Electronics

[curiousshopper]

I have an older desktop computer with Windows XP and a new laptop with Windows 7, 64 bit OS. Both have Norton Antivirus 2011 installed. Shortly before Thanksgiving, I got a Trojan on my desktop. Had to pay to get it removed. In about a month, my subscription to Norton on my desktop will expire and am trying to decide what to replace it with. I was considering going with Norton's Internet Security, but quite frankly, I don't know if I really want to trust any of Norton's products anymore--after all, NAV not only did not block this trojan, it never detected it when I ran a scan looking for it. (The company that I paid to remove it used the malwarebytes and super anti-spyware programs to detect it.) I noticed there are plenty of postings on here asking which programs are best to use for protection--Norton, Mcafee, MS Security Essentials, Kaspersky, etc.-- but I wanted to post this anyway in order to get the most current opinions on what's best to use.

An additional piece of info--my desktop no longer has a recovery partition on it (I do have discs, just haven't ever used them) nor does "system restore" work on it. It is impossible to restore my computer to an earlier time or to set a point. Just mentioning these issues in case any of the programs any of you may have to suggest would not work properly without these features. (By the way, I realize that if I would just use my recovery discs to reset this computer back to its factory settings, I would have system restore, I just haven't done it. In fact, my computer has been this way since a month after I bought it, in Dec. 2007. Had a problem with MS software that I actually resolved. Made the mistake, however, of then listening to MS's tech. Did what he said and had my whole system crash. I didn't know what to do and I couldn't get any help. Finally got it working again, but it was never the same. I know a little more about computers now (just a little!), but never bothered to restore it.)

Also, could anyone supply me with the correct address to download the malwarebytes program? I'm finally buying a Clickfree from QVC to backup my data and would like to run the program on my computer again to be sure there are no remnants of the trojan left before doing a backup. Thanks so much for any advice any of you can provide. It will be greatly appreciated!