Which would you choose

I know this Q has been asked before but the debate here on either free Avast AV or free eTrust 1 year AV from Microsoft. How do they both compare in terms of detection, system resources, speed etc and if you had to choose which would be you choice.

 

DO NOT GO FOR ETRUST.

i cannot in NO way, give a good comment about ca antivirus or their sooo called 'suite' .

its slow, performs with a massive drag on your machine and has LOW detection rates.

if you want free antivirus, try avg free / antivir or avast, all are good and all have free versions (i think).

give them all a try and see which you prefer.

 

This may sound stupid but I always thought paid AV software such as eTrust would offer better detection and protection against unpaid i.e free. I can't comment on eTrusts detection simply because I havent used it, but not that long ago I was using one of my brothers friends laptops (LG) and she had eTrust Suite on it and I must say I was quiite disspointed and a resource hog, I could feel it to be honest.

 

Hi Albinoni,

Our logic would say that paid AVs would offer better protection than freebies.
For whatever reason, however, some vendors offer a free version of their application. The free versions lack some features, but the engines are the same, and as far as I can learn, have the same detection rates as their paid versions.

There is also the fact that some are just better at detection than others. AV Comparatives is well respected, and one can see the results of tests there.

Avira was one of the two top AVs, and they offer a free version. It is better than most paid AVs.
Avast is better, in my view, than other paid AVs.

Best,
Jerry

 

"Avira was one of the two top AVs, and they offer a free version. It is better than most paid AVs. "


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to say something on that,

detection rate is not everything... got to have the balance right, of which avira do not have.

stick to what your know, the nortons, the kasperskys etc etc and you wont go wrong.

i dont think he should use etrust, surely its one of the worst, if not the worst on the market / paid or otherwise.
try it yourself and see

 

What "balance" are you talking about?
You are consistent about one thing,I'll grant you that....
You consistently run AntiVir down.And any test that AntiVir fared well in.
While detection rate may not be everything.It sure is relevant and one of the most important criteria for me when selecting an antivirus program.

 

you do need a balance of speed,detection rate,interface,reliablity e.g. will it load up on startup fine or will it produce errors quite alot etc.

lodore

 

yep, as lodore said, a balance of things.

detection rate alone is all avira sell on ..... i do understand some people will buy it, but hey... nobodys perfect.

 

i think nod32 has it almost cracked lol.

kav is very close on having it cracked the balance.

 

actually ... there are quite a few in my opinion that have it cracked.

norton 2007 suite
avg 7.5 suite
trend micro 2007 suite
kaspersky suite
f-secure suite

all them are FULLY capable of protection, id feel safe using all of those either way... even though some have bad things which others dont, none are perfect.

i have a licence for trend and now avg 2 year, go on ebay its cheaper.

nod, yep capable indeed for stand-a-lone, to be honest... even though im a suite-lover, if i ever went for stand-a-lone, id choose nod32, but i hate the interface of it, all this imon and amon or whatever, so stupid in my opinion.

 

i used to like suites intill i relised how bloated they can be.
i thought norton and macafee where the only bloated suites.
with seprates you get best of everyworld.
best firewall best antivirus best antispyware etc.

 

some feel bloated... the old nortons did and mcafee still does.

but some are super fast

 

f-secure is bloated but it provides solid and almost unbeatable protection i think they should replace ad aware engine thou.

but suites are normaly bloated because they use quite a few engines.

they buy companies or use engines from different companies so it gets bloated.
avg+ewido is ultimate thou because they both light.

 

they say they have improved their spyware detection and removal.

and added better detection to the other things aswell.

yes its bloated that it takes longer to boot and a longer scan speed, but i, personally, dont think it runs slow at all. (but ive only ever installed it without parental control, maybe this is the slow down part?)

 

i dono it never gave me the option to not install it i wish it had becauses its an extra process.

how light is avg antispy?
or as the installer file it looks like its called avgas lol

 

Thanks for the replies guys. Though I'm bit shocked here that not many people here have commented on NOD32 and its great protection, detection rate, speed and what it has to offer. And also some say that Avira offers the best protection and better than that paid versions, but when you say paid does this also refer to NOD32 and KAV ?

Now on the subject of etrust and its bad detection rate etc, does this mean that Zone Alarm ISS also has bad detection rate, as ZA uses CA engine though I'm not quite sure which one. I know as a fact ZA ISS reviewed in most Australian PC magz have done and scored very well sometimes 9/10.

 

The free versions have the same engines, and offer the same detection rates if I remember IBK's comments.
That being true, according to AV Comparatives the free Avira offers a higher detection rate than either NOD or KAV. Of course the difference in Avira and KAV is 99.51% vs 99..06 for Kaspersky and 98.61% for NOD. In my view those differences are inconsequential.

It is far more important that the application run well on your system, and such things as updates, scan times, and support.

I use F-Secure on my laptop because Avira did not run well. I am willing to tolerate the somewhat longer scan and load times and not have to put up with problems.
Best,
Jerry

 

Not to sound bias here, but really wont most users here choose NOD32 over Avira any day if they were given the choice.

And talk about detection rate does this mean that Avira will protect your PC better than NOD and if so why has NOD won more awards than Avira.

Sorry if I sound confused.

 

Well, also should be noted that Avira has improved lately, on past tests KAV and Nod32 were always at the top and continue being there, I only hope that Avira keep improving, that way it could get some "awards".

 

hell yeah!

people will choose nod32 over avira, yet nod32 has a slightly lower detection rate, you wonder why?

1. nod32 is a better product
2. the layout of nod32 is far better
3. the heuristics on nod32 are better
4. nod32's email-scanning 'works'
5. nod32 has a greater selection of options to configure if needed.

i could keep going on, but this clearly states that people (the sane ones) dont just judge an antivirus clearly on its detection rates.

 

On this, we finally agree.

 

lol well obviously, im not a lover of avira

 

It boils down to what runs best on a particular system. NOD and KAV 6 both run well without conflicts on mine.

Avira was very light, and except for not opening at startup sometimes, and not showing in the tray sometimes, it ran at least as well as the others. If they would correct those shortcomings I would prefer it to NOD.

If it does not run well then don't use it, but if it does it is as good as KAV or NOD, and has a little better detection rate than either. I notice that detection rate is not important unless it is your favorite at the top, and then that is a real "selling point."

AVs are just software to be used according to need. They are not to be worshipped or fought about.
Use what you like best and realize that yours is not the best for everyone. That includes NOD and KAV as well as Avira.

I probably like Bit Defender least of any AV due to conflicts and poor support. However, some consider it the best of all. Great if it works for them.

Regards,
Jerry

 

Well i guess not. Being an AVG user and watching Antivir kick it's butt time and time again.

 

ha you think so....

a better detection rate is all that avira have to sell on.
and its not even that much better, especially with the integration of ewido into avg and with avg improving their own services aswell with better heuristics and ntfs data streams, add ewido into this and i cant wait for the next on demand test.