Quote:
Originally Posted by eschwartz
Well, I am now typing this from my laptop with Arch Linux installed. (Woohoo!) But I still have XP as a dual boot option. I use it mainly for ADE, but at first I was still using it for browsing (while preparing Arch) and nothing happened to me.
This was after I stripped it down to clear space. One of the first things to go was the antivirus (AVG) as they tend to be on the large side. Update databse and stuff was hiding in All Users\APPDATA and was about 500 MB right there. 
Yes I know you should always have an antivirus. But honestly I am a pretty safe browser (#1 rule is don't be stupid, antivirus waits till #2) and I could always fall back on Arch, so... I didn't really care. But the good news is, I was fine.
I honestly think malware is far more likely to be blocked by basic internet safety + antivirus (and fortunately #2 is widespread enough to make up for the lack of #1) than by which OS you have. Once the malware is running on your computer (having gotten past that first line of defense) Win7/8 is not a significant advantage over WinXP. Either way, you are asking to become toast.
The most important thing is, that critical applications seem to remain WinVersion-agnostic. And MS only provides the OS framework and, if you are stupid, the browser.
FF/Chrome + antivirus pretty much blocks the main attack vectors. |
Yup on most things, I happen to think that IE is one of the better browsers however.