PC utilities forum: Norton system works: looking for your opinion

Symantec seems to believe that you should know all before upgrading. I upgraded by downloading Norton Symstem Works from 2003 to 2005. I was unable to get it to work properly. I called and was shipped off to India for help. What a mess. They really do not know the problems. After being tranfered to 4 tech departments I was told that the activation number was still on 2003. I was also told to uninstall the program and reinstall it again. This was no help. I finally asked for my money back and ordered the discs. I have downloaded the anti-virus many times and had no problems. It seems that Symantec dose not advise you to uninstall and says you should have known. This really screwed up my computer and a lot of clean up work. My computer is a Dell P4 with 512 Ram 60 Gig Drive.

Not everybody needs a 2 gig speed demon, but every one that uses the internet needs protection.

I add my name to those who have used Norton Utilities forever. But like all new tools, they require a learning curve. I have made a practice of installing the current edition of Systemworks to each new computer I use. It is the second application to be installed (second only to an ISP app), and gets fully updated before anything else is installed.
All settings and permissions are configured first, while reading and understanding the functions in the user guide and the online pages. Subsequently, I've never had a lick of trouble with any of the functions.
While working (offline) with large image files, I simply disable the background programs, to free-up resources.
This has proved effective since the earliest days of Windows95.

You are lucky to be able to stay right up at the front with new hardware and lots of cash for un-needed memory. If you are retired like I am, cash isn't as availible as it once was. But, what I want my computer to do is more complex than ever (time to keep me occupied) and my computer is typically running 12 to 15 major applications at a time. I cannot give NWS the memory it demands, nor can I give up the memory cycles it requires. My CPU is always @ 98-100% (it is a 433MHz Intel) and has 256 MB of RAM to work with.

My computer obviously is pushed hard by running continously 24/7 XP Pro SP2, Apache internet server, ArGoSoft E-mail Server, SpyKiller, AVG free Antivirus, Zone Alarm Pro firewall, Counterspy, Sunny Data Control to control & monitor my 10,000 Watt photo-voltaic solar system, my weather station, Outlook to schedule my time and for taking notes on the fly, and Excel to integrate the infomation from my weather station and Solar plant to produce a daily power bill status and to forcast the annual cost (or credit) for the power to run my all electric home. Also, periodically I do use Netscape 7.2, Access, Word, and other applications.

I am pleased to say that I have not crashed XP or any of the other programs I have run in over 3 months. I do regularly on Friday take the entire system down and restart it for cleanup purposes.

I tried Norton a year ago, and it made my (overworked and underpowered) machine very unstable and unpredictable, and I uninstalled it within 4 days after 20-25 lockups or crashes.

I've also been using Norton products for a long time. Since Norton Utils for DOS 3.3. Not anymore though. I refuse to give them another penny of my dough, not even when it turns out to be free after rebate. Their knowledge base is excellent for tracking down and explaining how to correct problems with their software. Unfortunately there are way too many problems and don't waste your time with tech support if you can't find the answer yourself. 90% of the problems I had with their software was due to the previous version not uninstalling itself correctly and causing major problems when installing the latest version. Their solution is to manually uninstall (i.e. regedit) all the registry keys and files that were left behind. After that, it worked fine. What a pain in the #@$! How do they expect to keep customers if the only one's who have troublefree installs are new users. I put up with them through NSW 2000-2003. I feel like an idiot for being loyal for so long, thru so many issues. Symantec's the worst thing that ever happened to Norton.

I have been using NSW or utilities since the beginning it seems. I too put the newest version on any new computer. NSW 2005 would not install. Finally after 6 hrs of trying anything I could think of and searching all of symantec I got it. First I went into the control panel, uninstalled the liveupdate. Then I went back the to support and they have a little program that will uninstall all instances of NSW from your computer. I had to do it in that order for it to work. (Trial and error) Wonder why they don't just post that up front instead of making a person jump through hoops?

Norton was a great product when it operated in DOS. Aside from buying up their competition, they crashed Windows 95 and have caused damage to my newest computers everytime Windows issued a service pak or an upgrade. There was Norton bringing up the rear of the horse.
And each time I got a trial version, I tried it and regretted it for days. Getting the thing uninstalled usually means Format C:\ and a brand new install of windows.

So I have learned never to install anything from Norton, except Ghost, on any of my computers. My daughter's brand new laptop came with a 3 month trial of Norton Anti-virus installed. It seems to work but I would hate to drive 500 into Manhattan to remove Norton Last it took 6 different registry cleanup software to get all the remnants it left behind on my computer. There was even a Norton-like file which caused other anti-virus software to crash. Finally I found it mislabelled deliberately on the Norton Setup Disk.

I use an older version on my 98SE system and it works as advertised. I will not use any McAfee products as they were a nightmare when they were installed. I have heard that Norton's has slipped but when I get my new system I would be willing to discreetly try it.

I have been using System works for 5 years and would not be with out it. On the 2004 version I did not install Ghost as it has never worked for me or Password manager as windown XP has one. I did install the extra Go back and have had to use it more then once.I works faster then System restore.Which will not restore a lot of the time. Go Back and Norton have never failed me

I upgraded to 2004 and my problems began. SLOW was the new norm. 3 systems and 3 big problems. I thought it was the AD WARE and ran the anti spy software over and over again. I added memory, NO improvemnet. Now aafter figuring that it was Norton. I removed it with great difficulty I might add. Even after using the uninstall it left bits of itself that slowed the system. Norton has removal tools that are hard to use and almost impossible to find. I switched over to AntiVIR XP for free with free updates and it has been heaven now for about 8 months. All the machine have running worry free with no virus' and no HOGGING. I have a Pentium 4 2.8 desktop, a mobile centrino 1.6 laptop, and a Dell 2.2 celeron laptop.

I have a small PC repair shop. I use to sell Norton. I told everybody how great it was. No more. Other than Norton Ghost, no Symantec product will EVER find itself on any of my machines or be sold in my store.
Norton has serious issues. The worst being it's total inability to prevent, heck, even detect trojans.
Next on the list would be the huge drain on resources. It will knock an aging machine to it's knees.
Oh, and how about the uninstall issues? Better hope it uninstalls from add/remove programs, otherwise you will be spending hours deleting folders, files and digging through the registry.
I love it when the customer renews the subscription declining to upgrade to the latest version and then does the on-line support thingy, just to be told that Norton no longer supports his product.

I am satisfied with the product except for one problem. During virus scan, Norton finds problems that it cannot delete or repair.

I find this frustrating.

I have long been a fan of Norton, but as of the last year or so, my Pentium 4, 1.9Ghz with 512RAM, with two 40Gig drives in RAID-0 and another 18Gig SCSI... now takes between 5 and 7 hours to perform a complete system scan for viruses. My PC mentor has told me he dumped Norton AV, but kept the Systemworks utilities and now uses Panda Platinum for AV. He says the speed of his AV scans is nothing short of phenomenal. The downside? Always is a downside... Panda Platinum is $80/year compared to Norton Systemworks at $29 (if you look for it) and another $29 annually for AV update subscriptions.

My Norton AV subscription ends in about 2 weeks and I am going to jump into Panda for the trial, then probably go with the 6 month option. If I fall in love with the speed... $80 seems a small price compared to 7 hours of Norton Scanning.
Stan

I've had nothing but problems with Norton. As another member said Ghost is good, but the rest of the stuff is awful.

It sucks resources, sometime causes more damage than it fixes, updates are usually a pain to install, support is terrible and it can be a nightmare to uninstall. And that's on a good system with plenty of horse power!

Norton products were really good before they became Symantec's.

Do yourself a favor, download the freeware programs like AVG, Zone Alarm, Spybot, Adaware, and Spyware Blaster (i'm sure there are others). I've been using these on friends PCs for a while now and they're all pretty happy with them.

If you'd rather use a commercial product, i've been using EZ-Trust (Computer Associates) because it came with my broadband account. I haven't had any problems with it (we use their network virus scanner at work). But if i had to pay for it, i would go with the freeware and send the authors some money instead.