Anti-Virus, Anti-Spyware, Anti...

[Paulo]

Guys,
Maybe I'm nuts but, I don't have any of those Anti-??!!! installed and my Daw runs really fast and stable... Many people say that my computer is full of crap if I don't have those things installed and my answer is it' is working just fine and most of the computers that have those things installed, are really slow.

But I have something to protect me, of course. Periodicly when I'm sure that the system is going smooth I back it up with norton ghost so, if any of those virus start messing with it, I can always get back to a point where it was rolling OK.

[Vincent]

Ive tried most of the antispyware programs like spybot ect however the best one Ive seen that I use daily is superantispyware.

They have a free home version

http://www.superantispyware.com/

Not saying you have to use a program like this however it gets rid of the adware that may have been blocked by your pop up blocker.

I use it daily.

[Tacman7]

I never put anything like that on my music computer, it's not on the internet so there's no need.

Backing up is still good, you could install some sort of malicious VSTi or something I guess. Never happened so far, 10+ years.

Like the guy who jumped off a 10 story building, each floor he went by he would say, "Well, so far - so good".

[canuk62]

Ideally, having a daw (not online) and everything going into it (vsts,files,exe's) being scanned..thats foolproof. I got hit by hitting a bad (through a search engine) link on the web, one of those "anti-virus" exe's loaded automatically (through a microsoft firewall) and nuked the operating system..took about 3 seconds.
I've been using malaware, pctools anti-virus,Norton and a new freebie(SystemCare Free) daily with no issues (so far), plus backing-up all collabs/files on a 1 TB portable drive, and the CBZ stuff on our ftp.
Lost a months worth of work last time...not again!
Marc

[TallPaul]

I also use SuperAntiSpyware and like it, but I only scan with it on demand. I also have Spybot's TeaTimer running in memory, and the 2008 BitDefender Internet Security (firewall, AV; does not hog CPU resources).

If you don't like running AV/AntiSpyware stuff, I would suggest looking at the products offered by Faronics.com.

[Gerk]

If you don't like running AV/AntiSpyware stuff, I would suggest looking at the products offered by Faronics.com.

Or just buy a Mac 

[TallPaul]

If you don't like running AV/AntiSpyware stuff, I would suggest looking at the products offered by Faronics.com.

Or just buy a Mac 

Well, there's always that option! :-) But what fun is a computer and an OS you can't curse at?!?

[Gerk]

LOL .. don't worry, there's always _something_ to curse at, you can just focus more on cursing at the the recording process and less on the OS level of things 

[mickbrit55]

If you have only 1 computer and you want to use it for internet and everything else then you can set up a seperate logon for just recording/editing music. Strip it down so that your DAW runs smoother, switch off the internet (disable your adapter in the Control Panel) and tweak the OS so that it is optimized just for music. You can always reboot back into the original logon when you want to do other things.

Personally, I have Windows XP 32-bit on a completely seperate drive. The OS is set up for internet and all other stuff. On another drive I have Windows 7 64-bit just for my DAW.

Win XP Tweak Guide :
http://www.audioforums.com/resources/windows-xp-optimization.html