Windows 10 and also 11 - The Bear and Badger

RedDave2

TheBoyRoberts wrote:

Kernowgaz wrote:

What’s the best free firewall and virus checker available now ? Used to use Avast and AVG, are they still any good?

If you're running Windows 10, I'd stay with Defender.

Seconded. I've been using the baked in defender since Windows 8. Works fine, won't interfere with the running of the system.

Unlikely

Me too.

Why do people use Chrome?

Facewon

Once upon a time because ie was awful and Chrome was faster and it and Firefox actually did some cool things.

Now it's a lot of habit, but also there's a bunch of extensions and cross pollination with andriod apps and chromecast.

Kernowgaz

TheBoyRoberts wrote:

Kernowgaz wrote:

What’s the best free firewall and virus checker available now ? Used to use Avast and AVG, are they still any good?

If you're running Windows 10, I'd stay with Defender.

Defender? It’s a new laptop for my sons Xmas present. Have they changed the name or something?

And yes it’s using Windows 10

Unlikely

But Google.

EDIT: Face.

Facewon

Google what?

Unlikely

Google is my issue with Chrome.

RedDave2

Unlikely wrote:

Google is my issue with Chrome.

I've come to terms with all this. I use Chrome because its the easiest to sync across devices and works with my companies email (we use a gmail base)

Edge is ok. Firefox is ok. I mean, they are all basic browsers in the end. Unless I am missing something as to what makes a really great browser.

Unlikely

Yep, I don't do anything fancy so to me they're all much the same.

RamSteelwood

Kernowgaz wrote:

TheBoyRoberts wrote:

Kernowgaz wrote:

What’s the best free firewall and virus checker available now ? Used to use Avast and AVG, are they still any good?

If you're running Windows 10, I'd stay with Defender.

Defender? It’s a new laptop for my sons Xmas present. Have they changed the name or something? And yes it’s using Windows 10

Defender is the built in anti virus/malware thing. It's free and will update automatically along with the neverending stream of windows updates. I use it too.

RedDave2

Unlikely wrote:

Yep, I don't do anything fancy so to me they're all much the same.

So, for those in the know, whats a really good browser and why?

Unlikely

One that doesn't chuck everything you do at Google would be a good start.

mrsmr2

I use Firefox, used Google a bit but read about what stuff they could be doing with your activity and moved away. I also don't like the blurry fonts with Chrome - I have to use it for work.

Chrome is good for technical things like measuring the refresh rate of monitors (not a common activity for most people), and it has more colour saturation than Firefox for watching stuff like Twitch, iplayer, etc.

Otherwise, Firefox all the way.

Kernowgaz

RamSteelwood wrote:

Kernowgaz wrote:

TheBoyRoberts wrote:

Kernowgaz wrote:

What’s the best free firewall and virus checker available now ? Used to use Avast and AVG, are they still any good?

If you're running Windows 10, I'd stay with Defender.

Defender? It’s a new laptop for my sons Xmas present. Have they changed the name or something? And yes it’s using Windows 10

Defender is the built in anti virus/malware thing. It's free and will update automatically along with the neverending stream of windows updates. I use it too.

Thanks all.

AJ

Unlikely wrote:

One that doesn't chuck everything you do at Google would be a good start.

True, but it's worth remembering that they know the vast majority of it anyway.

Facewon

AJ wrote:

Unlikely wrote:

One that doesn't chuck everything you do at Google would be a good start.

True, but it's worth remembering that they know the vast majority of it anyway.

Yeah, I'm a big meh on a lot of that stuff. Maybe I shouldn't be, but convenience ftw.

AJ

Same here, though I fully believe that in the long run (i.e. probably after I'm dead) it will be a big problem and side with things that prevent it even if I don't use them.

AJ

Actually, I saw an article recently about how bad phone privacy is - Apple included. Do we have a thread for that kind of stuff?

Blue Swirl

If you're running a 64-bit install of Windows 10, get yourself Waterfox. It's basically Firefox but re-written to take advantage of 64-bit computers. Put in an adblock extension of your choosing, EFF's Privacy Badger, and boom. Top browser get.

AJ

Can it run multiple separate sessions (i.e. different logins, cookies, history, etc.) in different windows simultaneously?

Blue Swirl

You can have multiple windows with multiple tabs, yes. I'm not sure if you can log in to the same website with two different accounts, I've not tried that. I would wager no.

Blue Swirl

I will also admit I have Chrome on my machine, but only for Google Earth. I also have Edge, obvs., but I only use that when something won't load in Waterfox.

AJ

Blue Swirl wrote:

You can have multiple windows with multiple tabs, yes.

I'd imagine every browser available today lets you do that.

I'm not sure if you can log in to the same website with two different accounts, I've not tried that. I would wager no.

That's the big thing that keeps me on Chrome, I'm surprised nobody else is doing it.

AJ

Oh, different sets of plugins and bookmarks for each, too; that's important.

Blue Swirl

AJ wrote:

Oh, different sets of plugins and bookmarks for each, too; that's important.

That sounds like some next level Neo shit, right there.

AJ

Need it for work, innit.

Dinostar77

Chrome has 65% market share as a browser. Its the quickest and best of the windows popular browsers. If you want privacy go with duckduckgo.

For the real geeks among you, Firefox does hard fail on you CRL checks as it doesn't use a CRL list only OCSP servers. Chrome has its own CRList pubslihed to the browser. I believe both do enhanced validation of webaite certificates if presented with EV certs.

As for AV windows defender is fine. However freebie versions of Avast etc give you more for free such as a more advanced firewall. I use f-prot as they do free licenses from time to time. That comes with AV, Firewall, Secuee browsing, secure banking etc all for free.

Unlikely

duckduckgo is great, but it's a search engine, not a browser. My understanding is Chrome itself is merrily tracking what you do, regardless of what search engine you use.

AJ

By all accounts it does, yes. Though Google knows a lot of it if you don't block them whatever browser you use.

Dinostar77 wrote:

For the real geeks among you, Firefox does hard fail on you CRL checks as it doesn't use a CRL list only OCSP servers. Chrome has its own CRList pubslihed to the browser.

I don't understand. Surely grabbing it from a sever network is better than storing its own list?

cockbeard

Unlikely wrote:

duckduckgo is great, but it's a search engine, not a browser. My understanding is Chrome itself is merrily tracking what you do, regardless of what search engine you use.

None of it is identifiable though. They also have to comply with GDPR. My last role I was working very closely with Google, specifically the advertising guys, and also pulling datafeeds with that info from Google directly. Nothing is recorded at event level anymore, they roll it up every few minutes or so, and for those few minutes it's not available to anyone outside Google

Google only make their money by selling the advert info to agencies, they've no interest in storing event level information, they don't do the analysis themselves. The little analysis they do need to do is all done via deep learning algorithms anyway. Google have been like that for years, when I worked on YouTube midroll adverts, the amount of human input into the ad placement algorithms (where to put the break in the video) had very very little intelligent human input, more just monitoring behaviour to see what the desired response was

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