A Must See pic --- Why you should buy a Mac

[Lacero]

Don't open "britney spears nude!!!.exe" off of LimeWire and you're probably in good shape.

Well guess what? You can get a virus just from viewing JPEG images. [peter griffin voice] Take that .exe!

 

[Heb1228]

In 3+ years of running OS X, I've had the same number of viruses and general malware problems as my parents have had running Windows machines: zero.

The horrors of malware on Windows PCs are, I'd say, greatly overstated for semi-knowledgable users. Don't open "britney spears nude!!!.exe" off of LimeWire and you're probably in good shape.

As a former semi-knowledgable Windows user, I'd say your parents have been lucky. I never got a virus, but thats because i was obsessive about keeping my AV up to date and I had to do weekly scans for Spyware, usually finding between 30-50 pieces from normal use.

And thats not to mention the victims of viruses like the Sasser worm and others who didn't have to do anything to get infected, just be connected to the internet.

 

[notjustjay]

The horrors of malware on Windows PCs are, I'd say, greatly overstated for semi-knowledgable users. Don't open "britney spears nude!!!.exe" off of LimeWire and you're probably in good shape.

This was true maybe 5 years ago, and was the reason why I *never* worried about Windows viruses -- I knew I was smart enough not to do anything stupid to get myself infected. I remember getting dozens of copies of ILOVEYOU in my mailbox at work; why everyone was foolish enough to open it was beyond me.

NIMDA was my first Windows virus hit, when it got the whole company almost all at once. No attachments to open or any user action at all -- if you were on the network, you were hit. I remember almost the instant it happened -- my machine began grinding to a halt immediately.

Nowadays I've heard that an unprotected Windows machine would last about 5 minutes on the internet before a vulnerability gets exploited and the machine becomes infected -- all without the user doing anything at all.

Luckily I switched to the Mac before any of that started happening.

 

[KingSleaze]

How many millions .........?

So exactly how many millions of processors out there does it take to attract the attention of "hacker/s" intent on making a name for themselves by being the one to write a virus? Or should that be 'millions of users of an operating system'?
(I still fail to see how a different processor running Windows is more secure than another. A software virus is attacking the software of the operating system and/or applications)

 

[Chaszmyr]

70,000 Windows viruses, 0 OSX viruses.

Lets just say OSX got a virus... That would be... 0.001429% of viruses, I believe.

 

[matticus008]

(I still fail to see how a different processor running Windows is more secure than another. A software virus is attacking the software of the operating system and/or applications)

Some processors (mostly AMD, but some Intel ones now, too) stop certain kinds of viruses because of how they hijack programs. The NX bit prevents some kinds of overflow vulnerabilities from being exploited by viruses by refusing to execute code coming from such an overflow. The CPU can stop software pretty easily, considering all software is really just instructions for the CPU and system components, and if the CPU ignores the command, the virus is not executed and the system is therefore not infected.

In a more or less accurate nutshell, that's how some processors fare better than others. Of course, these CPUs aren't immune to all viruses...just some. But making any dent in 70,000+ is a step in the right direction.

 

[weg]

More like 4% marketshare...zero viruses.

What about Word macro viruses? Ain't they perfectly portable? ;-)

 

[solvs]

come on dood... come up with a fairly reasonable arguement.. if you can....

There are thousands of viruses for Windows. Create one and you are just another script kiddie, even if you cause some damage. But there are plenty of smug Mac users out there that don't even protect their systems. If you could create a virus for OS X, all it would take is for a few machines to get infected, and you would immediately gain the notoriety of being the first person to ever infect a modern Mac (OS 9 excluded... which BTW did have viruses, so your entire argument goes right out the window). There are no such viruses.

Not saying there never could be, but it would take a lot more than 1 to match the percentage of Macs actually in use (marketshare notwithstanding). That point was already proven above "dood" in post #19 by the same guy who's statement you called moronic.

BTW, ignorant is not an insult. Moronic is. 4.5% marketshare, 0% viruses.