Hi guys and gals,
This is my first post and, because I can't find a "welcome" section and work in IT, I thought I'd make my first contribution here.
IT is a huge and broad-reaching sector to say that you work in so I'll try and give a bit of back-ground to my work. When I first started I worked in baseband networking, maintaining and installing everything from small 10 computer LANS upto several thousand computers, to installing and maintaining WAN's over telephony or satellite comunications. I then moved onto a more server based role managing variouis domains and systems. Since then I've specialised into Computer Network Defence which is where I currently work.
In my experience and opinion, the best thing that you can do with any Windows machine is keep it simple. The more applications that you have the more processes and services your computer will have to run through in order to carry out requests. The biggest problems occur when people install a ton of different programs that do the same thing. For example I was reading a reply on page 1 or 2 of this thread that said McAfee picked AVG up as a virus. It picked it up because some Malware, known as Trojan Horses, disguise themselves as safe executable files. When the user downloads the Trojan then double clicks, this then gives the Trojan permissions and rights at the level the user is elevated to. The actual programme itself may not have been malware, but the AV Scanners sometimes find it difficult to distinguish between what is good and what is not and opts for the safer of the two options.
This was just one example. Another is installing a Defrag programme when Windows has one installed already. Why do it? Since Windows Vista, there is virtually NO point in defragmenting your HDD manually at all. This is because Vista and later have a feature that automatically defragments your computer when it's not under heavy load i.e. when you're browsing the web. This means it keeps on top of what's going on. Installing a 3rd party defrag tool may appear like it's doing more than the Windows one, however the actual reality will simply be that it is just defragmenting your HDD in a different way to how the Windows tool wants to do it and, considering you're using a Windows Operating System, I'd suggest that the way the Windows tool defragments it is the correct way.
I've also read the above comment about using msconfig. This is a VERY good tool to use and can literally decrease your computer boot time by half.
For Anti-Virus, you can't go wrong with AVG free. Others may do more things, for instance Norton, McAfee and Kasperskey may offer a 100% Internet security solution which gives you a firewall, safe browsing, Anti-Malware tools and various other bits. These are great for those that generally don't care and in recent times have improved significantly with regard to resource usage. The downside to these programmes is that all a potential attacker has to do is test his exploit against the one piece of software that you are using and BAM, he's through all of your security.
Now, above I spoke about installing too many applications to do the same job. This is a bit of a problem with security; for reasons explained above. The best thing you can do is install a 3rd party firewall (The Windows one is excellent however it will also be one of the most tested against due to its nature of being proprietary) I suggest Online Armour, it's free, easy to use and for power users like myself allows you to view every port that's open and every programme that's using it. For your general Anti-Virus, I'd suggest installing AVG Free, simply because:
a) exceptionally light on system resources
b) managed exceptionally well
c) updates itself regulary
d) easy to use
e) always scores very highly with signature pick-up tests
This should provide you with an excellent base layer of protection, BOTH should be left ticked during MS Config.
The next two layers are simply scanners that check your whole system for issues. Malwarebytes Anti-Malware and Spybot Search and Destroy. Both are completely free. When in MS Config make sure you UNTICK these so that they don't start on boot-up. Regularly (I do mine once per week) scan your computer using full, heavy and deep scans (usually the ones that take the longest and have warnings about using system resources). Just leave them running overnight when you're not using the computer.
All in all this multi-layered approach to defence is the best that you can hope for without going into the realms of specific hardware firewalls (most routers come with some form of one anyway), IDS/IPS systems (such as Wireshark and Sourcefire) and Honeypot servers.
Anyway,
I hope this has helped.
Rich
PS if anyone knows how the hell to use Windows 8 properly please give me some lessons. I've tried and tried but it just confuses the hell out of me!
Speak soon!
