PCMag review

[Rickster100]

Hello,

Just come across an article from Pc Mag via a posting at Broadband Reports Forum http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759...079TX1K0000992. Anyone have any thoughts? Personally I think ewido 4.0 is an exceptional product and it would take more than one lacklustre review for me to consider changing.

Richie

[L Bainbridge]

Never been that impressed with PCmag's reviews- they always seem to favor products I and many others have found distinctly lacklustre over the years.
Never sure whether their reviews are truely 'impartial' if you know what I mean.
As regards Ewido 4 its a fantastic product and a quantum leap on from Ewido 3 (which was already pretty good).
I'm not sure its directly comparable with Spyware Doctor or Spysweeper as it also has far superior anti-trojan detection than either of those 2.
I use in combo with NOD32 and SpySweeper and it has caught a couple of minor nasties that were missed by SpySweeper.

[zapjb]

Stopped using Ewido some months ago, maybe over a year. Just like most realtime anti-trojain, as & malware. It would from time to time lock up my computer. And Ewido has further behavior that is also unacceptable to me. When run ondemand it has services running. That's BS & arrogant of Ewido.

But anyways I've found a solution for myself. But of course theres a sight imperfection. It has had a couple fp's. But they were easy to recognize & corrected the next update. But no system lockups.

[Rainwalker]

Originally Posted by Rickster100

Hello,

Just come across an article from Pc Mag via a posting at Broadband Reports Forum http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759...079TX1K0000992. Anyone have any thoughts? Personally I think ewido 4.0 is an exceptional product and it would take more than one lacklustre review for me to consider changing.

Richie

Thanks for the info Rickster

[Rickster100]

Originally Posted by L Bainbridge

Never been that impressed with PCmag's reviews- they always seem to favor products I and many others have found distinctly lacklustre over the years. Never sure whether their reviews are truely 'impartial' if you know what I mean.

Yes ive also heard that Pc Mags reviews can be a little "haphazard" at times, from experience its usually better to look at other reviews before making a decision or whether its good or bad. Im a big fan of Avast! and I remember there was a big forore on the Avast Forum about a review they did. Turned out that the "testing" they did was not as thorough or impartial as first thought...

I have always viewed Ewido as a TROJAN scanner to COMPLIMENT my existing spyware and antivirus apps. So I dont think it was too fair of them to compare it with the likes of Spyware Doctor etc which are didicated spyware apps. I wonder how Spysweeper would compare with Ewido in terms of Trojan dectection? So you see i dont think this is a fair comparison of products which IMHO do different things.

But what I dont agree with is Ewido changing it from Anti-Malware to Anti-Spyware. That leads to misunderstandings of what Ewido actually does. To me it will always be an Anti-Trojan application.

Anyway, any other comments welcome here.

Richie

[CloneRanger]

The software is called anti-spyware so i would have expected it to cover a large proportion of different threats which it missed in this review

I've pulled a few observations from the review to demonstrate some of the areas they found it weak and failing in

ewido anti-spyware 4.0 REVIEW DATE: 07.25.06

Grisoft's ewido anti-spyware 4.0 costs the same as programs that do a much better job. Some recommend using the scan-only free version as a second opinion, but it flopped in my tests.

Version 4.0 is the first post-acquisition release. But although it has a new user interface and a number of added features, I just can't recommend it while there are other apps that cost the same and do a much better job.

But then I subjected it to my usual torture testing, with abysmal results. It never requested a restart to complete spyware removal, but in a number of cases it blandly reported error while quarantining without suggesting any remedy. Grisoft admits the current product is not geared to handling keyloggers, and indeed, out of eight commercial keyloggers in my test set, ewido completely missed four and recognized but failed to remove three others. And while it does a dandy job of detecting spyware, recognizing 15 of my 16 spyware samples, it successfully removed just four of those. It left behind executable files and other significant traces of the rest. Some allegedly removed threats showed up as running processes in Task Manager. Others continued blithely popping up unwanted advertising windows, even after ewido had supposedly quarantined them. Not good!

[nameless]

Originally Posted by Rickster100

I dont think it was too fair of them to compare it with the likes of Spyware Doctor etc which are didicated spyware apps.

The name is ewido anti-spyware, so it is perfectly fitting that it be directly compared to existing anti-spyware applications. The software should be judged by how it's marketed, not by how it's perceived to function by a user who has used it for a long time and who has learned what its weaknesses are. If ewido can't stand up against other anti-spyware software, they shouldn't bill it as they do.

Can you imagine it being otherwise? Imagine Neil Rubenking's review: "Ewido anti-spyware missed many of my spyware samples, but I still heartily recommend it, since it will always be an 'anti-trojan' in my heart of hearts."

I've always liked Neil Rubenking's work, and while I almost never completely trust any review, I do trust this one. I'm also very disappointed in ewido.

[JerryM]

While I consider Ewido an AT, if it is marketed as anti-spyware it is legitimate to test and compare it with dedicated AS applications, such as Spysweeper, SuperAntiSpyware, Counterspy, and Spyware Doctor.

I suspect that each of those would outperform Ewido as an anti-spyware. I admit disappointment at its failure in the area of keyloggers. Spyware Doctor and Spysweeper were much better, at least from a cursory reading of the tests results.

If I did not have Ewido I might not consider buying it after reading that test.

I would like to see how a-squared 2.0 would compare, and of course SuperAntiSpyware.

If one uses an AV like Kaspersky, I do not think an AT would add anything to real world security.

Jerry

[CJsDad]

Stopped using Ewido because I wanted to use it as an on demand scanner but task manager and Process Explorer always showed a service from Ewido running in the background.

[Rickster100]

Originally Posted by Rickster100

But what I dont agree with is Ewido changing it from Anti-Malware to Anti-Spyware. That leads to misunderstandings of what Ewido actually does. To me it will always be an Anti-Trojan application.

This is the first review I have seen which directly compares Ewido with other well known and respected spyware apps. Others are sure to follow over the next few months. Many users here will have purchased Ewido for its ANTI-TROJAN capabilities (like myself). In the past, when compared with other anti-trojan apps it has always performed well in other reviews. IMHO this indictates to me that Grisoft branding Ewido as "Anti-Spyware" (at this stage) is premature at best. NOTE: This is only my opinion.

Originally Posted by JerryM

While I consider Ewido an AT, if it is marketed as anti-spyware it is legitimate to test and compare it with dedicated AS applications, such as Spysweeper, SuperAntiSpyware, Counterspy, and Spyware Doctor.

If Grisoft want to market Ewido as a good spyware app they may have to raise their game. If that is the case and this is what Grisoft are wanting to do then interesting times are ahead for fans of Ewido. They will have to work very hard to get people to change their views about Ewido being more than an just an Anti-Trojan app. Doing a web search on anti-trojan apps brings up Ewido along with other well known anti-trojan apps like BoClean, A Squared etc so they might have a lot of work to do to convince others of Ewidos AS capabilities in future.

Originally Posted by nameless

The name is ewido anti-spyware, so it is perfectly fitting that it be directly compared to existing anti-spyware applications. The software should be judged by how it's marketed, not by how it's perceived to function by a user who has used it for a long time and who has learned what its weaknesses are. If ewido can't stand up against other anti-spyware software, they shouldn't bill it as they do.

We have all seen here on the forum that Grisoft have worked very hard to improve things from version 3.5 to 4.0. Now they may have to put more work into developing Ewido in terms of spyware detection and up against very established names such as Spysweeper, Counterspy, Spyware Doctor thats not going to be an easy task. You just have to look at the background of the 2 companies here to perhaps explain the "poor" results here. They have come from an anti-virus background (Grisoft) and anti-trojan background (Ewido). Anti-spyware detection is a new direction for this company so I guess they can only but improve on things AS in future releases.

Although this thread seems a little negative against Ewido I have nothing but great respect for the guys at Grisoft for all the work they have done over the least few months and their dedication to answer questions and resolve user issues here is second to none. I have been a very happy user of Ewido 3.5 and 4.0 for a long time now in terms of Anti-Trojan capabilities. The review at Pc Mag did raise a few eyebrows with me and I think this makes for an interesting debate hence my original posting. I am not forgetting that this is only ONE REVIEW so others may lean more fovourably towards Ewido in future. It would also be interesting to hear from the Ewido guys about this thread and see what their views about the Pc mag review are.

Thanks to everyone who has responded so far.

Richie

[rdsu]

They change the program name, now they will suffer the consequences...

[GWA]

Originally Posted by CJsDad

Stopped using Ewido because I wanted to use it as an on demand scanner but task manager and Process Explorer always showed a service from Ewido running in the background.

Since I'm not a moderator and can not break out this comment, I'll respond here. I simply went to Services, stopped the ewido anti-spyware (guard) service and changed it from Automatic to Manual. It no longer starts, but could easily be changed back to Automatic later.

[CJsDad]

Originally Posted by GWA

Since I'm not a moderator and can not break out this comment, I'll respond here. I simply went to Services, stopped the ewido anti-spyware (guard) service and changed it from Automatic to Manual. It no longer starts, but could easily be changed back to Automatic later.

When I say I stopped using Ewido I'm talking about the 3.5 version.
I know how to stop the guard from running, nothing new, did it with their last version but why should I have to go through that in order to start it and shut it down every time I want to run a scan?
I used 4.0 for about a day on another PC, didn't see anything that was worth me keeping it on the other computer and removed it.
Doesn't matter anyway, with KAV and BOClean running on my computer I seriously doubt I need Ewido.

[zapjb]

I agree. It's somewhere from ineptitude through arrogance by Ewido/Grisoft. To have a process from Ewido running in the background when used as an on demand scanner.

[Edwin024]

SUPERAntiSpyware say they really destroy the baddies on your system when found. Ewido doersn't, that much is clear. At my PC they found no more than a few harmless cookies. SUPER is doing far better!

[Don Pelotas]

Originally Posted by Edwin024

SUPERAntiSpyware say they really destroy the baddies on your system when found. Ewido doersn't, that much is clear. At my PC they found no more than a few harmless cookies. SUPER is doing far better!

Edwin, how about you actually prove that blanket statement?

No one actually knows at this point if SUPERAntiSpyware is even close to being able to live up to their claims, it's one of many of these types of programs, most of them is mediocre & a waste of your pc's resources and SAS may turn out to be exactly that.................... i have the free version installed btw, i wouldn't even dream of buying it untill it has somehow shown itself to live up to the claims of detecting/removing the heavy stuff, so far it has only removed cookies on my pc, which of course proves as little as your statement does...........because my pc is clean and maybe yours is/was too, you can't exactly blame a program for not removing something...........that is not there in the first place.

[JerryM]

I agree that it remains to be proven how good SAS really is.

I am impressed with the support and how well it runs on my systems. However, I am taking it on "faith" and support instead of independent test results.

I eagerly await test results. I'm not sure when we will see such.

Regards,
Jerry

[robinb]

I have used spyware doctor for 2 years and pc magazine rates it as the best sypware removal program. Well guess what! 3months ago it did a update and everything went haywire on my computer and on 4 of my clients computers. Wierd things started to happen- I lost sound on one computer, 2 clients of mine could not login to windows xp, one when trying to log off to his wife's account, the computer locked up so bad the only way to shut it down was to push the button. I removed spyware doctor and all problems went away. another major problem with spyware doctor is it takes Forever to load at startup. Everything loads and finally after 2min or so the icon pops on.
I emailed the company- no telephone support only email and they made every excuse in the book for this one but could not come up with a solution.
And here it is said that Spyware Doctor has the highest ratings. Sometimes companies that test these products have nothing on their computers but the Operating System and nothing else and have no idea what it is going to interfere with- duh!
So you cannot believe everything you read.
robin

[rdsu]

Originally Posted by robinb

So you cannot believe everything you read.
robin

Like me...

Almost the reviews aren't completely well made, but since they changed the name to "AntiSpyware", now their program will be compared with others AntiSpyware programs.
The problem is that ewido is more an AntiMalware than an AntiSpyware, so it will loose almost comparisons with other programs on this area...

[strangequark]

Like others on this thread I purchased Ewido primarily as a trojan scanner after TDS went under, I also purchased Boclean shortly after. I will probably not be renewing my ewido licence as, in my opinion, Boclean does a much better job in this area. As for the spyware, malware or call it what you want ware, there are other free apps out there that do an excellent job. Another reason for my turn around is that, again in my opinion or experience, ewido has had a false positive rate a bit higher than I would like, nothing as bad as wasting time chasing those wild geese around. I will probably still use the free version as a back up mainly for it's on demand scan ability.

[aigle]

I don,t expect Ewido to be great in spyware detection as it,s new in this area and I still hope thay will improve. But I guess, for any product, if it fails to improve over a considerable period of time, it might not improve ober the rest of its life unless some major change happens in the company itself.
Let,s see how Ewido goes in the long run.

[WSFuser]

Originally Posted by CJsDad

Stopped using Ewido because I wanted to use it as an on demand scanner but task manager and Process Explorer always showed a service from Ewido running in the background.

u can still run ewido (on-demand) with the service disabled. for version 4 anyways.

[aigle]

Is there a link for the whole comparative testing/ article by PC mag. I can,t find it.

[Edwin024]

Aigle: before Ewdio was named antimalware, the name was already Ewido Anti Spyware. With that in mind the test record is a breaker, isn't it.

Other threads here show too that Ewido just doesn't do the job either. And than Peter sends me a PM...pfuh.

[aigle]

i think it,s still early to decide.