Customer Reviews
Voted With My Feet 
2005-02-20
After months of frustration with NIS 2004 and Symantec's pitiful tech. support, I finally threw in the towel. Went with PC-cillin Internet Security 2005 and am happy that I did so. The PC-cillin UI isn't as refined as NIS's but - you know! - the product works, the Anti-spam component integrates nicely with Outlook, and etc... No compatibility issues and my machine is running noticably quicker.
With any luck, I'll never have to be concerned with the quality of TrendMicro's tech. support. In any event, it couldn't possibly be worse than Symantec's. Here's Symantec's version of how to fix the Visual C++ Runtime Error for the AntiSpam plugin, so well documented in other customer reviews and on the Web:
1) Rename MSOUPLUG.DLL to MSOUPLUG.OLD. Trouble is, that's not a fix; it simply prevents the error message by disabling the very plug-in you were trying to fix.
2) Do a LiveUpdate for NIS 2005. Trouble is, I was running NIS 2004.
3) Remove and reinstall NIS 2004. A painful procedure that, in the end, doesn't work (and they know it).
4) Upgrade to NIS 2005. (Yeah! Right!)
Um... NIS 2004 a bad product. Very bad. Read the reviews here before you buy; we can't ALL be lying...
Killed my Internet Access Speed 2005-01-18
Loaded this suite on a newly built PC: AMD Athlon64 512Mb RAM, WinXP Home, running broadband cable - connection speeds were slower than my dialup while I had the program loaded. Uninstalled and PC ran like a champ... excepting the junk Symantec left on my PC... Couldn't fully uninstall since it had hooked nearly every program I had installed. Ended up having to reload Windows to get the machine to run without error and at optimum speed.
Would NOT recommend this program. It was a waste of my time and money.
NIS 2004 - Total Garbage 2005-01-18
Without repeating all the problems reported by other reviewers (I have experienced most of them and more) suffice it to say that amazon should take this off of their shelf and refuse to sell it. It is utter and complete garbage - I have never seen any software that behaves so poorly or is so poorly supported. Symantec / Norton should be ashamed of this product and should send a refund to all users of it.
I am so glad it's not just me!! 2005-01-13
I was begining to think I was computer-retarded after dealing with this program. I was using this on my 2001 Dell laptop (which worked fine until I upgraded to this junk!) I had much of the same problems that everyone else has listed (mainly the SLOOOOOOOOOW processor), and then I couldn't get the damn thing off my computer completely!
I decided to give it one last chance... so I formatted my hard drive, reinstalled Windows XP (which also required a day & night download/install of SP2 on dial-up) and put NIS2004 back onto the computer. It locked during install and I had to reformat the drive and start from scratch (GRRRRRR!)
Blessedly, my DSL was installed just about this time and I set up a wireless network with my desktop. So when I reformatted for the third time, downloading SP2 took no time at all and the new XP was kind enough to even suggest other antivirus programs to try (it also listed Norton and McAffee).
I downloaded a trial version of Computer Associates EZ Firewall and Antivirus and fell in love with a computer security system all over again. I can't recommend their programs enough.
And I can't warn you enough to STAY AWAY FROM NORTON!!
Give it a chance 
2005-01-13
I think this very good protection utility, you just jave to give it a chance. It always keeps me protected, since I started to use NIS few years ago, never had any viruses. It does a good job with the Firewall and Auto Protect. If you have two Firewalls on your PC just turn off one of them, I turnerd off my windows firewall and left NIS Firewall, and my PC works very smoothly and very effeciently. Once I had a problem with Auto-Protect, so I contacted Technician via email, and they send me response to solve mmy problem, I was able to solve it almost immedately. If you think about buying this Product I would highly recommend it.
Don't Buy It, It's worse than the viruses 2006-10-21
I bought the 2005 version for my wife and we've had nothing but problems. Most recently used PC Move when we got a new PC and I didn't think to get rid of this. Now I can't get it off the new machine and it's causing a problem exiting Word. (Documented on Microsoft's site). This is absolute junk.
They'll be selling SnoCones in hell before I buy a new ver. 
2005-10-06
I've been frustrated with this product so long, that the anger which would have inspried at least an entertaining review has left me.
About me. Back in the day, the mid-nineties, I worked as a technical support rep for a PC manufacturer, and then a REALLY BIG software company. Does that mean my opinion is necessarily expert? By no means. It does mean that I have worked in a corporate environment in which virus and firewall protection was mandated, and that I have had on multiple occaisions had to reset options setting and preferences.
All that being said, for the love of God this program WON"T SHUT UP! The firewall is insane, invoking a top level popup EVERYTIME something happens, and that box that asks if you want to use the action every time? It is as far as I can tell, non-functional.
For the sake of security I have endured it for the length of my update subscription (the update utility by the way was eating my processor time like locusts).
And now even though i still use it with its recently out of date definitions, IT STILL WON'T LEAVE ME ALONE! I KNOW Virus definitions are out of date, and I KNOW my NIS Updates are out of date. I'm the one that didn't renew them, I do NOT need a reminder ever 30 seconds. Of course have I shut it off? NO. i have a good mind to go back to Zone Alarm. At least if that irks you you know you got it for free.
This thing rocks on my 1ghz 256mb XP sp2 Emachine... 2005-08-25
I upgraded from NAV 2002 and ZoneAlarm to this...
Installing took minutes....Updating over broadband took 3 reboots and several updates that had been released since the release 2 years ago (expected).
Then only Virus definitions..and I was done.
A half hour to see all the new features and review the default settings, and 15 minutes to see how to enable one certain game for my child on NEOPETS.
Tried the other freeware including Avast and maybe I just got used to the NAV Auto Update and using the daily 4am Virus Checking.
The Internet Security included is very flexable and friendly. I actually feel ok now without Zonealarm (was my best pick) clogging up my net.
Plus I can configure the other users with a click.... Kids / Teens and adults....Then you can fine tune them if need be....All the logs are there and easy to read.
I really thought I was in for trouble after reading the reviews, but I got used to NAV and for this price glad I did.
I guess no news is good news and all the good reviews are just not showing up...Soo I thought I would speak for them...
Stick with the older NAVs 2005-04-22
Both my wife and I purchased this software near the end of 2004. At first, many of the "features" were just an annoyance, and I assumed that I would gain experience with them and move on. That never happened.
While online one day, Internet Security mysteriously disabled itself. I immediately got off the internet, but was unable to reactivate the program. After trying everything I could think of, including unistalling and reinstalling the program, I contacted Symantec. They advised, via email, me to do all the things I had already done (by the way, their online automated help is abysmal). This had the predicted result of not solving the problem. A clean boot and registry edit later, the program was still not functioning. At this time, my Outlook had ceased functioning until I removed the program, and several other programs on my machine returned errors stating that they had encountered problems and "needed to close". Prior to Internet Security crashing on me, I had never seen this error before. I found it distressing that the program designed to prevent any kind of Internet attack was also giving me this error.
I did some searching online and found a couple articles that said that Internet Security had been found to have a bug that allowed hackers to disable it over the web. Symantec assured me that this was not true. In the end, I completely removed the program and that solved most of my woes, however I am still recieving the same strange "this program has encountered a problem and needs to close" error with Adobe Distiller, and occasionally with other programs, however, only the Adobe Distiller seems to be completely fatally affected.
My wife has had problems with her Internet Security, and has also found that disabling it is the way to go. Fortunately, her's did not die completely as mine did.
Bottom line is, from my viewpoint, beware of this program. I never had any problems with earlier NAV versions, and I will be returning to them, although I was rather soured on Symantec as a whole for having produced such a faulty program.
Effective, but VERY bulky 2005-02-20
While it has a rather effective firewall, and comes with Norton Antivirus (which I'm actually rather fond of), the Security Suite has significantly slowed down my system. I'm currently using a Sony Vaio S-150 (which I bought at the end of this past August), and it takes about five minutes just to boot the system - in fact, I've taken to just hibernating, rather than shutting down completely.
The Antivirus is good, but "Internet Security" just isn't worth it.
