knows anything about information technology. So why did those stockholders vote for him? Did they want a negro for the sake of affirmative action? And who were these voters? I can only suspect, based on the following: I once met a Jew who knew some super rich Jews who would covertly buy up stock in a company, use their voting power to install who they wanted in a key position, then sell their stock and move on to their next target. If it's not good for the company, they don't care because they no longer own the stock. And if their chosen company officer is incompetent, then his subordinates will be able to get away with mischief. A double agent wouldn't be noticed. Maybe even viruses or spyware wouldn't be noticed, or hidden back-doors accessible to third parties who pay for the privilege. When checking an outfit out, Napoleon would first ask, "Who are the generals?" Was Thompson the natural leader of software inventors and technologists? In my view the answer is no; something's wrong there. So I wouldn't use their software even if they paid me to use it.
@ # Dave – your an idiot, John W Thompson prior to Symantec ran a $90B sector at IBM. It's a good thing they put a picture up so you could figure out he is a "negroe". Maybe if you email them they'll put up a picture of his fake degrees so you can do more visual research.
The idea of virus protection is flawed so how do you expect it to work anyway. The only reason any of you have success with other lesser known products is because they are not installed on a large percentage of consumer machines. Your arguing the same way Mac users argue that they don't get viruses. They very well could if someone was dumb enough to write a virus for 4% of the worlds computers as opposed to the smart guys who write viruses for Windows which runs on 73% of the worlds computers.
In conclusion if you run Windows you will have to deal with viruses. You may skirt around most of them but eventually you'll get stuck with one.