In Windows I was doing almost more antivirus, firewall and registry clean stuff instead of really using it.
If you really have done that, I don't doubt you did, you never understood Windows (or TCP/IP, or whatever).
For a lean and powerful antivirus & firewall solution just use brain 1.0.
And if you don't install Norton's malware in the first place, there is no need to clean it from the registry afterwards :>
Oh, and btw: There is no real need to clean it from the registry anyways, it's an indexed database, it doesn't really gain speed from using lamer tools like TuneUp Utilities & Co.
But I have to agree in one point:
One of the negative aspects of software everybody can use (to some degree) is also that everybody feels appointed to give advice ... e.g. to suggest installing Norton crapware and/or using TuneUp and shit like that.
I don't need that any more using Linux (okay, this may be just there are none/less viruses for Linux but I don't mind 
). A lot of software I needed to search on the internet with the potential risk of getting viruses or bloat-ware. In Linux I just use the package manager and I know the software is from a trusted source.
Where from do you know?
A user on the entry level of knowledge like you - else you wouldn't have wasted your time with Norton Insecurity, TuneUp & Co. - would happily also perform
rpm -ivh http://mirror.us.leaseweb.net/epel/6/i386/epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm
on CentOS if instructed to.
This one doesn't do any harm, it "just" adds a repo. But which repo did it add?
Now what if I take "epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm", modify it a bit to also add my repo of badware and reupload it somehere else, so that it can be downloaded this way
rpm -ivh http://mirror.us.leaseweb.net.mylinux.cn/epel/6/i386/epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm
Would you notice?
For Linux absolutely the same applies as for Windows:
Get your software from trusted sources only. But whom can you trust?
I bet average joe is can more easily tell that
https://www.transmissionbt.com/inside his browser address bar is more trustworthy than
https://www.transmissionbt.co.cn/than if the epel repo (For wich transmission is an example you need that repo for on CentOS) gets added from a strange source hidden inside one of those endingless command lines.
The difference:
When I download the VLC player from
http://www.videolan.org/I not also get the legit version but also a decently current version.
When you download the VLC player using
apt-get install vlc
or
yum install vlc
or whatever, it's probably (Unless you added not-so-trustworthy repos) also from a trusted source, but it's most likely also completely outdated.
We had the VLC dilemma inside the transcoding problem thread some months ago:
The repos deliver you whatever version THEY deem fit for you and for vlc this is a version which doesn't even handle streams right.
On Windows I download exactly the version from the vendor - which is as trustworthy, if not more, as the Linux distro repo maintainer - which
I deem fit ... and that will be a version which works with streams.
If you aren't happy with transmission 2.13 from epel (current is 2.84 or so) or vlc-outdated you will end up compiling them yourself.
Everyone who has ever compiled something more complex than inadyn-mt himself, knows that this task can easily become weekend-filling.
The theory is
./configure
make
make install
but the practice is
./configure
{Fulfill dependencies}
./configure
{Fulfill more dependencies}
./configure
{Fulfill more dependencies}
make
{Find a way through libhell}
make
{Find a different way through libhell}
make
{Find another different way through libhell}
...
make
...
and MAYBE finally
make install
That is the way it works, when it works out really good.
If it didnt work that well, you end without the program you wanted to compile and a mess of libs incompatible with the rest of the OS.
This hasn't changed trough the last decades to the slightest.
99% of all criticism on Windows by Linux nerds however is still based on Windows 95 knowledge and absolutely outdated.
On of the points for examle was that you can not compile yourself (for free) on Windows.
a.) No plain or average user wants to
b.) Microsoft offers free Visual Studio versions since ages.
You can not judge Windows based on WinDOS 3.95 from 1995.
I don't judge Linux based on SuSE Linux 4.4 either.
The problem is: Linux really has
not changed since in any serious point.
One for example still can't really work with the GUI. You still can't simply drag anything onto the GUI and expect it gets executed when you click or double-click it. At least not if you also want to append params to it or invoke it as a different user and thus would need to prepend "su <someone>" to its invokation.
Oh and btw:
Which idiot at Ubuntu came up with the idea of putting
two icons "Reboot" and "Shutdown" into their "Unity" menu bar when both effectively call the
same dialog in which you have to chose "Reboot, Shutdown or Cancel" again?
If my rabbits could tell it's plain unlogical, why can't Linux devs see that?
And another important issue for me: when writing software I want access to my computer and do things the way I want to.
And that's why I use Windows.
When I want to do something, I just install the program that does it best.
E.g. in order to cut Enigma2 .ts files, I just install TS Doctor and start cutting them 5 minutes later.
What would I need to do on Linux? Should I even dare to ask?
