SONAR, DAW and unwanted virus program

Hey, guys.  This is more a DAW question than a SONAR question.  A couple of years ago I purchase an off-the-shelf Dell (see sig for techs). It's got plenty of power for my purposes and has performed excellently for me despite the fact that is was loaded with "Extras" that I really didn't need.  I figured (correctly) that I could just keep it unplugged from the Internet and not be bothered by automatic updates, updating just what I wanted, when I wanted then unplugging again.  It came, as all these machines do, with a third party virus protection program (McAfee) that normally caused no problem with SONAR if I disabled "real time protection" before each session.  I don't use this machine for anything other than SONAR and a couple simple audio editing programs. However, after it's two year "trial" McAfee is now starting to interrupt me often with "you should update your virus protection" messages even when in the middle of working on a project.  To make a long story short (too late…) I'd like to uninstall McAfee completely to stop this, but I'm afraid what this may do to my system. Has anybody actually tried uninstalling a program such as this without issues? These virus protection programs are so invasive that I'm afraid my root files may get screwed up by removing them… anybody have any experience with this or any suggestions?
 
As always, you guys are the best. Thanks for any and all comments.
 
Rob

I also had the McAfee trial subscription on my Dell which I removed when it expired. Didn't have any problems with that. Now I use MS Security Essentials which I think does the trick and is much less invasive than McAfee.

I would also suggest you keep your Windows up to date on maintenance, as some run-time Microsoft routines are needed to be at current levels for Sonar to work properly.
 
Those in particular being out of date has frustrated some folks with X3 - getting those routines current fixed their problems.  It would be far easier to just keep the OS up to date and you would not have the issues they had in the first place.
 
Bob Bone
 
 

yea, get rid of it.  Microsoft security essentials does great.

yea, get rid of it.  Microsoft security essentials does great.

MSE isn't infallible.
 
My laptop was infected with a huge amount of Malware a month or 2 ago and MSE just let it all in.
 
Makawarebytes picked it all up & removed it from my system.

I agree that MSE doesn't do a complete job...just last week I had a virus get thru MSE from a photo editing program I downloaded..it hacked up my computer pretty bad, causing me to have to do a complete fresh install...my answer was to also install avast...now it seems to be better protected.

Well I can't afford three computers, so I have to make do with one. I'm constantly downloading stuff for my DAW, so being off the web isn't an option for me. My solution is to have better AV protection and be very careful of what I download. MSE alone doesn't cut it, so I'm trying out Avast because of many recommendations. I may go with the paid version if it works out well over time.

Cactus Music
So there you go- MSE is perfect for a DAW which should never be used for surfing the net or downloading software!! If your prone to surfing and downloading then you defiantly need a stronger AV. And you should use some old beater of a computer for that anyhow, not your DAW. 
DAW- your best newest computer- mostly never on the internet.
Office- your second best computer - regular browsing of safe sites for banking and ordering stuff
The old beater - Use this for experimental downloads and trying out freeware first before transferring to the other 2 computers. Arm it to the teeth with AV anti malware, peer block and CCcleaner. 

This is exactly the setup I have.  My DAW will only be connected to the Internet to download updates to Windows (thanks for that advice, Bob, I was avoiding the Windows updates as well…) and SONAR, so unless SONAR servers get infected, I should be alright with Windows Security. I am about to upgrade to SONAR X3, so I'll update my Windows, Uninstall McAfee and then purchase/upgrade to X3.
 
Thank you all for chiming in.  I feel much better now about uninstalling McAfee from my DAW and look forward to launching SONAR without disabling real time protection every time.
 
Best to all and Happy Valentines Day.  Remember, if your wife/girlfriend/partner tells you that Valentines Day doesn't mean anything to them…they're lying
 
Rob

@rcrees - just to be clear, on my computer, I NEVER have to disable Avast to run Sonar.  The only time I ever suspend it is if I am downloading a full release of Sonar, or when I do a Sonar install.
 
It does its thing quite nicely in the background, with Sonar just as happily doing its thing concurrently.
 
Bob Bone
 

Yep!

Apparently I got Avast just in time...I tried installing the paid version and my computer wouldn't install it. So I called Avast and they did a remote hookup to my computer and found a bunch of Windows problems. I did a system restore to a couple of days ago when the problems started surfacing....and that worked where I could install the paid Avast program....so now everything is working great. Apparently my computer was getting hacked again !!

There are various known unknowns when removing antivirus software, and known knowns.
A few months ago the manual was rewritten, most information is now out of date, see here:
http://youtu.be/bKgf5PaBzyg
 

If you'd like to check your Windows Reliability Monitor and graph, go to start button and search for Reliability History, it should come right up, and you can monitor your computer's performance from there.
 
According to the graph, it was very obvious when my computer started acting up....

The Avast program is reporting to me how many companies are trying to track me on each website I visit...
 
pretty spooky stuff.....