Issues uninstalling Norton Antivirus

Jika · Post by **Jika** » Tue May 03, 2005 6:53 pm

I heard recently that NAV can be difficult to uninstall or completely remove from a computer. Does anyone here know about this or have any experience, bad or otherwise with this?

My NAV subscription is about to expire and I was thinking of switching to McAfee so this is why I'm keen to find out. :-3

lady cop · Post by **lady cop** » Tue May 03, 2005 7:00 pm

hi Jika~~~try a pm to HAWKE, he's our techno-wizard! but i am sure many here can also answer you.

Jika · Post by **Jika** » Tue May 03, 2005 7:15 pm

Thanks LC. I'll go ding-dong on Hawkes doorbell.

Cheers.

TW2005....nope didn't think of that. Thanks for the input.

Hawke · Post by **Hawke** » Tue May 03, 2005 7:38 pm

The difficulty with removing Norton stems from older versions of the software on specific versions of Windows. I'll need more information to help you with this, namely which operating system you are running and which version of Norton antivirus you have.

Cheers!

Hawke

Jika · Post by **Jika** » Tue May 03, 2005 7:45 pm

Hey Hawke, thanks for responding. It's Windows XP Pro and the NAV is 2003.

Hawke · Post by **Hawke** » Tue May 03, 2005 9:23 pm

Alrighty then, let's go over how to completely uninstall NAV.

Fortunately, you have one of the later versions, so this becomes relatively easy. Here are the steps you should follow:

1) Choose Add/Remove Programs from the Control Panel. Assuming you are running no other Norton products on your system, remove anything that says "Symantec," "Norton," or "LiveUpdate." Reboot.

2) I don't exactly recall what 2003 names its file folders, so go to C:Program Files and remove all folders that say either "Symantec," "Symantec Antivirus," "Norton," or "Norton Antivirus". In addition, remove the following folder: "C:Program FilesCommon FilesSymantec Shared."

Now, if for some reason the previous removal steps fail to uninstall NAV from your system, you can download and run a special removal tool provided by Symantec. ONLY use this tool if the preceding steps fail.

That should do it. Questions? Concerns?

Jika · Post by **Jika** » Tue May 03, 2005 9:41 pm

Thank you Hawke. It's great to have our very own IT guru/certified maniac.

That's your 'good deed' for the day.

Hope one comes round to you!

Just like that quote says...."An idiot with a computer is.... a faster, better idiot" RJ

This idiot is now a faster, better, happier idiot.

Cheers Jika

anastrophe · Post by **anastrophe** » Tue May 03, 2005 10:27 pm

i would recommend, rather than moving to mcafee - which strikes me as jumping from the frying pan into the fire - try AVG. they have a free version, which i use, which works great, and isn't nearly as intrusive as norton was, nor as resource-soaking. the pro version is very reasonably priced as well, if you're not as much of a skinflint as i.

http://www.grisoft.com/

while we're at it, i highly recommend the Sygate personal firewall as well. it's free too, with a pro version available. highly configurable but reasonably easy to handle.

http://smb.sygate.com/products/spf_standard.htm

i like free software. :yh_party

gmc · Post by **gmc** » Wed May 04, 2005 1:00 am

I would second anastrophe on avg, try mailwasher.net as well if you want a good e-mail blocker