Customer Reviews

McAfee Total Protection 2009 3-User [OLD VERSION]

5 star:		(39)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(11)
1 star:		(44)

 

 

When computer users were searching for a term to apply to computer programs that came loaded with viruses, harmful DRM (Digital Rights Management) or other insidious ways of slowing down the user's computer, they eventually settled on "Malware."

Its time to coin a new term for programs like McAfee Total Protection. My complaints against the program are only partially related to its ability to filter out viruses and keep a computer free of junk.

The real issue with this program, and many, many others is that it will constantly steal the users focus by popping up text boxes from the Taskbar in Windows. These can come at ANY time the computer is on. They alert the user to the fact that "McAfee has installed updates," or "It is time to restart the computer" to the neverendingly frustrating "Your subscription is about to expire." These boxes can and will pop up while immersed in a full screen computer game, at times causing it to crash. They will pop up when you are working on editing digital photos, or watching a movie, or anything else that requires your full attention.

The term "nagware," came to mind, and maybe it will stick. Feel free to put your suggestions in the comments section of this review.

I understand why they do this. It is intended for novice computer owners who need to be reminded of all of these things, and who don't consider having their 'focus' (the primary task the computer user is working on. For example, as I write this review, it is my primary focus) stolen as EXTREMELY frustrating. That wouldn't even be a big deal, except that McAfee in their infinite wisdom has provided no remedy for the power user. We cannot turn off these irritating messages. They come regardless of my desire to see them or not.

They are amazingly irritating, especially if they disrupt something immersive, like a computer game or movie. Imagine: you are watching your new blue-ray of "The Dark Knight," and just as Batman is about to dispense with the Joker, a text box pops up with the message "McAfee has finished installing updates" in a gray box in the corner of the screen. Unacceptable in the first place, and even more so because you CANNOT TURN THIS FEATURE OFF! This gets unbearable when your subscription is a few months from expiring, and alerts informing you of that pop up literally every time you use the computer. Also, they don't just leave after they pop up, the user is required to click 'ok.' You cannot permanently disable these messages.

As a virus scanner, McAfee works relatively well. It will scan your system for viruses, and if your definitions are up-to-date, find them some of the time. However, it is pretty strange that after making virus software for so many years, they still cannot provide a reasonably well working Spyware hunter that is anywhere near as good as the free version of "Ad-Aware" offered by Lavasoft, or the retail version of "Spybot Search and Destroy."

Another major complaint is the sheer size of the system resource footprint that McAfee total protection takes up. If you have an older computer, less than 2gb of ram (4gb with Vista), this program will create a very noticeable slowdown in your computer's performance. Comparing to how it runs on my wife's laptop with 4gb of ram vs. some of the computers at my work with only 1.5gb, the older work computers are drastically slowed down by McAfee, while my wife's laptop with its 4gb of ram is not really affected. (I do not use this program on my computer for the reasons that I've laid out above).

In concussion, if you don't care about 1. Annoying pop ups that steal your focus and cannot be disabled, 2. Very limited spyware removal and 3. Slow and poorly written code that uses a large portion of system resources, you MIGHT consider buying this software.

*****UPDATE 09-15-2009*****

Still have this program installed on my wife's laptop, and it's still popping up annoying and useless advertisements despite the fact that I've turned off all notifications in the options tab--you can see the most recent one that I took a screen shot of in the 'customer images' section of this Amazon page. When the license runs out in a few months I will be uninstalling this program and replacing it with AVAST home edition which is free. I can't recommend this program to anyone. Save yourself the money and get a free alternative like AVAST or AVG.

*****UPDATE 01-01-2010*****

Microsoft has recently released their excellent MICROSOFT SECURITY ESSENTIALS for fee. It also recently won an award for being the best anti-virus program out there. Bests of all it's FREE to anyone with a valid copy of Windows (XP through Windows 7). I've been using it for a few months now and let me tell you, it's just about the best anti-virus I've encountered. Searches are wicked fast, the interface is slick, and best of all it has a tiny memory footprint! Updates are free FOREVER. Did I mention the program itself is completely free? Just Google search MICROSOFT SECURITY ESSENTIALS, download, install, and you're good to go.

I had McAfee before and bought this for renewal.Few issues that I have noted so far are
1.It keeps popping up a message asking to activate and even though I try to activate it does not activate.
2.Recently there was a trojan attack on my computer and McAfee did not even detect the virus leave alone repairing it. I downloaded tools from McAfee and that too was not of any help.Then I downloaded MalwareBytes and that rectified the issue.

I have no complaints about the operation of this product on a Windows Vista system, but somehow (in my opinion in a sneaky manner) without my awareness, the "Auto-renewal" feature was set up that automatically updates at the end of the year and directly charges your credit card!

To stop this "feature", they give you three options, but none are easy. Using phone call costs you. The chat client doesn't download, and the email means you have to wait 48 hours for a reply.

I am disappointed. Be careful you don't get caught in this trap. Otherwise, is OK product as far as I can tell.

WARNING -- McAfee VirusScan does not work with Internet Explorer 8. I bounght this product and found the product would not work on my computer. McAfee customer support did not help with the problem. After doing independant researh I discovered VirusScan was incompatible with the Imternet Explorer8 which was running on my Vista operating system. After I uninstalled IE 8 and reinstalled IE 7 on my computer everyting worked fine. This was a process that requires a medium level of computer knowledge. I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND THIS PRODUCT UNTIL MCAFEE FIXES IT TO WORK WITH IE 8.

The minute I put it on my system I knew I should not have. My system slowed by ~60% (easily). Both McAfee and Nortons are known memory hogs, but I figured that maybe since Norton finally caught on and improved that issue with their 2009 version, that McAfee followed suit. I was SO WRONG!! I removed it within 48 hours (and it was a pain to get it all off) Thank goodnees I bought it as a GB special for only $10.

I'm going back to Trend Micro..."if it ain't broke, don't fix it" I should have known better.

I have ran mcaffee for 3 months. It worked fine. Now it tells me every three seconds that my computer is under attack. Every website I go to is now unprotected (Amazon, AOL, google, compuserve, even Mcaffee). I tried to download Panda antivirus. Mcaffee identified it as ,you guessed it, a virus. This is the perfect software for the person who wants to shut down his computer forever. Once I figure out how to delete it from my computer I am going to run with Panda security.

Easy installation plus user friendly. However if your computer has other anitvirus protection you'll have to completely remove it or you'll experience difficulties. I've been using McAfee for years...no problem whatsoever. Nevertheless I always opt for buying the CD rather than the download.

I used McAfee Internet Security Suite for several years and it created more problems than it cured. It generated a nag pop-up that could not be controlled, returning as soon as it was dismissed. One year McAfee made an unauthorized charge to my credit card to renew three months before my subscription was to expire and at their full price, not the sale price offered in their regular e-mail offerngs. For the last several months the update manager program was consuming over 90% of my CPU time and the on line help was no help at all. Last week I completely uninstalled the entire mess and installed a competitive product which seems great by comparision.

I bought this to remove a Virus and it won't work. Support (in India) took 30 minutes of my time. Made me installo it on another Virus free PC so they could get the registration. Waisted 30 minutes of my day and then told me for $89.00 I could have access to Tech support. Services S _ ck's.

I wasn't satisfied with my original Protection software and decided to use McAfee Total Protection(3 user pkg). I installed it on my daughters, wifes and my machines. EZ installation, no conflicts, alerts to any malware in Emails or websites, full scans the systems quickly. (I/we have 2 Vista 64 and 1 XP 32 opsystem machines) I am very satisfied with the performance of McAfee Total Protection software.