Hi,
Norton used to be good but now i personally feel that its a waste of space, its a memory hog and does not detect as much malicious code as it used to.
For the best free anti virus i use
AVG Free, for premium use
Nod32 which i use and its excellent.
Fore spyware removal, adware and any other form of malicious code i use,
adaware se,
spybot s&d &
a-squared free.
I also use a program called
ccleaner which hels to speed up your pc.
Oh, and whoever told you that adaware & spybot are not very goods apps, is insane, they are the best apps i have used and i have been using computers for 10 yrs now.