Vista - Free Security Suite

Hey guys,
Just wanted to say how I'm protecting my system. I think with the right (free) security applications installed, you can be protected as if by a complete security suite. Best part is, you're taking the best of all sides. And did I mention they're free?

Basically my protection is

1. Avira AntiVir Personal - This antivirus application can do wonders in removing viruses and protecting your computer. It has heuristic detection which stands out amongst free antivirus packages and from my personal experience it works well with Windows Vista. Oh and did I mention it doesn't eat up much resources? (Scan once a day)

2. Malware Bytes AntiMalware - This baby is free, reliable and updated every 10 minutes, well maybe not 10 minutes but it is updated at least more than twice a day from my experience. This supplements Avira by removing items that are not detected by Avira. Now, no trojan, virus worm or whatever malicious software will ever cause great damage to your system (Scan once every three days)

3. Last but not least, Windows' default firewall will do the trick. Let's face it, we don't want anything complicated controlling our internet traffic. I mean most of us these days are behind a router which has a built in firewall already. I honestly even didn't run my firewall with xp and was fine with it.

P.S. Oh and since we're talking Vista, may I add that UAC (User Account Control) is also going to supplement the security of your system

Oh man too many tabs, I think this should go in System Security. Help MOD

You will probably flush out lots of opinions & recommendations here.
Incidentally,why do choose not to include Defender?
What you are using seems ok to me.
Your best free protection is to surf safely & to watch what you click on & down load.

Hey you got the same initials as my dad.

Yeah I probably will, Windows Defender? Never even scanned with that in my entire life. Although it's always updated. I might try that. Thanks for the suggestion

Great man! I have had malware bytes+ windows defender.. but then somehow somethign got through. I got avira, and my computer is now running like a beast!! Thanks

i run avast, defender, and windows firewall. no issues as of yet.

Zone Alarm free, AVG free and Malware Anti-malware is what I use.

i like avg but it is a resource hog.

AVG - A resource hog????
Running AVG Anti Virus Pro here quite happily on 2 Vista Ultimate laptops.

like i said i like AVG used to run it on all my rigs, great program just has a bigger footprint

YouTube - AVG Anti-Virus is a Resource Hog?

thought that was funny somebody would do that.

Actually, AVG is not a resource hog, it simply eats up more resources than Avast or Avira. Avast is also pretty good, I've used that for my virtual machine (xp) replacing my AVG free and I can say that it's running smoother. Although, IMO Avira is still the best out there. But I think if you're a beginner, you should stick to AVG or Avast. I mean Avira is not harder to use it's just that there's no link scanner in the free version. Something advanced users more than often do not need. Zone alarm is pretty good although it causes some issues on some setups that I won't take the risk of installing it. I'm sticking to the default firewall of Windows.