If Norton AntiVirus (NAV) 2005 is long on dependability, it's short on sizzle, adding only a few modest enhancements to last year's version. NAV's strengths remain its well-designed interface and impressive virus-blocking performance history. The new QuickScan tool, which automatically searches for viruses following updates, is a welcome addition; however, we're less thrilled with the much-touted worm blocker because it doesn't match the level of protection found in fully-fledged firewalls offered in competing antivirus packages. Current NAV users should upgrade to 2005, however, as the upgrade costs only marginally more than Symantec's annual subscription-renewal fee. But new users should shop around for an antivirus program that also includes a firewall, such as last year's Editors' Choice, Trend Micro's PC-cillin Internet Security 11, or the newly released ZoneAlarm with Antivirus.
Setup & interface
Norton AntiVirus 2005 now takes less time to setup and configure than before. In version 2004, a preinstall antivirus scan examined every file on your PC -- time-consuming overkill. This year NAV saves time with its new QuickScan engine, checking only the usual-suspect files and folders -- those with Startup entries or with System-Start INI or batch entries -- and skipping less likely files and folders, such as music and image folders.
After the quick presetup scan, NAV installs itself, automatically downloads the latest virus definitions and program files, and runs a mandatory, comprehensive post-setup scan. Our initial setup took just less than 45 minutes; plan to step away from the PC and brew some tea in that time, though, as NAV is a major resource hog during its system scan, essentially rendering your PC useless for other tasks. For instance, in our informal tests, Microsoft Word took 35 seconds to load during a system scan. With no scan running, it took just 6 seconds on our 2GHz Celeron system with 512MB of RAM. See below for more on system performance.
NAV's clean, well-organised interface remains one of the best in the antivirus market, and we're pleased to see it's mostly unchanged. One noteworthy upgrade is the Protection Alert screen, which allows you to specify a period of inactivity when disabling NAV's real-time virus scanner -- a necessary evil when installing some programs. Simply right-click the NAV icon in the Windows Taskbar, click Disable Auto-Protect and select a period of shutdown time -- 15 minutes, 1 hour, 5 hours or until the system restarts. This is important because many users forget to turn the scanner back on.
Features
Like its competitors, Norton AntiVirus 2005 scans and cleans instant-messenger attachments, as well as inbound and outbound email. However, all of NAV's best features are carryovers from 2004. This year's version adds Norton Internet Worm Protection, a lightweight firewall feature that blocks unsolicited inbound traffic, including nasty troublemakers such as the Blaster and Sasser worms. Unlike a full-on firewall, however, Worm Protection won't block outbound traffic, making it no more effective than the free Microsoft firewall included in Windows XP SP2.
We ran Norton Worm Protection against Steve Gibson's ShieldsUp security checker, which reported that our test PC successfully blocked most of the test Internet packets. Unfortunately, our test PC replied to the ShieldsUp Ping requests, meaning our computer was visible to the Internet -- not good. Typically, a computer running a full-on firewall won't respond to pings. Even with Worm Protection, Norton users will still need a firewall.
Like its predecessor, NAV 2005 scans for hidden spyware threats, including adware, diallers and keystroke loggers that record every key you tap. Unfortunately, its real-time scanner doesn't detect spyware; rather, NAV spots these menaces during only a full system scan or a QuickScan, the latter running immediately after virus-definition downloads. Overall scanning speed was respectable. In our informal tests, NAV took 37 minutes to scan a 12GB partition.
NAV 2005's list price remains unchanged at £44.99 (inc. VAT) and is comparable to the cost of Trend Micro's PC-cillin Internet Security 11, which includes a full firewall and anti-spam tools not found in NAV 2005.
Performance
In our labs tests, running Norton AntiVirus 2005 results in the same amount of drag on system performance as running McAfee's VirusScan and Trend Micro's PC-cillin. The lightest hit on system resources comes from Computer Associates' eTrust EZ Antivirus 2005. Norton took longer to scan our 1.3GB hard drive than either PC-cillin or EZ Antivirus.
To measure NAV 2005's impact on system performance, we use BAPCo's SysMark 2002, an industry-standard benchmark. The Internet-content-creation portion of SysMark measures desktop performance running off-the-shelf applications, such as Adobe's Photoshop, Microsoft's Windows Media Encoder, and Macromedia's Dreamweaver. We did not run the office productivity portion of the benchmark because it incorporates McAfee's VirusScan 5.13.
Our test system was a Dell Dimension 8200 running Windows XP Professional, with an Intel Pentium 4 1.9GHz processor and 256MB of RDRAM. With NAV running, our test system scored 94 percent -- meaning a 6 percent reduction in overall system speed. By comparison, VirusScan also scored a 94. An Internet-content-creation score of 100 represents the performance of our test system without any extraneous software running. In a test of scanning speed, NAV took an average of 6.1 minutes to scan a 1.3GB directory, slightly faster than VirusScan, which averaged 6.68 minutes.
| Antivirus software: impact on system performance | |||||
| Test system |
Norton AntiVirus 2005 |
McAfee VirusScan 9.0 (2005) |
Trend Micro PC-cillin Internet Security 11 |
CA eTrust EZ Antivirus 2005 |
|
| SysMark2002 Internet-content-creation (ICC) score | 233 | 220 | 219 | 227 | 233 |
| Normalised score | 100 | 94 | 94 | 94 | 100 |
| Percentage degradation | n/a | 6 | 6 | 6 | 0 |
| Average boot time (s) | 38.9 | 71 | 51 | 45 | 47 |
| Scan 1.3GB directory; average scan time (min.) | n/a | 6.1 | 6.68 | 2.48 | 2.56 |
Service & support
Symantec's phone support is available between 9am and 5pm Monday to Friday, but it'll cost you -- to the tune of £18 per incident.
Symantec's help site also includes the Automated Support Assistant, a downloadable utility that scans Norton AntiVirus for known problems. However, the assistant needs more tooling. For example, when we disabled Auto-Protect, NAV's real-time virus scanner, the Automated Support Assistant reported no irregularities on our system -- oops. Symantec also offers email support, but you'll need to run the Automated Support Assistant before firing off a query.
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Member reviews
- 4.50 out of 10
4.50 out of 10Be under no illusions -- NAV is a capable AV product but boy will you pay for it! Temporaily turn off your protection and see the difference it'll make to your PC -- you'll think you just added another processor. Support is very poor -- probably a little better if you live in the US. If you have the 2004 product stick with it -- again hardly the best but at least you won't get stung twice!
- 4.50 out of 10
4.50 out of 10Look elsewhere - NAV is an over-rated, under-performing product. Support will cost you dearly unless your prepared to compromise and wait... and wait.... and wait.....
- 3.50 out of 10
3.50 out of 10After the buggy 2004 version, I expected that Symantec would learn a lesson and would improve. But the opposite happened!
A program which makes your pc slow, by taking up around 50% of the CPU time....is a virus!.. so, it can be renamed Norton Virus 2005 (NV2005)!
- 3.00 out of 10
3.00 out of 10user "Hello, Help Desk?"
tech "How can I help?"
user "My PC is broken! HELP!"
tech "1. Is it turned on?"
user "ahhh, yep"
tech "2. Is Norton installed?"
user "ahhh, yep?"
tech "@%$# @#%% %$#@ go to http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/nav.nsf/docid/2001092114452606 and look at links at bottom if different version. It could take over an hour for an average user. Have Fun, and backup your registry!"
- 2.50 out of 10
2.50 out of 10I work in IT support. If I see someone with it installed even if they have paid for it I ask them to remove it. After the tricky uninstallation they think they have been upgraded with a new processor. I myself use AVG's fantasic suite and will be looking at purchasing the new Full V 8 after they upgrade my free version to 7. Symantec win with customers only because of the branding: people who don't know anything about PCs always go for Symantec. The same can be said for AOL users.
- 3.50 out of 10
3.50 out of 10The product is fat still buggy after all these years and overpriced. Their support is just so so bad. I have dumped it for avast on all my systems.
- 3.50 out of 10
3.50 out of 10Easy to set up and auto update is a good feature -- can install it and leave it. A bit pricier than most antivirus software but for some peace of mind good. A lot of people are put off because it is a big name, but this helps for home users who have not the time or knowledge to go searching for other products.
- 7.00 out of 10
7.00 out of 10I upgraded to NAV 05 hoping to fix some compatibility issues trying to run Norton Anti-Spam 05 with NAV 04 (I failed).
Task Manager shows that ccapp.exe, ccevtmgr.exe and ccsetmgr.exe between them are using a high proportion of my 2.7 GHz P4 CPU, and an average of 250 MB of RAM! The computer runs like a dog when scanning and spam filtering... if it doesn't crash completely.
I find myself using task manager to end applications and restart several times daily.
I regularly receive dialogue boxes telling me that the installation is corrupt and asking me to reinstall. I believed it the first few times until I realised it made no difference. It is also a little worrying to come back to my always-on broadband PC to find that the virus checker disabled itself!
Another annoying habit is that it refuses to remember my settings, returning to the defaults at random.
Last year for Mr Norton and I: you are the weakest link. Goodbye!
- 5.50 out of 10
5.50 out of 10Replaced free AVG and free ZoneAlarm with this crap. Believed that paying for a respected brand name would provide better protection.
Would not perfom scan of indidual files or system, tried fixes from Norton's website no avail. From reading various forums this seems to be a problem with some users.
Gone back to using free software which works. Going to try and get a refund for this rubbish. No wonder software piracy is rife when corporations rip off the consumer with this junk.
- 5.50 out of 10
5.50 out of 10I couldn't be more disappointed with this product. ccapp.exe runs at 99% on a one year old computer with XP. I've tried everything to improve performance (including disabling most of the features and a full system rebuild). The computer is close to unusable – So what's the point in being free from spam and viruses.
- 4.50 out of 10
4.50 out of 10I am so tired of reading how crappy this is. I am mad people are still buying this crap software. I fix computer - out of approx 800 service calls last year Jan 2004-Feb 28, 2005 only 12 - yes TWELVE people were NOT infected with viruses. I removed Norton off ALL those machines anyways and only left it running on 2 machines. It seems spyware cripples Norton - the 12 machines had no spyware. QUIT BUYING NORTON PEOPLE!!! It's a waste of money, HUGE resource hog, and barely works. I've had customers buy laptops from Bestbuy, Future Shop, anywhere with Norton on it and some were compromised within a week of buying the machine. This software doesn't work! Running a scan will almost always say NO VIRUSES. Remove Norton, install AVG - the highest was over 2,000 infections. Insane. Norton should be sued for selling such a faulty product!
- 3.50 out of 10
3.50 out of 10NAV 2005 adds at 10, TEN!, processes to your CPUs load. This is unreasonable. Moreover, its "Internet Worm Protection" is less effective than the simple firewall that comes with XP Service Pack 2 and tends to block online games.
I managed to get an OEM version for under $20, but I'm still feeling ripped off.
- 4.00 out of 10
4.00 out of 10NORTON INSTALLED – END DEC 20005
ccSetMgr This file, more than the other norton files,
is causing my computer to run slow, use a large
amount of resources, shutdown problems.
Overall NORTON has been Installed Uninstalled 38 THIRTY EIGHT TIMES.
Each time LIVE UPDATE has to be downloaded.
the time spent/wasted is ?????????????
ccapp will not let me shutdown properly
- 2.50 out of 10
2.50 out of 10It seems the Corporate version is better, but have you seen the price. Try AVG, Avast, ClamAV to name but 3 alternatives
- 4.00 out of 10
4.00 out of 10... I thought it was just me! I have a 3 y/o laptop that performs like a dog. Thought it was just age! Maybe not. Also had problems with Norton AV 2004. Download of updated virus definitions would not complete. Software corrupt? Help pages an absolute nightmare to navigate. Very difficult to contact them. They also have the cheek to charge you extra to have the ability to re-download the software. Oh - and download is the same price as the boxed product. They're having a laugh! Good riddence I say. I'm off to try AVG as that's what's being suggested!
- 4.00 out of 10
4.00 out of 10NAV 05 is absolutely a disgrace!!! instead of improving their software they have done the complete opposite, buttons do not work and do not expect to get support from symantec as it feels as if they are hidden somewhere in India. I highly recommend looking for another more stable anti-virus software package. It takes a lot for something/somebody to make me write reviews whatsoever but symantec's NAV05 definitely has deserved a couple minutes of my time.
- 2.00 out of 10
2.00 out of 10I am an IT tech. My job is to fix home and small business user's problems. Half of my jobs are virus-removal related and many of the virus-ridden PCs I come across also have Norton AV installed. AVG picks up MORE viruses than Norton, use that instead. The program itself has been the direct cause of many client's problems as well. One example, I had a client who's PC took at least 5-6 minutes to load and they could NOT connect to the internet. After removing Norton AV it took around 30 seconds for their PC to start up and they were able to connect to the internet once again. So get out of the mentality that "Oh it costs more, it must be better", because the best things in life are free.
- 2.00 out of 10
2.00 out of 10I too was a NAV fan for years, but I have never seen anything that even comes close to being this bad. Yep, if you already got NAV on your computer (or had it) it ain't gonna load. My days with them are done.. went to Kaspersky Antivirus and wish I did sooner.
- 2.00 out of 10
2.00 out of 10running p4 1.7, 768 ram; accepted default installation rathern than upgrade my NAV 2003. Immediately had issues with CPU utilization hovering at 20-40% ALL THE TIME. Crashes repeatedly. DO NOT BUY.
- 2.50 out of 10
2.50 out of 10I've been using NAV for years and never, ever had a problem with it. (But i do occasionally scan with an online AV, just in case ). Its simple to use and appears to do the job very well. I currently use the 'stand alone' NAV 2005 and use another, far superior Firewall and anti-spyware. Maybe i've been lucky so far..???
- 6.00 out of 10
6.00 out of 10- 7.50 out of 10
7.50 out of 10When you remove it it leaves a lot of rubbish behind ie empty folders - registry keys
- 5.00 out of 10
5.00 out of 10- Slow PC performance when installed.
- Was not able to remove a number of threats detected on my PC.
- Support team were not able to resolve installation problem after 5 hrs of online support.
- Would not give a refund even though the support team were not able to resolve installation problems.
- NAV Software proved very difficult to remove from my PC. I opted to wipe my hard disk and reload XP + other software to ensure corrupt NAV files would not cause a problem in the future.
- The installation troubleshooting procedure executed by the support team resulted in failure of other systems on my PC. e.g. Failure of web browser to connect to websites. Needed to reload windows XP.
Despite working as a Computer Validation Engineer, I wasted approx. 12 hrs of my time trying to get this product to work.
I strongly advise, any home user, against purchasing this product.
- 4.00 out of 10
4.00 out of 10slowed down computer, caused problems with my internet explorer and my windows explorer, a major memory hog, how could they ruin the excellent record by releasing such garbage. Buy this and you will lose more than just your money when installed.
- 2.00 out of 10
2.00 out of 10NAV is horrible i had AVG but i got 1 virus that avg couldnt solve so i got norton because it was expensive and its a trusted name(bad idea). MY XP comp is now running at 99% NAV sucks if ur reading this
>DONT BUY NAV<
im takin nav off and putting back AVG RIGHT NOW. I HAD NAV for a few days and i hate it. reasons
.slow web browsing
.laggy games
.startup takes longer
.shutdown takes longer
.it doesnt do a good job
.slower downloads
.EXPIN$IVE
.AVG is better and free
ALL in ALL ((((DONT GET NAV))))
- 2.00 out of 10
2.00 out of 10