What is the bar level icon that appears in upper left corner of my Safari screen? Sometimes is green, sometimes grey - looks like a volume level icon. Started showing up about 3 weeks ago.

archived details here and here

Jody --

Isn't that why you got a Mac? To get away from the constant AV updates? I would not have it, or any other AV app on my Mac at this point. All it really does is slow down your Mac, and throw up false positives (PC viruses that don't affect Macs).

Glad to have you aboard, Jody.

😎

You don't really need to be paranoid... Just learn what the threats are and how to avoid them. See my Mac Malware Guide:

http://www.thesafemac.com/mmg

Note that Avast does have some issues, most notably a tendency for false positives. I'm constantly having to calm people down after Avast identifies some normal OS file as malware erroneously.

>>so in your experience, Avast helps me no more than what Apple internally provides for protection?

I'd say so, or less given any problems/false reports & a sense of 'my computer's protected'. Keep it updated incl Flash etc, avoid java where possible, don't open any downloads you don't trust and/or know how to remove or recover from via a backup.