What is the Best Anti-Virus Availible?

[Under0ath]

My subscription to Norton Anti-Virus is due to expire very soon. I was wondering what a better anti-virus program is, because Norton, in my opinion bites. Also, McAfee bites too :P

I have read about other programs such as:
BitDefender
Panda Titanium Antivirus
TrendMicro

And several others.

Just want to know which in everyone's opinion is the best?

[tazdevl]

Run a search, this is one of the most commonly asked questions.

[Infinity]

there is no such thing as the best Antivirus, nor can you say this for a firewall or antispyware app, or whatever.

it depends on quite some things and for everybody this is a personal opinion. the best you can do is to trial some antivirusses (not all at the same time :D) but make a image first you can undo the installs if you wish to uninstall.
I have nod32 on my system and I am quite pleased with it. but for the same money another member doesn't like it...you gotta feel good with your av...and you gotta feel secure...

it is your choice. tell us how you go

Inf.

[Blackspear]

This sort of question can lead to a flame war. It is no different than asking which car is better when comparing two rival family size sedans. Saying one is better than the other is relative to what your purpose for it is. One car may get to the line first today, and the other might get there first tomorrow, both have a function of getting from A to B, some come with more features than others, others use less resources etc etc, and we all have our own preferences as to what we like. Yes there are some major differences between some products, but on a whole there is a majority of fine software available that performs very well. As such, you are better of taking a look at a few websites such as:

http://www.virusbtn.com/vb100/about/index.xml

and

http://www.av-comparatives.org/

And then from there I would download and try a few to see what you like.

On an overall general security approach I would suggest that you may want to take a look here (http://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=45284&page=1&pp=25) for further discussion on security and how to make your system that much stronger and here (http://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=43117) for more.

Hope this helps…

Cheers ;D

[Under0ath]

I was just curious, in everyone's extensive anti-virus/anti-spyware/anti-wife-not-making-you-a-sandwich trials, what everyones opinion on each was (i.e sucks at updating, long boring scan time, etc.)

[webyourbusiness]

{QUOTE-> My subscription to Norton Anti-Virus is due to expire very soon. I was wondering what a better anti-virus program is, because Norton, in my opinion bites. Also, McAfee bites too :P

I have read about other programs such as:
BitDefender
Panda Titanium Antivirus
TrendMicro

And several others.

Just want to know which in everyone's opinion is the best? <-QUOTE}


what are YOUR criteria for deciding on "best"?

My criteria left only one decent choice - NOD32 - and we went overboard, becoming resellers (as several others here in the forums are) - so you can take what I say with a pinch of salt if you like. You really need to have an idea of what would make one product better than another...

Some of my criteria were:

(not in any particular order or guaranteed to be all the criteria we used to decide)...

1. be able to run my own update server in-house
2. be able to get reports on what virus activity occured on my staff's computers
3. be able to be STOP the staff from turning off the AV protection
4. be fast
5. be light (not a resource hog)
6. be affordable

Now, I don't suggest that NOD32 is ONLY AV solution to meet these criteria - and your idea of affordable might be more or less money than mine - but I found a match in NOD32 for our company.
As I said - you need to make a list of criteria to judge these tools against one another - and then perhaps download trials and install them for a while?

I would suggest that if you have at least the last 3 out of the list we had - then you might look at NOD32, Panda, KAV and AVG.

If you have enterprise concerns, I think you only have one choice... but that's only MY OPINION!

I hope this helps you....

regards

Greg Hewitt-Long

[Infinity]

it is just that Wilders is getting full of this what is best or what is worse. you should get a good idea if you search the Antivirus area and quickly you will see what the good things and bad things are about the AV's. and then again: it is just an opinion...might not be adressed to you.

what are you looking for yourself? what do you find important on an AV? that would be more interesting I guess and should lead to a more suiteable answer.

have a nice eve.

[jlo]

Hi,

Well as the others said there is no best.

All the following would offer good protection and quick updates against virus outbreaks.

1) Kaspersky AV (or F-secure, Gdata, AVK, Escan which all share the Kasperky engine) I use F-secure myself. Very good detection and very regular updates.

2) Nod 32 (good detection and great Heuristics)

3) Dr Web (Good detection, lots of small updates and good heuristics)

4) Bitdefender (Fairly regular updates and good Heuristics)

Out of the free ones

AVG and Avast seem reasonable and small updates.

Antivir very good heuristics but big update files (1.5mb) do not for those on dial up.

Just my opion and I know there are lots of other good products out there. Download a trial and test one and make up your own mind.

Cheers

Jlo

[Under0ath]

{QUOTE->

1. be able to run my own update server in-house
2. be able to get reports on what virus activity occured on my staff's computers
3. be able to be STOP the staff from turning off the AV protection
4. be fast
5. be light (not a resource hog)
6. be affordable
<-QUOTE}

Thank you VERY much for your imput, i greatly appriciate it.

I have similar criteria as you, however, instead of Staff members, Family Members.

I am looking for a User-Friendly AV and one that is simple to use, not with all these unecessary things installed with them.

[Blackspear]

{QUOTE-> I was just curious, in everyone's extensive anti-virus/anti-spyware/anti-wife-not-making-you-a-sandwich trials, what everyones opinion on each was (i.e sucks at updating, long boring scan time, etc.) <-QUOTE}That’s ok, this further explanation to your question alters what you were actually looking for in an answer, and as such you should get some varied answers to the usual…

By the way, welcome to Wilders ;D

All the best.

Cheers ;D

[Blackspear]

{QUOTE-> I am looking for a User-Friendly AV and one that is simple to use, not with all these unecessary things installed with them. <-QUOTE}Then Nod32 should be taken into consideration, they have a 30 day trial available here: www.nod32.com

I have made a step by step tutorial on extra settings for those wanting to “Tweak” it up a bit, here: http://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=37509

Hope this helps…

Cheers ;D

[Under0ath]

{QUOTE->
Hope this helps…

Cheers ;D <-QUOTE}

Ahh it Helps muchly, Thank you for your imput

[Blackspear]

{QUOTE-> Thank you for your imput <-QUOTE}My pleasure, any questions post away...

Cheers ;D

[ninja_style]

{QUOTE-> My pleasure, any questions post away...

Cheers ;D <-QUOTE}
thanks man, that helped me alot as well, really appreciated!

[Diver]

It is really hard to say what the best antivirus is because there are so many criteria for selection. You will hear about NOD32 a lot around here because their support forum is on this board. It is definitely one of the better ones. Another one of my favorites is Kaspersky which is generally considered the champ at finding the baddies. If you have an old computer, try F-Prot becaus it uses less memory than any other AV yet has very good detection. I can't say that I am wild about Norton, but it is the most widely used and it does well on VB100. A lot of the "talking heads" (magazine writers etc.) are jumping on the bandwagon for Trend Micro because it includes a firewall and free support.

[richrf]

I switched from Norton to KAV 4.5.104 (with extended database) because of KAV's extensive coverage of both viruses and trojans. I run NOD32 for backup on-demand scans becuase of NOD32's heuristics capabilities (it is a fine AV on its on-right).

KAV 4.5.104 is user friendly in that it catches lots of nasties before they can infect (there is nothing more unfriendly than an actual virus infection). I had lots of problems with the new 5 version so I stayed away from it, despite its improved user interface.

Before I chose, I listened to the recommendations of members of this forum and did take a peek at http://virusscan.jotti.dhs.org/ once in a while to see how different online scan engines were doing in real-life situations.

Hope this helps.

Rich

[nadirah]

There is no such thing as a BEST anti-virus out there. Just choose one that suits your needs the most.

[nameless]

Nonsense. There is a best anti-virus solution. Abstinence. :)
-

[Blackspear]

{QUOTE-> Nonsense. There is a best anti-virus solution. Abstinence. :)
- <-QUOTE}LOL, gotta have a sense of humor ;D ;D ;D

[izi]

Hello!


KAV is the best AV!!!
Under0ath, try KAV 4.5 (ftp://ftp.kaspersky.ru/products/release/english/homeuser/kavpersonal4.5/) with extended database (http://www.kaspersky.com/extraavupdates?chapter=146235718).
If you have KAV you don't need any other software for adware, trojans etc.

izi

[Starrob]

KAV can be beaten just like every AV or AT scanner can be beaten. It sometimes helps to have several different scanners to catch what the other misses but even that is no guarantee. Each day there is malware introduced that no scanner picks up at all.

It is best to supplement defenses with alternative defenses like PG, SSM, PREVX, RegRun or the many other products out there that defend against attacks that may not be picked up by scanners.


Starrob


{QUOTE-> Hello!


KAV is the best AV!!!
Under0ath, try KAV 4.5 (ftp://ftp.kaspersky.ru/products/release/english/homeuser/kavpersonal4.5/) with extended database (http://www.kaspersky.com/extraavupdates?chapter=146235718).
If you have KAV you don't need any other software for adware, trojans etc.

izi <-QUOTE}