ANTIVIRUS SOFTWARE NIGHTMARE: NORTON VS. MCAFEE [Product Review]

Online Newsletter, May, 1999

When the Melissa virus first struck in March of this year, this reviewer rethought the issue - that despite the fact of never encountering any viruses over the past twenty years (by being very careful what files are opened), that viruses are getting smarter and more numerous all the time (over 13,000 known viruses at present). ... Especially so, when Melissa turned out to be another virus associated with email.

That could be a worst case scenario nightmare for a publisher - when news and press releases are a vital part of email.

Melissa affected many users, organizations, and Internet email servers, who often unknowingly, passed along the virus along to others.

The decision was made to finally install an antivirus software program, and the McAfee VirusScan program (Network Associates) was chosen initially over Norton AntiVirus (Symantec) because the McAfee CD-ROM contained all the various Windows programs on a single disc that was needed to run both DOS/Windows 3.1 -and- Windows 95 on the same PC. (The Norton Antivirus program at the time was contained in separate packages.)

This decision quickly became its own worst case scenario nightmare, as the story unfolds.

Background on Viruses

A virus is a software program designed to replicate and spread. It attaches itself to other programs such as word processors, spreadsheets, disk boot sectors, and most recently, email. Viruses range from being annoying to destructive. Most often they are transmitted by sharing floppy disks, but with the advent of the Internet, many today are downloaded, and there are thousands of virus strains.

Viruses come in a variety of forms such as boot sector/partition tables, multi-partite, Trojan Horses, file overwriters, polymorphic, and stealth - to name a few.

What Antivirus Scanners Do

These scanner antivirus software programs examine every file on a specified drive against a list of known viruses, often detecting it before it can run. Periodic scans can be programmed by the user to scan the entire PC system on a periodic basis, while TSR portions of the antivirus program work constantly in the background to protect against infection from floppy disks, and downloading from the Internet or other sources.

However, with the rapid proliferation of viruses being introduced, it is absolutely necessary to frequently update the list of viruses (called ''DAT'' files) and/or upgrade the antivirus program itself. DAT files should be updated at least monthly.

Theoretically, the McAfee and Norton programs should be fairly similar - but they are -not-, as this comparison will prove.

McAfee VirusScan

How McAfee rates their antivirus program as being #1 is beyond comprehension.

This reviewer elected to install the McAfee product in DOS/Windows 3.1 first, to see what happened. Everything appeared to run smoothly, so the Windows 95 version was next installed. Again, installation went smoothly.

The first thing that became readily apparent in -running- either the DOS/Windows 3.1 or Windows 95 versions, was that the system slowed down considerably, mouse moves were erratic, and .WAV audio files had a ''staccato'' effect while the program first loaded. Once the McAfee product was disabled, all PC functions ran normally.

Although the initial installation processes went smoothly, it was not until after downloading the current DAT list (4020updt.exe) to update the DAT files from the McAfee and/or Network Associates servers that it was discovered that the updated file was incompatible with the Version 4.0 that came in the package (getting an installation ''Information'' error message that a later version was needed). (McAfee offers -one- free upgrade to the product and ''lifetime'' DAT updating for the life of the product.) ... And just trying to connect to the McAfee/Network Associates servers was a trying task in itself.

This reviewer then called McAfee's ''free'' technical support (long distance phone charges apply and the service is only available weekdays during normal office hours), and waited about a half hour before getting a ''live'' download tech support person. Tech support advised that the DAT file available for downloading only worked in Version 4.02. - Thank you very much.

So Version 4.02 for Windows 3.1 was downloaded. Each time the attempt was made to download the 5.4 MB file, the server would ''time out'' after about 20 minutes (and the servers were extremely slow). Confirmation of this server problem was also noted when calling the McAfee tech support line (while waiting) that, indeed, their servers had a ''time out'' problem, especially if you were downloading at 56K or lower (Isn't this just about everyone?). McAfee's tech support advised, as an alternative, to download the five separate files which were about 1.2 MB each, constituting the whole program, and this was done successfully.

The new Version 4.02 caused Windows 3.1 to crash each time Windows 3.1 was booted. This problem was resolved by removing references to the McAfee product in the WIN.INI file. ... The DAT files were still inaccessible (only now a different error message advised that the installation could not find any of the installed product). - The new DAT files were required to install protection against the Melissa virus, since the McAfee CD-ROM product was released in 1998.