The best way to protect ur com --- get ur system loaded with anti virus, anti spyware/adware...(u no those) and a firewall. with a small combo, rest assured ur chance of hitting a pandora box is like 1 out of 10000 times.LOL. juz try to beef up ur security.

Settings is depending on the AV. Normal settings for other AVs? No, you might be much mistaken. Their normal settings is also about the same as NOD32's settings. It is depending on whether you want to look it up and get used to the AV itself. From the look of it, you have used another AV, right?

dgtel2's Seoncd Option is one the best methods to test AVs. I do that also. Give it a try. If possible, disable your primary AV from loading in the first place. Then, NOD32 will run flawless.(At least)

updfiles is a folder for update files. If you ask me, I rather leave those files alone. Why disturb if they don't bite? Cheers.

No Piracy talk here.

Even if you use cracks, you don't have to announce it to the world. Forum RnR.

Cheers!

It will depend on your Updates Setting. Did you enable Update System/Core Files? if you didn't, it will not update it for you. You would need to do it manually.

Cheers!

n20nine, you are answered by bean_man.

Cheers!

Just a note to clear some dust:
I have used NOD32 AV for like 2 years. The only incident that has happened was NOD32 failed to detect Brontok.G, but Kaspersky picked it up.

We cannot say NOD32 is lousy. Why? Simply because it has an extremely small Viral Footprint. Compared to Kaspersky, Norton, AVG etc, they use Signature Based Detection, which in other words, Have a HUGE Viral Database.

NOD32 is so reliable all this while, simply because it has the Most Advanced YET Accurate Heuristics Engine.

Thus, I would recommend Having NOD32 as a MAIN/Primary AV, while having a Non-Intrusive AV as a Backup/Secondary AV.

Cheers!