To Virus scan Or Not to Virus scan

[Rebco 0]

Ok, i had a friend make me a real nice DVR the other day i went to pick it up and he didn't have the Norton Virus scan installed, so i asked him wuat was up and he told me most of his CCTV installers don't put virus scan on there machines, so here is the question do i put it in ? and what are the Pros and Cons of each?

[CollinR 0]

Will this DVR have access to the internet? Is this a single purpose DVR? How many machines will be on it's local network? How big a geek are ya?

[phil_gt 0]

if its stand alone and will never see the internet then dont bother otherwise put 1 on

[kensplace 0]

If you use a anti-virus package, I would look at using something other than norton, its very resource hungry.

[rory 0]

once its set up properly, dont install one.

Nothing should be on there besides the DVR software.

[cctv_down_under 0]

Nortons is bloatware so do not use it...I agree with Rory, but you should have a virus scan on it if it is going to be on the network that goes to the internet, I suggest a network version of the virus scan, something that can be used to REMOTELY scan the computers on the network but does not reside on the machine...files change on a DVR all the time, having a LIVE SCAN can be detrimental to performance...If you can handle your machine ever gong down to a virus for a few hours then just make a ghost of your initial image of the OS and then you can simply reload it.

[Rebco 0]

It is a stand alone DVR but will be conected to the Internet.

Just for everyone help, i was a "robot" Installer i would do what ever my boss just said, now i am trying this business on my own so any help with anything is greatful.

 

Also when you say the DVR is set up the right way can you elaborate on that. Please

[rory 0]

Once Windows is set up properly (Secured), there is no need for an Anti Virus. If the user has access to the internet from it, then thats another story, but if its a DVR, they should not have access to the Internet at all, as well as no access to the OS in general. Only an admin should be able to login to acess the OS when required, and still not have access to the internet. You can still open the neccassary ports for the DVR while blocking everything else.

 

Anyway, its personal preference, but not required. Even the network versions, are just something else to slow it down, especially Nortons, as something must still be installed on the DVR. And still, things like Nortons sill dont catch all the Trojans, which are more common than Viruses these days. Basically, prevention is better than the cure.

[phil_gt 0]

get avg free as an antivirus uses little resources and its completly free

[rory 0]

If you must use an Antivirus, then yes AVG is lightweight .. but make sure to check the box for each component in their properties, which says ignore faulty component, and disable updates, unless you are going to leave the IP protocols open in TCP/IP Filtering (not suggested) then you would set the updates to fully automatic. Or keep all the non essential ports closed and updates off, then charge the client to logon with Ultra VNC every couple weeks to update the AVG manually using a file.

[Thomas in BP 0]

I second (or third) the Avira Antivir.

 

If you only need Internet access because you need to access the DVR and you will do that from fixed IP addresses, then I can recommend a small application called Protowall, which is sort of a firewall on IP packet level. This does however require that you do not mind getting your hands a little dirty with some bits and bytes!

 

Protowall is popular in the P2P community to block out computers belonging to the recording industry and government agencies, but it also works great if you want to limit network access to just a few known (fixed) IP addresses. It sits as a network device driver which will block IP ranges based on a blocklist file.

 

I use it on my home PC to block more than 2 billion individual IP addresses among others edu ranges (a lot of attacks come from schools and universities either via live studens or zombie PCs), known zombie IP ranges, and even a lot of nosy companies and government agencies who have no business tracking my use of the Internet. In my case the blocklist takes up almost 10MB of physical memory, but if you basically exclude all existing IP addresses except for just a few, then you will only have a few lines in the blocklist and then the blocklist will only take up a few kilobytes of memory. Regardless of the blocklist size it uses very little processing power (less than a regular firewall).

 

Most firewalls allow packets to go through the network adapter and into the firewall application in order to analyze whether packets and IP addresses should be granted access through a particular port or not. Even if access is blocked, there will still be communication between your network adapter and the network adapter of the blocked IP. With Protowall, the network adapter will not even respond to communication attempts by returning packets or acknowledging receipt of packets to IPs in the blocklist, so basically your PC appears not to exist at all. A locked door is good, but I think an invisible locked door is even better

[Thomas 0]

I actually don't recomend a local anti-virus. They tend to be resource hungry. I do recommend something like Trend-Micro's Housecall or the Symantic Corp Ed.

[rory 0]

also, just found this from American Dynamics while looking at one of their DvRs online ..

 

http://www.tycovideo.com/WebApps/getDocument.aspx?filename=8200-0497-9900.pdf

[Nortonics 0]

If ya really feel the need to incorporate virus protection here's my view from literally decades of experience:

 

In the Corporate world there is really only one antivirus package worth a darn, and that's Symantec AntiVirus Corporate Edition (Corporate client) in the 10.x versions for instance. Very Low overhead on the machine it's running on - undisputed complete virus protection that auto upgrades practically on a daily basis. Real-time scanning is easily turned off & on and if chosen will also scan Outlook/Exchange in real time too. Ain't cheap but there's a reason for that - it works, and it's what all other antivirus software manufacturers only wish they could produce.

 

Don't even think of the Symantec/Norton versions made for the home user or McAfee Antivirus as these are all huge resource hogs, not to mention they often install so much garbage alongside the actual antivirus software that unusual operation of the system afterwards is a common occurance - not good.

 

Now realize this is antivirus protection only. This software does not really protect against spyware, root kits, and other forms of infections.

[Rebco 0]

is there a way to set the AVG to not scan everyday or everytime i turn on the computer?

[rory 0]

yes, under scheduling, click properties and disable it there.

[CollinR 0]

is there a way to set the AVG to not scan everyday or everytime i turn on the computer?

 

Yup buy the pro version.

 

Of course the free version isn't for commercial use anyway.

[Rebco 0]

Of course and this problem only happens on my home computer.

But seriously I will look into that for my DVRS

[rory 0]

like i said though, you can turn all that off with the Free version.

[kensplace 0]

As for the moment I use my geo card on my pc (till I get a spare pc just for it) I use avg free, and with geo running the scan takes so long it starts a new scan before the old one has finnished, so if I go away for a few days several scans run concurrently! Will have to turn of the daily scan

 

Interestingly, the emails are slow when geo runs, downloading emails with incredimail takes ages, so what I do is get task manager up, and right click on the gv1480 entry and select priority, then change it to below normal. Geo still seems to run as normal, and the emails speed in a full speed.

[rory 0]

incredimail is your problem there ..

[501 0]

Plus a 1480 card is very processor intensive. If you are recording in 720x480 and have a lot of cameras, you are definitley running that processor pretty good. If you don't have a lot of ram, I'd limit my pre-recording as well.

[kensplace 0]

Yup, according to task manager, its at 100 percent cpu usage pretty much permanantly