Okay, here's the background. We have a couple of older PCs here that are not "ours," they are built into the presses we run in our shop. These are not joined to our domain and are not actively connected to the network in anyway. We do occasionally have to connect them for internet access when we need remote access for the manufacturer. The problem is, on the two oldest machines, they have no option to install antivirus. I have told the manufacturer that if they want these computers to ever hit the internet, they have to have AV. Their response is for us to put them in a DMZ but that would require some new equipment due to the distances involved and the current infrastructure. That also doesn't really address the virus issue, I don't want these computers compromised regardless of whether or not they are on my internal network.
So, down to the question. Does anybody know of or use/recommend an option to run active anti-virus from a flash drive? I'm not talking about a way to remove viruses, but actual, real time threat protection. Is there any such thing? I cannot simply install an option for 2 reasons, the computers run XP Embedded, which I can get around, but that would really piss off the manufacturer since they have told me it will cause issues with their software. Also, the software running is very resource heavy on an older machine, AV will kill it, so they tell me.
Bottom line, in the very few instances where I have to put these on line, is there any way to run AV from a flash drive for the short amount of time they're online?