[Onward2wards]

I've been using Kaspersky firewall and antivirus for a couple of years and really like it. Since my subscription was about to expire and I'm on a very tight budget I decided to look into free replacements.

I installed Comodo free firewall and Avast! free antivirus scanner on both my Windows 8 PC and my old Windows 7 backup PC. Both installed without any hassles and have been cooperating together nicely without slowing anything down too much like some programs do. Both of these programs have a good reputation.

I just wanted to throw the idea out there for anyone on a budget needing good security programs. There are other good freebies out there too. Comodo and ZoneAlarm offer combined firewall and antivirus packages (not the best free antivirus apps though so I've read) and ZoneAlarm also has a popular free standalone firewall. AVG and Avira both have decent free antivirus programs too.

If anyone else has found good free firewall and/or antivirus solutions, please post them here.

Links:
Comodo
Avast!
AVG
ZoneAlarm
Avira

[seeker1950]

Thanks for the links and info, Onward! I have used Avast in the past. Seems the last few times I tried to install it, however, they wanted to charge me. When my current Norton protection runs out, I'll try it again, along with some of the others you've recommended.

I hadn't used McAfee for a couple of years, and I got an email stating that my automatic subscription to McAfee had charged $95 to my credit card! To cancel this and get a refund was a huge headache.

I'm unwealthy and have to be as damn frugal as I can. I have run multiple freebies for years without issues. I have either used these in the past or still am using them.

Malwarebytes has one of the top rated scan engine detection rates of any available paid or free. Many IT guys use it in their arsenal.

Others:
Avast! Free
AVG Free
Zone Alarm Firewall and/or AntiVirus
Comodo Firewall and/or AntiVirus
Super AntiSpyware

One that I like is SpywareBlaster. It has no scan engine. It just has a regularly updated list of blacklisted sites that are automatically blocked and will not allow IE or Firefox to open them.

And many IT pros say the best way to keep safe on the net is to never access internet while using an admin account.

Microsoft Security Essentials and Bitdefender have worked fine for me. All the free programs will protect you but many are overzealous and give too many false alarms. And they aren't necessary unless you cruise really shady porn sites. A firewall will not protect you from a virus but it will help keep your network secure. NoScript is highly recommended. The threat of computer viruses is really overblown.