AVG is awesome.

Let me just say, that AVG is the best antivirus program ever, especially for corporate networks.

We were running fine on 9.0 for a year, until users start getting "Upgrade to the Search Shield blah blah blah". Yes, this is something different than the Link Scanner. Ok, well, no way in the admin console to disable this because the USER gets this new feature, leaving the admin console behind, until you upgrade it to 2011. We figured ok, let's just upgrade to AVG 2011. That was the best idea ever.

We managed to get around the 2011 BSOD (AVG Worldwide - FAQ - System crash after the recent AVG 2011 update 3292 (BSOD)) safely, which I'm guessing is a feature along with the other cool features AVG has introduced.

Then came time to install it. AVG has this proprietary agent that it installs and then you can push the software to it. It is so cool. If the agent even works and it doesnt die from a different service pack of Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable, it will uninstall the old AVG and REBOOT without telling you. That's great for us, because our users dont do any work. See there's this check box to NOT reboot after install, but that does us a lot of good when it REBOOTS ANYWAY after it uninstalls the old version. Good thinking AVG. Reboot on the uninstall, but let us disable that 2nd reboot.

So then it tries to install, but doesnt. So you go checking event logs, looking in the task manager, digging through the temp folder, rebuilding your lab with different builds, smashing things, doing needle drugs...whatever you usually do when these things happen.

But that's ok, because it will never actually get to the real install. So now you've just removed AV from the machine. If you do get to the install, you are really in for a treat. At least they gave us the option to disable that second reboot that might never come!

AVG now has a toolbar (it has for a while actually) that is checked by default in the admin console that gives users yet another toolbar featuring:
- Search by any of the major search engines. Since apparently every other toolbar doesnt do this.
- Add your facebook.
- Check your email.
- Twitter.
- Read RSS feeds. They have a cool one in there to get you started.

After the toolbar install is successful (and believe me, if any component will be, that is it), you are taken to a page that has one of those "Thanks for installing this stuff" and an awesome SPEED UP MY PC link. I mean I've seen some viruses that have this junk and it's fake, but this one is great. It DOESNT result in a hundred users calling asking why they got a toolbar and if they need to speed up their PC, which undoes the last 6 years of the help desk's nagging to not do things like that (even if they dont have admin rights).

I realize the users could just click No to all this stuff, but there are thousands of them. They rotate PCs, so we don't know if the users will have to click No on every PC they use, or what. Since the program is so reliable and not full of bloated junk, we can't really find this out either, because like all things AVG, we can't replicate it.

And dont try to call support. Because the javascript on their web site doesn't give you a usable drop down for you to specify your operating system, so i guess you just don't need to call anyone or file a ticket. Their web guys must be just as good as their marketing guys.

I'm so glad my company has another 2 years left on our license. It was only an arm and a leg to begin with. See we got a great deal on it because we're a non-profit.

We had fun the last few days in the lab with you. Goodbye AVG. Stay classy.

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Comments

Essendon

OMG you had AVG as your corporate AV?? Damn man, Symantec arent upto scratch either. The product is poor and the support's even poorer. Yesterday we had an outbreak on some machines on the network (detected by Foundstone), some .rugo virus and it couldnt detect the virus on multiple machines even though there were annoying ads popping up on them. McAfee is the way to go.

eansdad

McAfee isn't much better.....

tomahawkeer

I've had moderate to low success with Panda Software, and pretty decent success with Trend Micro.

ehnde

Clamwin does the job just fine and it's not a flaming pile of.........I mean it works ok.

rfult001

Using McAfee right now at work. Thinking about moving to MS Forefront Security...any thoughts or feed back on this?

I moved away from AVG recently at home to MS Security Essentials and it has been working pretty well. As I understand it, Security Essentials uses the same engine as Forefront.

RobertKaucher

I had no issues with TrendMicro Worry Free. I really liked it and it brought the "Fake AV" trojans to nearly 0% back when they were running rampant. McF blew and was really expensive.

N2IT

SEP 11 in our environment. It's average at best.

Plantwiz

I still like Trend Micro's product.
It has remained good for resource used, problems caught/fixed, and pricing for the past several (8ish) years. Just about every release of Symantec, and McAfee and a few times CA I'll go back and test in lab and find they just don't have the value for my clients that Trend offers.

I have a couple friends who use Symantec for their clients and swear by the product...so they certainly have their market share.

Psoasman

Eset NOD32 works pretty well.

chmorin

OP, your post made me smile. I need that!

BerryKix

AVG is useless. One of the few times I had a virus on my computer it couldn't even detect it. I have AVG on my computer right now, but I'm tempted to just remove it since all it really does is take up system resources.

steve13ad

We use LANDesk AV, and it does about as good a job as the 3 Stooges!

sthompson86

Essendon wrote: »

Symantec arent upto scratch either.

We run Symantec at my current job, and its horrible. Mine and the other Tech's computers want even update with the server managed version.

Nonetheless, I was surprised to see a a thread entitled "AVG is awesome", but after reading the thread I find myself not surprised with the outcome.

gateway

Oh dear. I have not yet heard of AVG being used in an enterprise environment before and I guess this is exactly why - interesting post!

I have never had an issue with the free home version and even if I did I can't grumble as it's free - although when I have 5 mins I would like to stop that annoying advert appearing in the console.

We use McAfee here on a huge scale, with several EPO repositories around the country. Once configured correctly, it seems to work ok - not had any showstoppers anyway. I can't comment really on anything else as I have never administered any other enterprise AV solutions.

Thanks for posting.

peanutnoggin

gateway wrote: »

We use McAfee here on a huge scale, with several EPO repositories around the country. Once configured correctly, it seems to work ok - not had any showstoppers anyway. I can't comment really on anything else as I have never administered any other enterprise AV solutions.

Thanks for posting.

+1

We were using Symantec for a long time and about 6 months to a year ago, we rolled out McAfee! It's been running with very limited (if any) issues.

-Peanut

tomahawkeer

The only hiccups ive had with TM, is on occasion we have had issues with getting it installed on a few workstations (very few). But as far as catching stuff / blocking / scanning etc, its light years ahead of what we used before (Panda). We have been using it almost a year now, and I can say that I would recommend it. I can't see us switching anytime soon.

hypnotoad

AVG is fairly common around here in companies. The network edition is supposed to give you the ability to check in on users and upgrade things, change settings -- that's the advantage over the free version. Network and free run the same virus defs with the same engine.

The network version was fine until my users got prompts to install stupid crap without the network management console having any control over it.

Complicated by a difficult upgrade process that is totally broke.
Complicated by a reboot with no warning to the user you basically can't avoid.
Complicated by a stupid toolbar that basically looks like malware.
Complicated by a website with a support link that doesn't work.

arwes

We just got GFI (formerly Sunbelt) Vipre Enterprise Premium for 4 years for what we paid for 1 year of Symantec Endpoint Protection this past year. On top of that, they threw in a free home license for Vipre for all our employees (~80 users). I'm liking it pretty well, but SEP really sunk its teeth into some of these machines. CleanWipe helps, but their network driver tends to screw things up on the way out.

I forgot to add that GFI's support is really fast. We were getting a false positive on akamai.net, and they had it fixed in the next definition update a few hours later.

it_consultant

We use GFI and it has been pretty good so far. The scanner is VERY effective, though sometimes I wish it would block more viruses on access so I wouldn't have to use the scanner in the first place. The best on access scanner I have used is the Microsoft product, which is what everyone at home should be using. I use avira at home, I can't say its any better than MS Forefront.

undomiel

For my anecdotal evidence I can report not much good from Vipre nor Eset. Vipre's been a leaky sieve for a few of the clients that we've been working with. Can't say anything bad about the protection side for Eset but I've had it hard lock several SBS servers so far so I can't say I'm impressed. Kaspersky has been great on protection but horrible on resource utilization. It has been causing a number of headaches performance-wise for a number of our clients. Symantec doesn't catch anything. AVG we haven't had any problems with, though it hasn't been very good at catching stuff either. I haven't found one I like yet since they've all been rather problematic so far.

billyr

Psoasman wrote: »

Eset NOD32 works pretty well.

+1. Been using it for nearly 2 years now and never had a single issue that it hasn't dealt with.

hypnotoad

undomiel wrote: »

For my anecdotal evidence I can report not much good from Vipre nor Eset. Vipre's been a leaky sieve for a few of the clients that we've been working with. Can't say anything bad about the protection side for Eset but I've had it hard lock several SBS servers so far so I can't say I'm impressed. Kaspersky has been great on protection but horrible on resource utilization. It has been causing a number of headaches performance-wise for a number of our clients. Symantec doesn't catch anything. AVG we haven't had any problems with, though it hasn't been very good at catching stuff either. I haven't found one I like yet since they've all been rather problematic so far.

Agreed. No AV program is perfect. Or even close. I've spent more time worrying about the AV products than the viruses themselves.

It would probably be easier to train the IT staff on cleaning systems up/reimaging them and do our best to hit it at the network level rather than the user's endpoints.

RobertKaucher

hypnotoad wrote: »

Agreed. No AV program is perfect. Or even close. I've spent more time worrying about the AV products than the viruses themselves.

It would probably be easier to train the IT staff on cleaning systems up/reimaging them and do our best to hit it at the network level rather than the user's endpoints.

I agree with this. Especially for places using Windows 7. Modern AV systems just don't do what they promise as well as they should and usually cause more issues themselves on a wider scale. I think of it his way: a new virus might infect a few PCs before it is caught and steps are taken to keep it at bay (network layer AV or something like that) - when the corporate AV system sends out a patch that causes systems to BSoD every PC with the corporate AV is a potential issue. And that happens way too often...

RobertKaucher

tomahawkeer wrote: »

The only hiccups ive had with TM, is on occasion we have had issues with getting it installed on a few workstations (very few). But as far as catching stuff / blocking / scanning etc, its light years ahead of what we used before (Panda). We have been using it almost a year now, and I can say that I would recommend it. I can't see us switching anytime soon.

The thing I liked best about TM is it never brought my network to its knees. It did it's job and was not very intrusive. When your AV causes more issues than virus outbreaks would, it's is time to switch.

wd40

We use Mcafee at work, for the past 4 years we had zero incidents in all the branches in more than 70 countries.

But ..

We have strong PC security rules "Access control, applications that are allowed to be installed, which people can have admin access, security updates, no local shared folders, etc"

and strong firewall rules,
and strong spam filtering system.

So basically we have no security holes, even if the AV is not updated for whatever reason, the chances of getting an infection are low.

jmasterj206

hypnotoad wrote: »

AVG is fairly common around here in companies. The network edition is supposed to give you the ability to check in on users and upgrade things, change settings -- that's the advantage over the free version. Network and free run the same virus defs with the same engine.

The network version was fine until my users got prompts to install stupid crap without the network management console having any control over it.

Complicated by a difficult upgrade process that is totally broke.
Complicated by a reboot with no warning to the user you basically can't avoid.
Complicated by a stupid toolbar that basically looks like malware.
Complicated by a website with a support link that doesn't work.

We use AVG Business Security here as well. Did you purchase your licensing through Waytek? Their support is superior to dealing with AVG. I've also had some issues with the 11 upgrade. I just ran the network install and told it not to install the toolbar since is it more pain than it is worth. Also, when you install you can't do a hidden install otherwise it will reboot without user intervention. My biggest grip is that when doing the install (non hidden) it prompts the user for reboot and if they don't reboot basically they have zero protection and a lot of my machines are on 24/7, so I had to go hunt them down. Needless to say when I am done with my 2 years I am done with AVG.

rfult001

wd40 wrote: »

We use Mcafee at work, for the past 4 years we had zero incidents in all the branches in more than 70 countries.

But ..

We have strong PC security rules "Access control, applications that are allowed to be installed, which people can have admin access, security updates, no local shared folders, etc"

and strong firewall rules,
and strong spam filtering system.

So basically we have no security holes, even if the AV is not updated for whatever reason, the chances of getting an infection are low.

Add to this a strong IDS/IPS and you reduce your security vulnerabilities to dealing with the idiots on the inside who can't follow policy.

netpcdoc

The school district I am at is running symantec Corp, i am supposed to push out SEP 11 over the holidays.

My old job, I talked them into Avast and it had to have been the best av I ever came across. It was lean fast, and efficient. This was ver. 4 back then.

it_consultant

I have had literally nothing but problems with SEP. A large minority of desktop problems were directly related to SEP. Adding insult to injury, it would let viruses in and not clean them in scans. Symantec tech support gave us a BS line about the inane difference between viruses, trojans, and spyware. No dude, I want your software to take care of all of it, especially considering the number of problems it brings us.

When we deployed vipre we uncovered at least three viruses that SEP never detected. Since we deployed we havent had locking computers, randomly deleted network drives, mysterious disconnections from the network etc.

SteveLord

Psoasman wrote: »

Eset NOD32 works pretty well.

I use NOD32 here for my office. Couldn't wait until our McAffee contract ended. NOD32 installs quick, uses hardly any resources and updates itself automatically and behind the scenes.

If I were money strapped, I'd use MSE. If Microsoft made a corporate version of that with some extra stuff and at the right price without screwing it up.....I'd do that too. It's the best free AV for home use in my opinion. There really is no reason to pay for antivirus at home anymore.