I've been resisting getting Virus protection for my MAC for two reasons.
1. In 10 years of Mac use, I've never gotten a virus (with Internet, Fetch, Napster usage, and several email accounts)! Not to mention installing various software (of unknown origin) from friends....and
2. The one time I tried using Norton Utilities, it messed up everything and I had to initialize my hard drive.

So I've been this big "baby" and telling everyone I don't need it, but now the "peer" pressure from my fellow CIW students is getting to me. I don't want to pay and I don't want something that will mess me up!

What's a gal to do

In general I agree with you about the 2 main points. (1)Compared to PC's, mac viruses are quite rare. and (2) Norton AntiVirus can often be more hassle and/or harm than good.


However, in my 6 mos. of using lime wire my opinion has changed somewhat. A while back I downloaded a Stuffit Archive that was infected with the Sevendust C virus. My system started slowing down, I found an extension in my Extensions folder called " 666".

Basically, a lot of reinstalling stuff. I learned my lesson. While I don't use NAV all the time, occasionally I'll reboot w/ it enabled, check, and then disable again.

Good luck, Hope this helps....

What's the point of being a Mac user if you can't smugly look down on your dysfunction PC colleagues, happy in the knowledge that you'll never have the problems that they will. I think there are about 50,000 PC viruses lurking about, compared to about a dozen or less for Macs. Be proud...

My fellow students (and instructor) are all PC users, no wonder they are passing all their "fear" and "virus horror stories" on to me!

I'm just gonna keep things the way they are! I just needed to hear from other MAC users that they also didn't absolutely, positively REALLY need Virus Protection!

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I strongly suggest getting Norton AntiVirus or other virus protection software. I've seen about a dozen Mac viruses in ten years. Its true that's no where near as many as the PC community gets. However why risk it? Are the contents of your hard drive worth the $40 purchase price to protect it?

I am under the impression that while Macs are immune to PC viruses, we can still pass them along to others. The MS Word Macro virus is also cross-platform. With Norton and a bit of common sense, I have been able to warn people in newsgroups that a posting was infected. I have also received infected documents from friends who were quite glad to find out they had a virus.

I think all computer users owe it to everyone else and themselves to use anti-virus software. I also do not see how Norton can "mess up your HD".

Having used Macs since 1987 and having been online with a Mac since 1994 I can admit I have NEVER contracted a virus. I used to keep Norton Anti-Virus on the hard drive but there are so many servers out there I don't bother any more. You know you could REALLY give into peer pressure and buy a PC and then you can worry about ALL the viruses out there.

I can't run LimeWire with Norton AV running. In fact, when I recently turned on Norton and tried to scan my hard drive, it froze. I restarted and tried to scan three times and it froze every time. So, maybe I have a problem on my hard drive, but I can't find it with Norton. Everything seems to be running fine otherwise. Except for Outlook Express. That freezes consistently a couple of times a week. I think having Virus protection is a great thing, but if it doesn't work or interferes with other programs, what's the use? Arrggghh...

This is getting off-topic, but have you rebuilt your OE database recently? Hold down the option key at start-up and follow the directions. NAV is a good program. I do not use the automatic check, however, but run the virus check periodically on those folders that might be susceptible to infection. This lessens the chance of NAV interfering with some other program.

Thanks, Frieluft. I wasn't trying to ask for help with OE, but I sure appreciate the response. I tried it, we'll see how it goes...

Sorry, all, for the topic change. My post was really supposed to be only about NAV, but I got a little side-tracked. Won't happen again (I hope!)