A Shitty Poem for a Shitty Company:
Damn you to hell Symantec. 
I used to love you, but now I’m jilted. 
Your SAV had me going for years,
Reliable, a workhorse you were.
Now you are a beheamoth,
and your products suck ass.
Endpoint Security is a joke,
and so is your virus protection.
If I continue to be yours,
I will have a full head of gray.

About a year ago I migrated our firm to Symantec Endpoint Security (the first release, RTM) from SAV 10.  It has been nothing but a complete fiasco.  I’m pretty good at this stuff and had deployed many, many SAV systems previously.  When I initially installed SEP (initial release) I had high hopes.  These hopes were immediately dashed with countless problems that took weeks to get fully straightened out.  Although I “know” the product much better now and have less problems with it, I still hate it with a passion for the following reasons:

• beta-level software billed as “production” - buggy as hell
• bloated administration interface (good concept, terrible execution)
• anti-virus that DOESN’T WORK half the time (ask me about infections that WHIZZED right by SEP - like the CNN spam sourced Windows XP Antivirus virus/malware)
• constant maintenance releases/bug fixes.  99% of the time these upgrades cause major issues.. and there’s one every couple of months.  RTM-MR1-MR2-MR3–blah
• 50-80 minutes on hold to get to tech support
• recurring issues with LiveUpdate, random definition distrubition
• huge footprint, slows endpoints down considerably compared to SAV
• firewall is completely problematic - I don’t even use it
• 15 GB server disk footprint.  I have 50 workstations and a 10 GB SEP embedded management database - that’s 200 mb per workstation!  WTF?! 
• i could go on…

With that said, all our SEP products (including Symantec Mail Security which I have less of a problem with) will be expiring in March of 2009.  I’m probably moving to AVG.  Can’t say I’d recommend any of Symantec’s products, maybe with the exception of Backup Exec.

It’s 2:45, September 26th and I’m traveling North on the 405 near the Sunset Blvd. exit in my Porsche, doing my guaranteed-to-suck Friday commute home at a brisk 0-20 MPH in heavy traffic.  I’m in the #3 lane and there’s a newish Audi S8 in front of me, I’m a good car or two car distances from him.  All of a sudden I see this Audi shutter, but don’t think anything of it - god knows the 405 is littered with potholes.  Then I saw a lady in the passenger seat look behind the car at me and again I thought nothing of it.  This Audi then proceeded to start going very very slow, so I go to the #2 lane to pass him thinking “WTF is wrong with this guy?!”.  I’m blaring Metro Station in a total “commuting zone”.  I see that he’s pacing me on the right, so I look over and the dude in the Audi is making a hand gesture for me to pull over (again I’m like, “WTF?!”).  I turn down the music and hear him say, “you hit me, pull over.”  I replied, “I didn’t hit you!”  He then insists I hit him and tells me I need to pull over.  I proceed to exit at the Moraga exit following Sunset and pull into the gas station.  

My head was immediately clouded with negative thoughts like “how did I hit this guy and not even realize it?”, “how the fuck am I going to pay for this!” or the “I need to cut down on my drinking!”   We pull into the Chevron off the exit.  I grab my wallet and insurance info and proceed to exit my car and he is parked right behind me. I immediately go examine my front bumper for “damage”.  What do I find: nada, jack shit - I look at his bumper with him and find no damage, just a McCain 08 sticker. 

I should have told this old douchebag with his trophy Pinay mail-order bride that he was a complete ass.  Instead he thanked me for pulling over and I went about my commute in utter fucking astonishment.  God I hate the 405!