anti-virus on sql server box?

hi!

i am using sql 2005 with sp1 standard edition.

i have a question regarding the antivirus software. Is it ok to install anti-virus software on the sql server box? what are the issues involved if we install anti-virus software on the sql server box?
I heard, it causes some performance and other issues.

Is there anything we need to take care of .if we decide to install anti-virus software on the sql server box?

Can anybody share experience on this?

Thanks

Personally, I am very much against installing anti-virus software on a SQL Server box, for performance reasons. You see conflicting advice from Microsoft about this. The Perf people say no, and the security people say yes. If you decide to run AV on your SQL Server, make sure to exclude the data and log files from the scanning.|||

Generally speaking, it is not a good idea to have anti-virus products on a SQL Server.

Consider that anti-virus products protect the computer from user activities in the Workstation service.

On a SQL Server, there 'should' not be any user activities in the Workstation service.

|||I disagree with the other posts here.

ALWAYS run anti-virus on ALL machines on the network, servers and pcs, with current virus defs.

On SQL server, exclude the data and log directories from the scanning and virus protection.

Many viruses will infect all machines on the entire network, and if you don't have AV on ALL machines, when you remove it from all your PCs, it will hide on your SQL server box until it infects the entire network again and again and again. I know because this has happened to me, with more than one customer who has the same "performance" concerns.
|||Yes, I agree with Tlom. There are several approaches, defined by the policy of the companies which way you can take if you secure SQL Server. You can either exclude the data file and directories or exclude the appropuiate MDF / LDF extensions (which assumes that you are using these extensions with your files) I prefer the extensions exclusion which will makes it even not possible to inject a virus in the data directories of SQL Server.

Jens K. Suessmeyer.

http://www.sqlserver2005.de

|||Thank you everyone for your replies. I really appreciate it.

So if you exclude the data and log files, are there any performance issues and other issues like communication/blocking etc ?

Thanks
|||

I hope this will help you:

Guidelines for choosing antivirus software to run on the computers that are running SQL Server

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/309422/en-us