McAfee Antivirus

What about installing an update; does it usually take 24+ hoursto install an update?

You may have a problem

I've been using Norton Internet Security 2006 and I'm using McAfee Internet Security 2007 now. McAfee eats up less ressources than Norton but it still requires some RAM.

Updating doesn't take 24+ hours, it actualy takes 23. No really, updating is fast. A deep scan is also faster than Norton's.

However, just like most similar applications, then are tons of useless features you might want to disable. First of them is that damn file backup thing. it keeps on running in the background while eating 90% of your CPU/Hard Drive. I also disabled phishing protection, parental control, privacy protection... I'm also thinking about disabling antispam. All it does is randomly moving some emails to the Spam folder.

ZoneAlarm 2007 is also a great alternative.

Using Mc for years, now. Seems to be the lesser bother of the "big two". Just renewed, and am only running firewall and av. Updates fine. Using AdAware/AdWatch for the rest. Oh, yes, forgot the latest addition: Mc Site Advisor. Mixed blessing, gets in the way some times, but that may be IE7, which has a few bothersome bits itself. Site Advisor now rates us here at WC as "green", which I am happy about.
As an added aside, I needed tech support from McAfee a few weeks ago due to their faulty dll update. They were very responsive, with even a free live chat session to quickly fix my snafu.
I'll stick with Mc for now, along with XP PRO SP2 and the AdAware/AdWatch pkg. "If it works..." Cleaned out my registry and that made an amazing difference in RAM and CPU cycle-usage.

You have a problem no doubt. Get rid of McAfee. Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for nothin'. Get Zone Alarm and AVG. As seldomseen said clean the reg. Get CCleaner for that.

Once all that's set up do a scan using AVG and Bob's yer Uncle. I paid McAfee hundreds of bucks for years before I saw the light. Zone Alarm + AVG + AdAware + CCleaner = No Worries.

LMAO its still updateing. And, of course, it won't let me turn off the computer. Its stuck.

I paid McAfee hundreds of bucks for years before I saw the light

You would have to go and say that   

Hey there seldomseen. Didn't mean to be a buzz killer. McAfee worked pretty well for me most of the time and everything was bundled into the Security Center so that was pretty cool but every year I had to pay to re-up. There were a few factors involved in ditching McAfee. I didn't like the fact that I had to use IE on their site. Couldn't do anything with Firefox there. I know that is an issue with a lot of sites but I just didn't care for it in this case. I think that when the first beta for IE7 came out there were problems with McAfee also. All those things plus my financial situation or lack of one made the change inevitable. Goodbye McAfee.

I think utilities like the firewall and anti-virus should just run and you shouldn't even have to think about them. They should just work. I also am of the opinion that if it's free, it's for me.

Hope that clears up my view for you.

Chasbo, AOK, I'm just grumped up because I just spent $ I could have put toward Christmas presents instead. NBD. Holiday Syndrome. I hear you and am seriously looking into alternatives!!
Merry Christmas, and a Prosperous New Year!   

its still updateing. And, of course, it won't let me turn off the computer. Its stuck.

Dunno that's just McAfee doing that.....had a similar situation with Norton a while back, It turned out to be a particularly nasty piece of malware that disabled security settings (gave the impression updates were still downloading) and took control of my PC....as in I couldn't reboot, shut down or close IE.

Probably a good idea to be looking along those lines as well....but don't just rely on Adaware and/or Spybot as they missed it/couldn't remove it when I got infected.

Can't remember the name of it now, just that it was a pain in the arse to get rid of, that all I could do was unplug my PC at the powerpoint and get a techie to do a clean install cos it wouldn't let me in full stop. Hopefully that's not the case for you and someone here has an answer for your situation.