Question

AntiVirus Recommendations

Asked by: 889515

I am trying to find a solution for antivirus and antispam that works well in a Microsoft terminal server environment. We previously had McAfee, but it has proven to be a major resource hog. Any one have any good suggestions and why? We run Windows 2003 Standard on all our servers. We need to protect 5 terminal servers, a file servers, two domain controllers, a number of software software servers, and about 40 laptops and desktops.

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Asked On
2009-05-01 at 12:44:33ID24373628
Tags

Antivirus

,

Terminal Server

Topics

Anti-Virus

,

Anti-Spam Email Software

,

Anti-Spyware

Participating Experts
11
Points
50
Comments
17

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Answers

 

by: marine7275Posted on 2009-05-01 at 12:51:53ID: 24282845

I have always been a Symantec, Trend Micro, and AVG fan, but http://www.kaspersky.com/anti-virus_windows_server is also been performing good for me.

Symanetc tends to be a resource hog, but if you have the extra memery to make it hum, I would go with it.

Less resource intensive but really good solutions are Trend and AVG.

Kapersky works well with larger enterprises.

 

by: IT_Desktop_SupportPosted on 2009-05-01 at 13:26:14ID: 24283126

I  tend to stay away from the major brands anti-virus software just because they tend to be resource hogs and really aren't that good at all.  We also use Mcafee in our corporate environment and it fails on so many levels.

AVG and Trend are pretty good, although I probably prefer something like F-Prot anti-virus or even Avast.

Both Avast and F-Prot should be pretty light on memory usage.

 

by: IT_Desktop_SupportPosted on 2009-05-01 at 13:28:40ID: 24283145

I must say though, there really isn't one anti-virus that is superior out there since they all have failed at some point.  It's probably best to inform your users on what to look out for (ex. random link from people on IM clients, suspicious emails and so forth).  

 

by: davetestaPosted on 2009-05-01 at 13:29:33ID: 24283148

Firstly, what are the specs of these severs, (Make and model if not)

You can always start buy using the free version of Malwarebytes for malware(available at http://www.malwarebytes.org) which is effective at removing some basic spyware and trojans, although I have to say from the experiences of my IT team, we have found that it is not as good at removing certain strains of Trojan Vundo as the program claims to remove.  Malwarebytes consumes few resources, and doesn't install a background service, or any drivers for that matter.  

If your servers are more recent, or you have about 512MB free or greater (hopefully), I'd recommend Symantec Endpoint Protection as your Antivirus solution, which seems to be pretty effective, however it doesn't play well with computers that don't exceed it's requirements; I've found it works fine on recent netbooks even, so it's worth taking a look into.  

I agree with Marine7275 however, Kapersky is a viable option as well; I'd beg to differ with McAffee folks, however so far I've seen their installations corrupted by some not so dangerous Malware to the point of having to use their uninstaller repair tool to successfully remove it, to either re-install, or install another removal and protection solution.

 

by: 889515Posted on 2009-05-01 at 13:34:01ID: 24283188

Davetests,

That is why we are moving off McAfee, we've had a ton of problems with it. I think Kasperky will be the first I look into. Have you heard anything good about Panda?

 

by: IT_Desktop_SupportPosted on 2009-05-01 at 13:37:38ID: 24283211

I agree that Malware Bytes is definitely a good choice overall as well.  Some other useful tools if any of the laptops/desktops get infected are Combofix and SuperAntiSpyware.


 

by: marine7275Posted on 2009-05-01 at 13:50:34ID: 24283307

I have not used Panda myself other than home use, but I have heard really good stuff using their enterprise solution.

 

by: warturtlePosted on 2009-05-01 at 15:01:10ID: 24283700

This website gives a comparison of different antiviruses, might be useful:

www.av-comparatives.org

 

by: WumpusHunterPosted on 2009-05-01 at 15:24:49ID: 24283802

Take a look at Sophos. We're moving to them when our NOD32 license expires. They cater strictly to businesses (small and large) and their detection rates are top notch. They live and die by their antivirus product unlike behemoths like McAfee and Symantec. I believe they also support TS environments, though I'm not quite sure if you're seeking client or server spam filtering. Can't vouch for performance yet.

Last week we got three different "zero-day" viruses that bypassed our three different antivirus solutions (nod32/Antivir/and sonicwall), but when I scan the viruses online using www.virustotal.com, Sophos detected them all.

 

by: kabooskyPosted on 2009-05-01 at 15:47:28ID: 24283915

I wouldn't recommend Sophos to small businesses or home offices. To run Sophos, you need a full-time IT depepartment due to the INCREDIBLE amount of false-positives.

 

by: davetestaPosted on 2009-05-03 at 13:09:31ID: 24291101

I don't know how much of a viable solution Panda's security suite is, but I would agree with WumpusHunter and kaboosky; Sophos is a pretty solid solution, but does produce a good amount of false positives, however this is the case in more and more antivirus solutions so it is to be considered the norm from the nature of program heuristics or registry keys in some perfectly safe applications.  Honestly, I would recommend Symantec End Point Protection or CA Antivirus; however that Panda USB vaccine tool seems to be simple, and effective to provide a quick and easy means of preventing autorun based USB Storage Device attaching infections from propagating throughout your network.  The pros being it is free, and can be used by the average user.

 

by: aleinssPosted on 2009-05-04 at 11:07:30ID: 24297585

NOD32, it's written in assembly language and is very light on resources.

 

by: 889515Posted on 2009-05-04 at 11:21:46ID: 24297710

Thanks for all the input guys, we are downloading some trial version and testing them out.

 

by: GOCARDSGO32Posted on 2009-05-11 at 00:15:25ID: 24352140

If you haven't figured anything out yet, I would also try Avira AntiVir. It' runs extremely fast and is low on resources. Cnet.com also provides some reviews of each of the antivirus software out there.

 

by: gammPosted on 2009-06-30 at 23:14:50ID: 24751845

Trend Micro ServerProtect is the way to go for Terminal Servers:
http://tinyurl.com/nhrd5p

It only runs as a single instance on the server, so you won't have an instrance running for every user session. They are still in beta for Server 2008 at this time, but it is supported on your 2003 server.

 

by: dragon24Posted on 2009-08-01 at 14:24:17ID: 24996722

889515, IT Desktop Support is right on. We have used F-secure for 4 of our servers for over 2 years now, and have been virus free. You can download a 30 trial version to test it out.
http://www.f-secure.com/en_US/downloads/trial-versions/business/

 

by: jasonbnixonPosted on 2010-09-02 at 07:56:40ID: 33587557

We have been using NOD32 for several years now and it has performed flawlessly! I also had a client a few days ago catch a new variant of an old virus. My client, and a few other users noticed it the same day and reported it on the ESET forums. ESET's tech's emailed me a manual tool within minutes that removed it.

Symantec on the other hand has caused issues for us, another large customer of ours, which rendered their ERP dead for a time. McAffee seems a bit desperate these days by adding their AV to just about any piece of free software on the web.

I'm all in for ESET's NOD32.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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