CA Anti-Spyware 2007

Pros: It looks nice and it updates a lot

Cons: I think I need to reformat my drive and reinstall Windows

Summary: I purchased CA Security Suite 2007 with a special offer that came with a free copy of PC Optimize. That's where the problems began. After communicating with CA tech-support, it turns out that the current version of CA ISS 2007 on offer was completely incompatible with PC Optimize and was guaranteed to cause problems when used together. A sheer stroke of genius on CA's part. Great going guys!

After uninstalling PC Optimize and performing a System Restore I was still having problems. Firefox, Opera and IE started sucking up 100% of the CPU. Browser windows could not be shut down via the Task manager, requiring a re-boot. I know Firefox has a history of memory leaks but I've been using it for six years without a problem. I unsintalled CA ISS, manually removed all remnants from my registry and performed a System Restore again.

My idiotic mistake was reinstalling the updated version CA ISS thinking it would be more stable. I figured I payed for it I may as well use it. Duh... My browsers don't crash as much as they did initially—from the memory leak, that is—and I can close them using the Task Manager when they do. Excellent improvement, CA! However, my browsers are very sluggish now and do crash when viewing any page with QuickTime or PDFs. The Windows Media Player Plug-in doesn't work. Many pages in Firefox are blocked with a "<!------Removed By HIPS FW------>" message even though I've disabled pop-up blocking in CA's Firewall. On top of that, there is now a Javascript problem. pop-ups don't work anymore. Not even for software updates. IE will no longer open multiple windows and crashes frequently. What else can I say. Installing the CA Internet Security Suite is the worst thing I've ever done to my computer. Don't buy it. Don't even try it.