FREE and EFFECTIVE are two words which are dear to my heart! With my gasoline, electric and grocery bill taking unprecedented hikes, I have found a couple of spyware/adware removal and antivirus software programs which are both free & effective.

-I recently downloaded Windows Defender from Microsoft. It seems to work really well and can be found by doing a search on Microsoft's download page. It scans you PC at a scheduled time or you can do so any time you want. It has a quick scan option or a full scan which takes longer. At the end of the scan, it shows you what it has found, and allows you to remove all or select certain items. Updates are downloaded automatically if you are set to receive Windows Updates automatically. I guess I'm naive, but seems to me, who better to tell you how to detect spy-ware than the author of the operating system we use. I'm not sure why Microsoft has not made the availability of this software more widely known, but I am happy to find it.

-If you use peer to peer download software (Kaaza, LimeWire, etc.), you are almost certain to get more spyware. A lot of these programs now have scanners that check files for viruses and spyware when you download.

-All you have to do in order to find available providers of pay to use antispyware is look through the ads that even line the sides of the pages where our answers show up in Helium on this subject. They are numerous. But I'm really into free.

-So, in addition I stumbled on Avast anti-virus recently as I tired of paying monthly fees to Norton for each computer in our house. (Norton was charging us $4.95 per computer. About $3o per month!) Avast provides anti-virus software to corporations for pay, but the home edition is free. It was easy to install with a 60 day trial. Then all you have to do, per the instructions, is go to the Avast home page, copy a license number they provide for you and paste it in the space provided for registration. This is good for one year, at which time, they just ask you to come back and get another free license key to copy and paste in the registration blank. The program updates automatically on a regular basis and alerts you audibly when it does so. The scan has several variables that you can customize. When viruses and adware are found it offers to delete or quarantine the program as appropriate. I am quite impressed with the program's performance and now use it on 6 PCs owned by my immediate family.
-WOW! WHO SAYS NOTHING IS EVER FREE? THANKS MICROSOFT & AVAST!

Learn more about this author, Steve Weathington.
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