Office Anti-Virus

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Goldie Dice

Goldie Dice

Procrasti-nation
Aug 28, 2008
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I have looked through a few of the threads we already have here on the best anti-virus software but did not find exactly what I was looking for. My office currently runs on a Windows 2000 server - our IT company are charging us upwards of $4000.00 for renewal of Sophos anti-virus which I politely declined.

So I'm looking for an alternative - I understand there are a few good free AV programs available (Avast, Kaspersky etc.)

Our network has around 10 computers. What would be the cheapest yet still safe alternative to this hefty bill?

All the best,
Goldie.
 


Grisoft's AVG Network edition works perfectly for me. Locally I have 4 W2K3 Ent. servers, 1 exchange, 1 SQL, and one NAS. AVG has versions appropriate for each one and I've never had an issue.

For what it's worth, I had a PCI scan (passive penetration) done 2 weeks ago and the OS/patch/AV levels passed with flying colors. (can't say that about the .scripts though!)
 
Whoa, whoa, I had this same EXACT problem a year ago, and it's not so easy. AFAIK, Sophos is the only anti-virus company that still (tries) to support Windows 2000 (I may be wrong about this, but I know AVG doesn't support 2000). The server version is your problem. Unless you update your servers to 2003, you are stuck with Sophos.

I have a bunch of posts on my blog about viruses and 2000, they are about one year old. Good luck, you're going to need it..

Attack of the brain-sucking Trojans | Prepress Pilgrim

Have our Windows 2000 servers been saved | Prepress Pilgrim

Trojans and Windows 2000: Continued | Prepress Pilgrim
 
What Benji said.

If you're gonna upgrade your server, your options are a lot more open... but damn, Win2K? I keep a bootable copy of it to play my old DOSgames, but that's about it.
If you do upgrade, avoid Symantec products. Sure, they update the virus lists every 6 seconds (ok, slight exaggeration), but they're overpriced and I'm told their customer service sucks unless you're paying through the nose... Not to mention it sucks up cycles like they're nobodies business.

I use Avast SB edition ony my home network, and my girlfriend's work uses Kapersky Corporate. I've never had a problem (that I didn't directly cause by messing about with stuff I'm not supposed to... oops), and she's never told me about any problems at work.
Avast 4 still works on Win2k, but I don't think they run active tech support for it.
 
I usually use Clam Win for windows machines. It works with Windows 2K and is based off of ClamAV, which is a solid Unix based virus scanner. There is a version of ClamAV that works with XP/2003 servers, but for Win 2K, you would probably need to go with Clam Win.

The 'downside' to Clam Win is that it is not an active scanner, as in it doesn't scan every new file on the computer, so you would need to schedule scans. which is also why it is so much better on memory than most other Anti-Virus software suites. Might not work with your application though, but if you upgraded your server, you would have a lot more options...
 
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