Virus and firewall protection

Shelly68

I'm new so I don't know what was discussed already. However I want to know if installing two different virus protections on your laptop is harmful? Should you only have one to cover everything?

Ian

https://community.microcenter.com/discussion/9632/virus-and-firewall-protection

Greetings. running multiple antivirus programs in the background on the same computer at the same time is not recommended in any way. In all likelihood, the computer's performance will be greatly reduced with multiple antivirus programs running, possibly to a point of not being able to efficiently open programs or use the computer as intended.

It should be noted these issues will only occur if you are referring to two anti-viruses that are not Windows Defender. Windows Defender doesn't need to be adjusted / removed as it simply disables itself if another antivirus (ESET, McAfee, Norton etc.) is installed. The issue I am describing above would only occur when two antiviruses like ESET, Norton, McAfee etc. are installed on the same PC at one time.

JohnDaBeardWilliford

One good one with a good VPN is sufficient. Most of us at Micro Center run ESET and NORDVPN. If you plan on changing to Eset from another program you may need to make sure it is removed entirely. If you have McAffee or Norton installed you will probably need to run the removal tool to entirely remove it. Which antivirus programs are you looking at and what are you currently running?

Remember: free is free for a reason. Some -if not most- of the free anti-virus programs are reactive rather than proactive: meaning they let things in and then try to get them out.