read all of it before attempting to chew me out
I don't understand the big deal with Hijackthis. The only difference is that you can read the list and choose manually what may look suspicious to you.
Why choose something that requires manual intervention and researching(in which sometimes you -simply- cant find and understand everything), when adware/spybot have the ability to preform the -exact- same tasks without 2-3 page long lists, as well as describing what each process, violation, spyware, adware, and infection does, as well as where to read up more on it.
To me it's quite similar to pulling a cart yourself, rather than using an automobile.
So it can't be about choice, because spybot/adaware both give you the detailed information as well as the choice to remove or not remove. It can't be about features, because I've compared the programs and so far hijackthis seems to be nothing new or inventive to further -prevention- and -detection-, both being primary things users need to get rid of spyware. Who wants to read up about what process might be real, what process might be fake, but has the same name, what hijack is real or blah blah blah when they are still sitting on an infected computer?
Get the jod -done- while learning about what has infected you. Spyware/adaware detects, prevents, explains, and teaches users. Bah to hijack this.
edit:
I'm not done. One of the largest things that gets me about people recommending hijack this as if it was the all empowering fix-it tool, is that this is what you get when people use hijack this:
"Can you review my log file?"
"see anything odd in my log file?"
".. blahlog file?"
"...blah log file?"
"...blah the log file?"
So in essence, people go out and google all the listings on the log to find out about the processes. This is something that has already been done, people. Adaware/spybot has already gathered up the information, and that combined amount of information per process and program has surpassed 30,000. Do you know 30,000 off the top of your head? In fact, could you google all 30,000 in the time it would take spybot and adaware to discover them, show you the information, and then remove them?
Recommending hijack this to everyone on the face of the earth not only drives IT's mad (we don't have time to research each and every process, sorry), but is a step back in program usability. Surely you have better time (and bandwidth for those LARGE log files) you could use scanning and letting the research of companies that not only receive massive donations for their hardwork, but get paid on a regular basis to make sure their products are updated near daily to keep up with 1-day (what I call it when one day has passed after discovery) adwares and spywares.