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Reviewer: scupper
Company: Computer Associates, Visit Site
Product: PestPatrol ... Version: 5
Visit the store. Write your own review!
| | Reviewer's Ratings | Avg Company Rating | | Overall Feeling |   | | | Customer Support | | | | Value for the money | | | | Product's ease of use | | | | Ease of installation | | | | Product website | | | | Reliability | | |
Compare Product Reviews in this ClassI've been using Pest Patrol for almost a year now, and although I never had a spyware/adware problem prior to installing it, nor since installing it, I knew I needed to start using a program if I were to continue to use Internet Explorer.
In the time I've had it installed on three different operating systems, Windows 2000 Professional, Windows XP Home and Windows XP Professional, I've never come across a real pest. On my Windows 2000 Professional partition, PestPatrol has incorrectly detected certain Adobe Photoshop Plugin files as being spyware.
I wish I could say either way that PestPatrol was really cleaning house, but aside from the occassional 3 or 4 cookies it catches, it's really only been a resource drain on my memory, and occassionally has contributed to slow shut downs on XP when MemCheck is enabled, and the systems hasn't been rebooted in at least 3 days.
That's not to say it's not doing it's job, it's just that I run very strict permissions on my systems through Internet Settings, Zones, firewall rules (Zone Alarm) and Local Computer Policy, as well as the most important, practicing safe and smart browsing and using an alternate broswer.
I find the program inteface to be pretty well designed and easy to navigate, understand.
The PestPatrol web site I think has both a good support section and Pest Research Center. I've seen a lot of links to PestPatrol definitions from forums and competing product support/knowledgebase forums.
Installation and uninstallation has always gone flawlessly for me.
Aside from the occasional hang on shut down when memCheck is enabled, PestPatrol has run stable, and I've not had any problems on Win2k, XP Home or Pro.
But can I say it has saved me from a trojan, browser hijack? No, I can't, and I can't really say either way if it's value for the money, since I read daily the successful results of programs like Spybot Search and Destroy, with a price Pest Patrol can't match, and a zeal from a support and user community that seems unmathced as well. I've used Spybot S&D and not detected any problems with my systems either. I hope others can brings some better, more critical reviews to the table here.
Added: September 2nd 2004
Hits: 8003
NOTE: Product reviews are independently written by our members and do not necessarily express the opinions or views of CastleCops.
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PestPatrol
Posted by 1972vet on 2004-09-18 11:20:14
My Score: 
Since my review and cost analysis, I returned to this thread to update the readers.
Today is September 18th 2004, and I have still not received a reply
from the Pest Patrol people regarding their findings from their digital detective software which reported that my system was loaded with trojans. It is not, but I was hoping that the pest patrol customer support people would have responded by now with some reasonable explanation.
I continue to use pest patrol, and have even paid for an additional year subscription to receive their updates, as pest patrol does do a bang-up job of finding and destroying pests.
I have yet to determine however, if pest patrol is capable of finding any more pests than the freeware pest removers that are offered on this site. I fear that it does not. I use it most often just for the cookie patrol feature that it has. Whenever I visit a web site that wants to place spyware cookies on my system, pest patrol kills them instantly and keeps record of it for me. All other cookies are allowed to remain until the user decides to delete them.
If I were to have relied upon pest patrol''s scanner findings alone to keep my system pest free, I would have been deleting protection software entries in my registry made by other protection software, thereby rendering the other protection software useless to a degree and my system vulnerable. That is NOT good.
Although I do not believe the cost of pest patrol will run me off anytime soon, I still would not recommend it to others because of it, considering the alternatives offered here for free.
In my previous post where I tried to show what a cost comparison should look like, I tried to create columns using the space bar, and I see that when it was posted here, it didn''t seem to look like it made much sense the way it appears. Below, I tried to correct that using dashes instead of spaces in hopes that it would appear like a spread sheet:
--------------------Pest Patrol---------------------Freeware
removes pests--------------X----------------------------X
prevents unauth.
downloads of pests--------------------------------------X
offers free updates---(for 1st yr)-X---------------Indefinite-X
free on-line support---------X----------------------------X
Cost:---------------------$39.00------------------------$0.00
I would hope the above analysis makes better sense, and helps
some of you to decide if it is worth it or not.
vet
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PestPatrol
Posted by 1972vet on 2004-09-09 12:09:19
My Score:
I''d like to clarify that Pest Patrol does NOT identify Computer Cops as a pest, as someone here suggested from reading my review. That is not at all what I wrote.
In reviewing my posted comments, I clearly see that what I had written was that it was interesting to note that the Pest Patrol software does identify the cookies placed on your browser during each visit to computer cops as being spyware cookies. If you have the cookie patrol function enabled, and you visit this site, you will see when you review the cookie patrol log that Pest Patrol found and deleted the spyware cookies:
09/09/2004 10:46:46 ~ [action:Deleted ] Found spyware cookie owner@computercops[1].txt
09/09/2004 10:47:36 ~ [action:Deleted ] Found spyware cookie owner@computercops[1].txt
I am glad to read that there are those who find Pest Patrol software a bargain. I happen to think that the freeware offered on this site is a much better bargain. The freeware I have found here does the same job as Pest Patrol, using less resources and causing fewer problems.
If I had to do a cost comparison for a descrimiating consumer, here is how it would look:
Pest Patrol Freeware
removes pests X X
prevents unauth.
downloads of pests X
offers free updates X X
free online support X X
Cost: $39.00 $0.00
Make a rather wise decision.
vet
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PestPatrol
Posted by cuminstd on 2004-09-07 21:19:36
My Score:
I use Pest Patrol on all my computers. it works fine and I have never had a problem with it saying ComputerCops is a Pest. It has caught many Pests because my kids aren''t that computer literate and they seem to not particularly pay attention to what they are doing. Originally, popups on our computers were a severe problem, they are now a thing of the past. I use only Norton Anti-Virus in conjunction with Pest Patrol and our computers just run flawlessley day by day with no popups and any problems being detected. I do upgrade Pest Patrol at least every few days. It works relatively fast when checking your computer as our computers are all in about the Pentium 3 (1 ghz range). I actually purchase Spyware X Terminator but I believe it is Pest Patrol since all the upgrades seem to connect to the Pest Patrol Web Site. I''ve seem my kids get on the computer for a couple hours and it is not unusual to see a few dozen Adware Pests on the computer and it is a cinch to get rid of them.
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PestPatrol
Posted by 1972vet on 2004-09-02 21:09:51
My Score:
I''ve used Pest Patrol for about the past 14 months. I have noted during that time period, that Pest Patrol customer service is prompt. Usually a response is received in 24 hours. Usually.
Compare that to a week or more response time from symantec as an example, and Pest Patrol customer service wins the Gold. However...
The service received doesn''t compare at all with the service provided
by the software.
I have alerted the Pest Patrol makers of some flaws with their software to wit:
Pest Patrol finds the kill bit entries made by spyware blaster as being malicious, which of course, it is not as I now know from the education that I received here at CCSP.
I also take issue with their digital detective software that they in fact may ask you (the pest patrol user) to download and run in an effort to help them serve you better (cough). I did as they requested, and forwarded to them, the snap shot that their software took of my system.
Their response? My system is loaded with trojans (NOT).
I responded to their findings with a resounding try again. The date of my reply was 8/13/04 and as of today 09/02/04 I have not received a response. It does give one the impression that their customer service is nothing more than window dressing. I''ll update this post, when (or if) I hear back from them.
As for the Pests? Well, I must say the software will correctly identify pests but the user must be more savvy then the typical novice that is out there on the web. Otherwise, the pest you delete with their software, may very well be as innocuous as your own protection software.
It is interesting to note that each time I come to CCSP, Pest Patrol does identify computer cops cookies as spyware and deletes them.
I have had no problems or complaints using the freeware that I have found on this site. Is Pest Patrol worth it? For me, no. It isn''t.
1972vet
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