Norton Internet Security 2009 - Norton AntiVirus 2009 Review

Norton Internet Security 2009
Norton AntiVirus 2009

Over the course of several years, I would dutifully get the latest Norton antivirus software and load it up for a while, only to wind up throwing F-bombs around at some point when I was trying to uninstall it. It was insidious, with tentacles deep into my system, and enterprising software engineers out there were forced to come up with independent solutions to root all the nasty bits out. Even then, you would find stray pieces in your registry or who knows where else.

And the reason for every single uninstall was always the same – the Norton software slowed you down. Sometimes way down.
Especially as an on-and-off gamer, specifically one who has always preferred to take his gaming online, anything that slows down my system or impedes my Internet access in any way was simply not acceptable.

Which brings me to the Norton Internet Security 2009 and AntiVirus 2009.
After being asked if I wanted to check them out, I had that same old nag. Will I run into the problems I used to have? Has there been enough complaining to get Symantec’s attention?

Looking at the packaging for both of them, it becomes obvious that they’re dealing with a perception issue. Hanging conspicuously under the product name are the words “Engineered for Speed.”

A good idea, but anybody can stick a blurb in the box copy. There was only going to be one way to find out if these were better products, and I am a curious beast, so I stuck the first disc in the tray.
Installing something takes on a rhythm of its own, one that we all know.

You pop in the disc and up comes the Microsoft installer, you click a few yes bubbles, agree to a bunch more stuff, and wait. Then you reboot, watch all the old-school boot up, sit through the Windows splash and grit your teeth while you wait some more.

But this time it was different.

Symantec isn’t using the Microsoft installer, they’re using their own. And it takes a minute. Really. About one minute. With no reboot.

Now, at this point, I don’t know much more about the Norton packages than I knew two minutes before, but I already like them. Maybe that wasn’t just PR hyperbole on the box. A little Googling reveals that Symantec blames Microsoft for some of the reputation for Norton’s bloat in the past, and this new installer, all stripped down and very, very clean, has me convinced that they might be on to something.

Once into the interface, another aspect of their new commitment to speed is revealed. The main menu is much stripped down as well, with options for basic configuration and tool choice never more than one click away. It’s much easier and more obvious to set your specific level of protection. Pop-ups tips are fairly clear, and there’s not enough on the screen to confuse someone who simply wants to make the simplest choices for their system and be done with it. Another great idea is the removal of the constant nags for other Norton products. In prior versions, people who didn’t have the best grasp on their technology would be confused, assuming that they still didn’t have everything they needed, that there was something missing from the software they had just installed. People who did know what they wanted had already bought it, and they didn’t need to see an ad for anything else. Nobody is going to miss those baked-in ads.

One of the best features of the Internet Security package is the way it decides what is and isn’t malware. When your system is scanned, Norton then goes out and compares what it sees in your computer with a whitelist of files in use on other people’s computers. If Norton doesn’t recognize something, instead of putting up a red flag and causing you some concern that you might not need to have, the software assumes that the file in question must be okay and ignores it. If very few other users have that unknown file, you’ll likely get a warning.

The old method of updating virus and malware definitions is gone (goodbye LiveUpdate), and is replaced by a much more active definition retrieval structure. Norton literally updates its definitions every few minutes, and you can see this in the interface, if you’re the kind of person who needs to know these things down to the second. (I just checked, and it last updated 29 seconds ago.)

I don’t have enough other antivirus software to make an accurate comparison with Norton, but a little looking around online shows me that Norton is among the top rated for rooting out even the nastiest viruses and much the same with the speed of scanning, picking through fat hard drives much faster than I remember from years back.

I also haven’t had enough time to really test the edges of the IdentitySafe and AntiPhishing aspects of Norton, being a fairly careful surfer. Casual examination suggests that it runs quietly in the background until you bump into something that triggers an alert, and it shuts you down before you get a chance to hurt yourself.

The only problem I had with either package was, naturally, once I started running a few games. Even though I had opened up a hole for World of Warcraft to slip through the firewall, I had to fiddle around stopping and starting the program to get a connection, and the same thing happened with Call of Duty 4. The problems didn’t last long, however, and free tech support was there if I wasn’t able to figure it out on my own. As usual, the best place to check for help is the users forum, as there’s bound to be somebody else sharing your pain out there in the world.
After a few weeks of use, I haven’t had any problems at all, no obvious slowdowns or hitches, and no annoyances in terms of configuring. It looks like Symantec has really responded to their customers here and come up with a solution for every complaint from the previous versions. In my estimation, Norton 2009 is highly recommended.

What’s Wrong With Tropic Thunder?

First off, let’s get this straight – some of this movie is hilarious.

I started off my viewing experience laughing like a little girl with a face full of nitrous. I laughed so hard I peed the pants of the guy beside me. The parody in the first act is excellent, gouging its thumbs into the eyeballs of the movie industry and digging deep.

The fake start Ben Stiller uses is brilliant, and I know there were people in the audience who bought the trailers as real until it sunk in who was starring in them.

The movie within a movie was equally enjoyable. Lots of Apocalypse Now, Platoon, even Born on the Fourth of July in there, all being sent up perfectly, sometimes down to the shot.

By now, everyone knows that the three main actors are Ben Stiller as Tugg Speedman, Jack Black as Jeff Portnoy and Robert Downey Jr. keeping his balls out summer going as Kirk Lazarus. And everybody knows that Downey is brilliant as an actor heavily inspired by the intense character building done by intense Method actors like Daniel Day Lewis (assuming there is anyone like Lewis, whose real-life devotion to his roles isn’t too far off what Downey plays in this film). But what people maybe don’t know is that Jack Black isn’t very entertaining in this.

Maybe it’s just me, but Black’s spin on a pathetic star of fart joke comedies falls into some uncomfortable reality with regard to his drug addiction. I wasn’t offended, but I need better jokes if I’m expected to laugh at an addict going through withdrawal. Even the requisite puking scene was weak, and ended up being more about exposition that anything else.

Stiller can play a deluded moron in his sleep by now, and has some great moments throughout the film, but there weren’t many surprises in that character until he begins to perform his Simple Jack character for the narcomilitia towards the end.

I loved Matthew McConaughey as Rick Peck (The Pecker), Speedman’s agent, and I can get onboard the excitement many critics had over Tom Cruise’s heavily made up character turn, although by the end, it completely blows out of energy.

Much of the fun in this film is running through a list of who’s being mocked by all these characters and sequences, and even the more casual readers of Hollywood news/scandal will probably be able to recognize various aspects of plenty of the rich and famous. But the vicious delight of the satire falls away once the Act 2 stuff kicks in, and instead of making me laugh, the filmmakers decided to try and make the kind of movie that they had only moments earlier been taking the piss out of.

Watching Stiller lean on played out action movie tropes was a real kick in the ass, and the number of laughs died out in the theatre I was in as we forgot that we were watching an incisive comedy and went through the action paint-by-numbers.

The problem with this is that we don’t have anything at stake, so the action is meaningless and feels thin. We’ve been laughing, we’ve been having fun and feeling very much in on the joke as the film makes fun of the movie business, so when the story suddenly tries to raise the stakes and take us through a series of set pieces, it feels too much like a straight to video 80s movie. Honestly, I felt like Chuck Norris or Michael Dudikoff was going to pop out and blow a clip off an Uzi or something. This isn’t what I want in my comedy.

By the end, there were a few more laughs – back to the satire - but the final sequence, which involves Tom Cruise again, is a waste of screen time.

Should you go and pay money to see this movie? Maybe. It’s better than buying a pack of smokes, but that’s not a very good review. Imagine this blurb on the poster, “Won’t give you lung cancer.”

Instead, I will tell you that you should see it, have your big laughs up front, and then sit uncomfortably in your seat for a chunk of the middle, yanking out the good stuff here and there, until you see Tom Cruise again, at which point you should notice how big his hands are. Was that a makeup effect, like the hair? It’s hard to say.

Top 10 Reasons to Go Out and Buy an iPhone Right Now!

Top 10 Reasons to rush out and buy an iPhone right now! And I mean right now! Read this when you get back! More exclamation marks!

10. It’s already been hacked. You don’t know what that actually means, but it sounds awesome!

9. Lots of apps available. You don’t know what that means either, but Leo Laporte seems to like it and he’s awesome!

8. Every time you use it you’ll feel like a character in Minority Report, but without all the annoying Tom Cruise.

7. Heals the sick, clears bad acne and can be used as a compression device for a serious gunshot wound.

6. Easier to buy an iPhone than it is to find a woman who loves you for the person you really are. And I mean you personally, not the collective you.

5. Apple’s use of 3G is 130% more awesome than EDGE, and gets you tons more action than stupid EVDO. Hellooo ladies…

4. Creates a shiny new means by which a few large telecommunication companies can pursue their maniacal agenda to rape, pillage and sodomize their clients prior to stripping them of their wallets, their dignity and their firstborn children.

3. You would only use that money to buy a lot of cheap, plastic crap that was made in China and would leach toxic chemicals into your bloodstream and give you a tumour.

2. The neighbour’s dog said you should get one, right after you buy a handgun and ten rolls of duct tape.

1. You don’t want to make Steve angry. You know how he gets.