Norton Systemworks 2003 Upgrade (AntiVirus, Utilities, Cleansweep, Roxio GoBack)

The most valuable tool included in this product in the Norton Antivirus 2003. This has proved its worth on a number of occasions!

Apart from the upgrade of the Antivirus product which now includes monitoring for messenger applications I can really see no advantage in this update.

All of the utilities have exactly the same look and feel as they did in the 2002 version. There are no detectable new facilities available either. In fact it was quite hard to see that the upgrade to 2003 had worked at all ! The only difference is a slight change to the integrator menu that now appears to be slightly neater.

If you do not have systemworks, I can certainly recommend it. If you are already running Systemworks 2002, consider if you really need the full Systemworks upgrade. If you only need the antivirus upgrade, save some money and just buy that instead.

By comparing with the previous versions of Norton System Works, the best new feature added to the package is the Worm Blocking technology, as it seems to be something that we just have to have. Also the ability of scanning all outgoing and incoming email and also instant messages will keep the computer safe from viruses. At the end, I noticed Symantec releases updates on its software regularly and I feel safe and trouble-free.

I would recommend this software to everyone, and to be at the safe side, I also recommend Norton Internet Security so that the computer can be trouble-free, virus free and be safe on the Internet.

An antivirus tool is a must for any computer connecting to the Internet and Norton's Antivirus is one of the top two products in this field. You can not go wrong with this product and one year of free updates is included. By default updates are automatically downloaded by the LiveUpdate program or you can select to be notified when new updates are available. Norton Antivirus is very comprehensive and includes auto-protect (checks programs for viruses as they are run), scanning of both incoming and outgoing email, scanning of any Instant Messenger, regular hard disk scans and script blocking. The latter prompts you to confirm the action to be taken when a potentially dangerous script is run. As with any virus checking program it is worth temporarily disabling virus checking and script blocking when you are installing new programs to prevent potential installation problems. The manual included gives detailed advice on what to do if a virus is found.

Norton CleanSweep is a limited tool for removing unwanted files, programs and Internet files from your PC. It offers very little above that already available via Windows own Disk cleanup facility and Internet Explorer menus.

Norton Utilities comprises several separate programs: System Doctor, WinDoctor, Speed Disk and Disk Doctor.

Norton System Doctor can continuously monitor your computer and can be configured to alert you when conditions need attention. This is highly configurable and you can select from a wide range of disk, memory, CPU and network sensors. The style and alarm level are all configurable. It is rather like having an instrument panel on your PC.

WinDoctor is a powerful tool that should be used with great care. It checks for problems such as lost short cuts and invalid registry options. The scan is safe but you should not accept the recommended fix without checking. On my PC it wanted to fix a registry entry for a broken uninstall program by replacing it with a different uninstall program. Imagine the horror when you went to uninstall an application only to uninstall a totally different application.

Disk Doctor is rather like the built in Windows command CHKDSK and will check your hard disk's physical surfaces for errors. This can take a very long time on large disks that are now common in modern PCs.

Speed Disk is a disk defragmentation tool similar to that already included in Windows XP. If you are running Windows XP then Norton's version has the advantage in that it can also defragment system files such as page file and Master File Table. Speed Disk also optimizes the layout of files on disk for best performance.

Other utilities include a protected recycle bin and a utility called wipe info to permanently delete sensitive data to Government standards. Also bundled with the product is a cut down version of GoBack 3. This is a system recovery software tool that records all changes to your hard disk. If you experience a problem due to a bad install or system crash GoBack can revert your system back to a stable state.

With all these utilities SystemWorks represents good value for money. Some of the applications do require a certain level of understanding of Windows to get the best from them.