Avast versus Norton Security Suite

I have been using Avast for several years and it has generally been good for me. It has missed a few things which I have ultimately fixed through the support of this website, and it does slow my system down at times, but for the price I can't beat it.

Anyway, my internet provider has recently offered up Norton Security Suite for free as a benefit to its customers. My question is are there any benefits to switching? I would appreciate any feedback from anyone with experiences with the two, or just some honest opinions. Thanks

Norton was the product of 2009 for detection rates (av-comparatives tests etc..), it is light as avast and they claim they have advanced technologies. I believe you wouldn't go wrong if you choose norton.

Antivirus comparisons are seldom trustworthy. And even if the source is actually good, the tests are not conducted in a useful manner.

Norton is first and for all a paid product, whereas Avast is free.

Avast is more light on resources than Norton, but Norton come with a firewall in its Security Suite.

Personally I encountered a few very nasty problems with Norton when attempting to clean certain rootkits. These problems were so severe that users who were affected could no longer boot succesfully.
However their biggest problem is their support. You have to pay to get support when you have a problem with their product.

With the above said, I am trying to stay objective here. There are also far worse products than Norton and if your ISP offers it for free, you can at least try it, but my personal opinion would be; stick with Avast.

One thing with Norton (and now Avira) is that it looks up related files and registry entries when it finds a malware file. So thats more complete removal. Some other antivirus products only remove the malware file.

For example, if you insert a USB disk and it has a file infected with w32.Sality virus. Norton (and Avira) would not only delete the infected file but look for possible entries in registry and files that Sality virus might create on hard disk. But some other antivirus products, just clean/delete the infected file.

One thing with Norton (and now Avira) is that it looks up related files and registry entries

While this is not a bad feature (I haven't heard of any problems with Avira), its proven disastrous in Norton.

As I mentioned, I have had a few cases, where the atapi service was wiped from the registry. Why? Because Norton detected an infected copy of atapi.sys and decided that "thus" the service attached to it, is bad too.

A computer without atapi service is toast. You can't recreate it. The only hope is somehow copy System Restore points back. Of course Norton support doesn't know how to do this, even if they are paid ........

Thanks to all for your feedback. Its been helpful. I think I will stick with Avast on my main computer, and on a wireless "play" computer try the Norton.

I've found Norton to slow down my computer quite a bit. My ISP also gave it to us free when we used to get McAfee free (which I found to be better.) I want to switch to Avasti but what do I do about the firewall which was included in both Norton and McAfee? Any recommendations on freeware?