Bitdefender Std 8 Antivirus

I wanted to share my comments and independent evaluation on Bitfefender Standard 8 Antivirus Software. The following I have tested on my pc.
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"Bitdefender Standard 8 Evaluation"

"INSTALLATION'
Installation went smoothed with no problems, the installation wizard guides you through the process of installing Bitdefender. After reboot resources were at 84% which is good. Email configuration for scanning is atomatically set up and configured by default so there is no need to set this feature up. One very interesting feature after installation is "file zone".

''FILE ZONE'
File Zone is a real time monitor with graphic display of files that are scanned. This module is place on the right side of your pc and as you access the web,email, it would display in real time. Also a plus one can drag and drop files....exec....into file zone and Bitdefender will automatically scan these files for virus's.

'BITDEFENDER ICON'
The icon is displayed in your task bar by right clicking it on you have 6 options to choose from which are sef explanatory. This pretty much is standard for most antivirus software but is a convience.

"BITEFENDER MAIN INTERFACE"
The main interface is user friendly and robust. You have 3 main tabs which are General...... Antivirus and Update.

A.) GENERAL
When you access this tab you will notice 4 other tabs at the top...Status......Registration....Settings and About.
Status - When you click on the status tab you are given statistics about the virus shield as to how many files have been scanned....infected (if any) emails scanned (infected if any) total messages received and the date of the last time system was scanned.
Also shown is the automatic updated enabled. Listed is the last update.....how many virus signatures in the data base and engine version.
Registration - is self explanatory which list your license key and date of expiration.
Settings - Under this tab you have the option to tweak numerous settings to suite your needs.
About -This will list the main web site.....support.....phone numbers.....and url's to access for FAQ........

B). ANTIVIRUS TAB
When you access this tab you have 5 tabs at the top and they are: Shield....Scan....Scheduler.....Quarantine and Report.

Shield - You have 2 sections Shield Settings which you can tweak to your needs also addition advanced settings to refine your scanning under the Shield.
The second section is the shields statistics which list the files last scanned.
Scan Tab - This tab allows you to set up what you want to scan the complete C drive...Network Drives.....Removable Drives...etc....you can also add folders to scan or remover. The settings tab when accessed allows you to fine tune what you wnat the scanning process to do.
Scheduler - This tab allows you to setup up prefined scans...modify if need be add or delete and run.
Quarantine Tab - Under this feature you can control what is quarantined...you have the option to restore, add, delete or send the infected file for further examination.
Report Tab - Lists the reports generated so far....given attention to size and name and date of modification.

C.UPDATE TAB
When accessing this tab you are able to access updates and view details of what is being downloaded. It also has a settings tab which you can fine tune to your needs.

NOTE- What I have found very interesting under each major tab and sub tabs that I have discussed above Bitdender has listed a explanation about each tab and its function on the right side of the interface. Bitdefender has made it very easy to understand and has taken the steps to insure you understand how to use their software to its maximum potential. This is a real plus factor in my opinion.

SCANNED C DRIVE
My next observation was to scan my C drive and determine how well Bitdefender performed.
When scanning the C drive bitdefender has detailed information in 3 phases.
Time........Statistics ......land Results. here is the following information on my C drive.

"Time" 34:15sec
"Est Time Left"
"Scan Speed Files/sec 22

STATISTICS
Boot Sector - 2
Files - 43,808
Folders - 515
Archives 798
Packed Programs 1865

RESULTS
Infected Objects - 4
Suspect Objects
Warnings
Disinfected
Deleted
Copied
Moved - 3
Renamed
\Identified viruses - 1

NOTE - The above infected objects were a test I conducted to see if Bitdefender would detect my Trojan Simulator. When I attempted to activated the Trojan Simulator Bitdefender blocked the path and a warning window popped up stating it had detected the Trojan application and protected my computer. Now when I did a complete scan it detected the trojan simlulator attempted disinfect (could not) then automatically lmoved all the files to the Quarantine. Also what is impressive is Bitdefender was able to extract the Trojan simulator applicaton from the Quick Temp Restore files on my system and move them into the Quarantine. Past antivirus softwares that I have tested
DID NOT detect the trojan simulator.

I must admit Bitdefender is not as fast on scanning as Nod32....which is the fastest scan engine that I have tested......however Bitdefender does a indepth and precise scan of all files.....achives....and packed programs, leaving no stone unturned. I am very comfortable with this program.

HELP FILES
Once again Bitdefender has paid attention to details to help the user. Each tab and sub tab you can click on in the lower right hand corner "more help" this will bring up a indepth help window with detailed step by step instructions on the specific feature and how to use it.

"CONCLUSION'
In my opinion, my first impressions Bitdefender is a outstanding antivirus software. The developers have taken great care and time to provided the average user as well as the advanced user all the tools and information at ones finger tips to maximize the use of this antivirus software. I recommend that you give it a try for yourself and formulate your own opinions. I welcome your comments and suggestions on Bitdefender.
In the next 2 to 4 weeks I will post again on how well Bitdefender stands up to the virus's in the wild. I know this is a major point on all antivirus software's. Part II will be
posted then on my results.
Here is the main web site for Bitdefender
http://www.bitdefender.com/index

 

Hi musicman

It would be a great help if you could post some screenshots when you 'review' a particular piece of software

In your Part II, maybe you could include the following information;

1. I am interested in the resource/memory usage of BD 8. Did you find it 'heavy' on your computer using the Real Time Monitor? How much memory did the running processes take up?

2. For simulated malware testing, apart from your Trojan Simulator, the response of BitDefender to the Eicar files or to AntiVirus Tester would have been of interest.

3. Have you tried their support? Did you recieve a quick response to your queries?

4. Are there any major differences between this version and the previous? For example, has the unpacking engine improved?

5. What are the differences between this Standard version and the Professional/Professional Plus packages?

 

I did some testing with Bitdefender on a P3 450 with 128 megs that I keep around here because it is so slow that any software that tends to slow down a computer will really stick out on that old POS. I found that Bitdefender 8 tended to slow it down quite a bit. Then again, so did Avast. AVG and F-Prot had only a minor effect. The one that really faked me out was McAfee enterprise. It ran just great on the old hulk.

 

Diver,did you test avast! on Windows 9x OS ? I noticed that such slowdowns are only on Win9x machines.

 

BlackCat thanks for your reply:
First to answer one of your question my OS is ME, resouces are holding at 84% even with the real time monitor activated.
Secondly I tested the eciar test file against Bitdefender, a window popped up and identified the eciar test file denying me access to it and advising me it protected me against this virus test file.
In refererence to their unpacking engine, it has improved dramaticly!! Its engine unpacks every achive file and exec. As mentioned in my review Bitdefender was the only antivirus to extract from the Restore Temp files the eicar test file and Trojan Simulator files and automatically sent them to the Quarantine.
The difference with the Prof Plus Version is Bitdefender has incorpated a firewall and spam software along with their antivirus. I have not tested this out yet.

 

All tests on the special POS box are XP SP2. I might not notice a 5% slowdown on a fast P4, but on that old box any slowdown is magnified. There is no other resident stuff on that box. No software firewall, just a NAT.

In the recent past I have said that AVG is junk and several around here did not agree with me. But it does run well on the POS. So, I have to revise my opinion. Although it appears to be weak on trojan detection according to Mary Landsman's test in one of the magazines, which one I can't remember. AVG also has more false alarms than the majors, but fewer than NOD32.

I would be comfortable running Bitdefender on a more modern box, but prefer KAV 5 for that sort of application, unless Bitdefender is on some kind of special. You could probably go on forever trialing different AV's and never buy a single one.

 

AntiVir runs fine even on very weak machines. At least it did when i used it to clean the mess on my school PC...

 

Here is a iimage of Bitdefender.

 

I sent E-mails to their support several times. The response time varied between a few hours to 2 days.

 

Mirin:
Bitfender now has live support that you can talk in real time with a technican. Just go to their main web site click on support and then click on live assistance. I think you'll be pleased

 

I know. Unfortunately I cannot use it for some reason. Thank you anyway.

 

I'm using the free version and like it a lot. If I were to buy Bit Defender, I would hate the graphic display of the files the real time monitor scans. NOD32 does this with that horrible HTTP scanner. Drove me nuts. So can you turn that off? I also would have no interest in such a cumbersome thing as dropping some file into the graphic display. Gee, just use the right click command line scan which is much easier.

Also, is it easy to disable the email scanner? Can you decline install of the email scanner entirely?

 

I have used there LiveChat at 3am on a Sunday Morning.

Could not sleep so went and did a complete online scan of my Computer. It found a 'may be a file infecter' virus. Ran it through JOTTI on line scanner (I was using F-secure on my computer at this time) and all other scanners showed file as clean.

Anyway I clicked on livechat and answered straight away, advised where to send the sample and updated a few days later by e mail that the file was a false positive and this had been corrected with latest update.

All very good service

Kind Regards

Jlo

 

Mele,
you can turn off both of them through the Shield settings tab of BitDefender Management Console.

 

Excellent point Mirin. This is one of the nice features about Bitdender, at a click of the mouse you can enable or disable any feature you desire. Bitdender has made it very easy to tweak or customize your settings at a touch.

 

Thank you. That's very good to know. I like AVs that are easily customizible as what one person wants/likes another may not want/like.