Customer Reviews

Norton Internet Security 2005 - Single User

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(17)
1 star:		(123)

 

 

I have been using NIS for a few years now. I really liked the 2004 version and have had no major problems with it other than once my computer boots, I always had to go into NIS properties to see if my EMAIL SCANNING said 'ON' or 'ERROR'. Evidently, something on my computer will occassionally cause the email scanning to not load properly, so if it showed 'ERROR' - I would have to reboot and then it would be ok. I should point out that Norton Support Staff told me even though email scanning said 'error', the computer is still protected by the 'auto-protect' feature if it is turned on. Minor inconvenience, but other than that, I was very happy with the program.

The same holds true for the new 2005 - I still have the occassional email scanning 'error', but there are a few new irritating things happening. While the software works fine, it has tremendously SLOWED DOWN the launch of Outlook Express and it even hangs a second or two when I close it. Also, if you open NIS properties screen, when I am finished, I hit the X button to close, but it takes like 2-3 seconds before it will close. Even though these are just a few seconds, it really irritates me because I have a very fast computer.

However, something that really excites me about this new NIS is that the hard drive scan of all files by Norton Anti-Virus seems to take a lot less time than it did with a previous version. Being a stickler for speedy computer processing, this is definitely a plus.

So, overall, this program works OK and keeps me protected, but I still think there are minor issues they need to work on as mentioned and I also think that the average computer user is not given enough information about whether to allow certain things when a firewall warning appears. I know so many people that have blocked innocent programs and found that they are unable to use them or get on the internet. There should be a way for NIS to know what is innocent and what should be blocked... the average computer user doesn't have the time to research what they should block or not - in fact, isn't that the reason we use computers? They are supposed to be able to do the work FOR US!!!!

I'm a long-time Norton Internet Security (NIS) product user. I've been running the 2002 version of NIS and signing up for the yearly security updates. This year I decided to get the new NIS 2005 package because of all of the new features. I removed the 2002 NIS and installed 2005 NIS.

Bad move. I could still access the Internet via AOL, but I couldn't open any windows. AOL couldn't even pop up it's trashy, repetive messages about second phone lines, much less my mail box.

I called the Symantec help line which was another big mistake. Once we got past the language barrier, the tech claimed I had an AOL or MicroSoft Explorer problem. I asked him if he believed in coincidences, but I don't think he understood me.

Finally I checked my PC's RAM utilization. It had jumped from 58% used to 75% used, which is why I couldn't open anything on the Internet. I uninstalled NIS 2005, reinstalled NIS 2002, got my RAM back, and returned NIS 2005 to Symantec, along with mutterings about their 'RAM sucking piece of garbage.'

Beware! Beware!

I work for Microsoft. My position is that of level two technical support for Microsoft Windows Xp. I must say that Norton Internet security has taken over AOL as the number one cause of problems with the Windows XP operating system. My co-workers and I never suspected that any software could take the place of the poorly written AOL software in terms of being problematic, but somehow Symantec has managed to create something that is even more troublesome.
Even users with 512 mb of ram can expect a significant decrease in system performance as well as longer startup and shut down times.
The product can also limit or prevent internet and e-mail acess.
I have seen startup times on a properly functioning Windows Xp computer increase from 3 minutes to 10 minutes only with the instalation of Norton Internet security.
Also, it often disables access to secured websites such as those used by banking insitutions or the Windows update site.
It also in many cases does not un-install correctly causing numerous other problems leading to the computerized equivelent of a train wreck.
Many customers report little to no resolution from Symantec so they turn to us. Myself and my co-workers have become quite good at cleaning up the mess this product makes. Beleive me, we've had plenty of practice!
There are many other products on the market that will do the same job for free or very cheap.
Please consider alternatives, for example:
A hardware firewall such as that found in virtually any router will protect your system better than ANY software product.
They are very simple to set up and the cost is low.
There are several very good antivirus programs which are free or cheap that will protect as well or better.
There are also some very good anti-spyware products and some are free.
Consider all of these options before placing your Windows operating system integirity at risk.

I've been a long-time Symantec/Norton security products user. They've always had excellent AntiVirus and FireWall products and, as a matter of fact, still do.

However, the AntiSpam product does not work well at all. I started using the AntiSpam product with the Internet Security Pro 2004 suite. I could never get it to work right with Outlook 2003, one of the most popular email software applications in use--the software slowed Outlook to a crawl--it took forever to retrieve/send mail, move messages from one folder to another, delete messages, etc. So, I disabled the AntiSpam feature. When Internet Security 2005 was announced, I thought Symantec would have fixed the problems integrating AntiSpam with Outlook 2003. Not a chance. Using Outlook 2003 with AntiSpam was painful--I couldn't retrieve or send mail--the function would time out. I had to disable AntiSpam again.

In my search for solutions on the net, I learned that Symantec had purchased the AntiSpam application from another company. Their efforts to integrate AntiSpam into their suite leaves much to be desired. My search also revealed that many other users are having similar and worse issues with AntiSpam. Some users have approached Symantec Tech Support only to be told that they do not have any answers for the problems. By the way, you have to pay for all Tech Support.

I've also disabled AdBlocking and PopUp Blocking because they wouldn't work properly, either.

Buy Internet Security 2005 for the AntiVirus and FireWall applications because I believe the suite is less expensive than buying those products separately (unless you can take advantage of rebates) and use some other software program for AntiSpam, AdBlocking and PopUp Blocking.

I've been using Symantec products since 2002 and been happy. For ten dollars more I decided to upgrade to 2005 instead of renewing the subscription for 2004. I had no problems installing NIS 2005 and seems to be running fine. The only problem I had was connecting to the Symantec server to activate the product. I tried again 30 minutes later and it went through.

The hard drive scan is faster which is a plus. The downside is this software uses more ram than the previous version. This didn't really surprise me any. As time goes on new software of any type requires more resources from computers.

If your computer has at least 512MB of ram try this version if not stay with your previous version.

I'm a long time user of the Norton product suite, loyally upgrading each year with the latest version. In the past, I've put up with installation and integration problems, Liveupdate problems, etc., but I've always stuck with their products because the problems weren't all that significant and the functionality worked well once you got it installed.

In the 2004 version of NIS I ran into a problem where Norton Antispam would cause Microsoft Outlook to crash when first started if more than one userid was logged onto the machine (apparently a common problem based on google searches). Since my wife and I both use the same machine a lot, this usually meant one of us experienced Outlook crashing at least once a day. I reported the problem to Symantec support, went through deinstalling and reinstalling several times (on the advice of the support team), but the problem was never fixed. Eventually, I just gave up and got used to it (annoying, but not a show stopper).

Sadly, I just tried the Trialware version of the NIS 2005 product and the same problems with Norton Antispam crashing Microsoft Outlook still exist. Overall, the product seems better integrated and a bit more polished, but if you have multiple users of Outlook using the same machine with different Windows user accounts be prepared for the same problems that have been around for awhile.

Normally, I'd give the product a 4 or 5 (the Antivirus product works well, the Firewall is very solid, and the Antispam product cuts down the clutter in your Outlook inbox as long as you don't mind the crash on startup). But with the lack of attention to fixing a long term and well known bug I can only give the 2005 version a 3 star rating.

If you are the only one that uses your PC, this is a great product. If you have multiple users, be prepared for at least some of the same old annoying problems.

I have been using Norton AntiVirus 2002 and Personal FireWall 2000 on WinXP Pro for quite a while. Decided it was about time to "upgrade" them so I went and bought Norton Internet Security 2005. Norton Internet Security comes with both AntiVirus and a FireWall.

After first installation, AntiVirus (NAV) scanned 255K files and crashed. Symantec LiveUpdate informed me that some components were missing, would not tell which ones, and refused to update them. Uninstalled and reinstalled...

After second installation NAV scanned 255K files and crashed (again). Went on the web in search of answers. Symantec's website has a very nice tool that detects problems. It informed me that a component needed to be updated and provided the link to run LiveUpdate. LiveUpdate informed me that all my software was up to date. Played this game for awhile. Uninstalled, cleaned the Registry, Defragged the hard drive, did a clean boot again, and reinstalled again.

After third installation NAV scanned 21K files, it's actually gotten worse. Played the "Call Symantec Support" game, gave up and tried again the next day. Finally got thru to support, not to anyone that knew anything at all about the software of course. They proceeded to repeat all of the Knowledge Base articles and fixes that I had already found and tried. Their last ditch effort at pulling a fix out of the air was "run CHKDSK and try changing the display driver to use VGA, and call us back". In case your wondering, no it didn't work. Now scanning crashes while scanning a .bmp file about 20K files in.

Four days and about 48 reboots later I have finally been able to reinstall the original software AND got it working again!

I like new things so I upgraded to Norton 2005 from 2004. What a mistake! It kept shutting down and telling me I had a serious error which I kept reporting. It refused to let me access the internet unless I disabled the Firewall despite configuring it and reducing the protection level, till I was blue in the face! I uninstalled and reinstalled thinking something had gone wrong in the installation but to no avail. I went onto Symantec's website and tried out their fixes but they didn't work. I gave up and a computer teckie friend recommended MacAfee. I have only had one problem with it and that has been that it says my Privacy Service is disabled when it isn't. At least I can now access the internet without worrying.

I was very disipointed in Internet Security 2005. Besides taking up tons of hard drive space, it uses the majority of your ram. You cannot run more than two programs at once because it has no ram to run on. It also caused my advance businuess computer to overload often. Good protection, bad software.

I always liked norton and i find the interface easy to deal with ...however the most unacceptable thing about this is the huge amount of system resources this will use...and im running a dell 3.2 Gz with HT with 512 Mg of DDR ram, i feel sorry for the people with older computers trying to use this. My startup, shutdown and the opening of problems have doubled, at least. Photoshop filters take forever to process. And i run scandiscs and i defrag my comp once a week and still ...this is slow as hell. For total security i wont mind taking a 10-15% hit in performance, but 50% ?!?! I pressed Cntrl/Alt/Del to get my performance indicator up and at all times even with nothing running my CPU's use is always at 50%, with this contstant strain of my system, im worried about leaving this thing on too long, i cannot afford to lose my comp at all. I wish i didnt pay so much money for this!!!
Lastly, this product shuts itself down every few weeks and required re-aunthentication...this leaving my computer vunerable to viruses and trojan horses, this is the last norton product ill ever purchase, ill do like most of my college buddies and download the cracked version, thanks a lot norton.