Free Antivirus Comparison Chart

Discussion in 'other anti-virus software' started by Brandonn2010, Jan 10, 2011.

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  1. m00nbl00d

    m00nbl00d Registered Member

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    An additional information regarding AVG LinkScanner.

    It does block access to known malicious domains, but this feature is only available for Internet Explorer and Firefox users.

    LinkScanner provides two components: Surf-Shield and Search-Shield.

    Surf-Shield doesn't care for the web browser, as it will scan the URL for exploits and other stuff.

    Search-Shield does care for the web browser, and is the component that displays the ratings in IE and Firefox, when using Google, Bing, etc.

    Initially, Search-Shield also checked for threats in real-time, but this made webmasters waste bandwidth, so AVG changed the way it works. Now, Search-Shield is merely a database of known malicious domains.

    This is why sometimes users complain LinkScanner doesn't protect them as it should when they get a green rating when searching in Google, for example, and then it blocks access, via Surf-Shield.
     
  2. xandros

    xandros Registered Member

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    thank you

    good job avast free :thumb:
     
  3. Syobon

    Syobon Registered Member

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    what is lacking? if you think seriously about it, Avira lacks nothing really important, sure blocking malicious url is good, but malware can only infect your pc getting into memory or hdd, Avira covers that areas.
    So people started buying security company ideas and anti-malware applications turned into bloatwares, another good example is Malwarebytes anti-malware, its ondemand and more powerful than many paid AV scan...
     
  4. Dwarden

    Dwarden Registered Member

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    maybe more fields like

    on-demand scans
    windows explorer extension (not sure if scan of file/directory directly from explorer is worth to mention but definitely it's easier than going thru whole ui)
    screen-saver scans
    log files
    self-protection
     
  5. Matthijs5nl

    Matthijs5nl Guest

    It is indeed good to say something about AVG and online protection, like m00nbl00d already did. A short summary.

    AVG Free includes AVG LinkScanner, which contains two protection mechanisms:
    1. Safe-Search: scans search results for malicious domains, also it scans links on the pages of the domains showing up in the search results. This works on Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox for Google, Yahoo!, Bing, AltaVista and Baidu;
    2. Safe-Surf: scans all HTTP traffic for (1) exploits, (2) phishing websites and (3) hacked websites.

    AVG paid includes the additional Online Shield, which also contains two protection mechanisms:
    1. Webprotection: scans in realtime for malware (including for example dangerous Javascript);
    2. Instant Messaging Shield: protects you when chatting with ICQ, Yahoo! or MSN/Windows Live Messenger.
     
  6. johnyjohn

    johnyjohn Registered Member

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    Hi,

    Avira detects malicious scripts. Detections begins with :

    JS/... => javascript virus or trojan horse
    HTML/... => script virus for HTML data
    PERL/... => perl virus script

    I don't think Avira engine uses any fingerprinting methods.
     
  7. Brandonn2010

    Brandonn2010 Registered Member

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    Ok. I assumed all of them used some fingerprinting, because in the AV-Comparatives performance test, all of them loaded things faster on a subsequent run, which I assumed was because of fingerprinting.
     
  8. Brandonn2010

    Brandonn2010 Registered Member

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    Here's the latest and probably last, unless there are any inaccuracies. I added Custom Install, Custom Uninstall, Repair Option, Site Ratings, Simple Interface, Network Interface, and Explorer Scan.

    Also, should I include the AV Comparatives results? Those are applicable to the paid versions of programs, and I think I should stick to features.
     

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  9. Brocke

    Brocke Registered Member

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    Can we get this Stickied that chart would help people.
     
  10. acr1965

    acr1965 Registered Member

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    Do all these free products have context menu scanning? If not, then that would be a good category.
     
  11. Brandonn2010

    Brandonn2010 Registered Member

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    By context menu scanning do you mean right-clicking on a file and then there's a scan option? If so I included that as Explorer Scan or something. They all do it as far as I could tell.
     
  12. CloneRanger

    CloneRanger Registered Member

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    @ Brandonn2010

    Hi, i see what you mean now ;)

    @ Mr.PC

    Yes you're both correct :thumb: my bad :(

    Regards
     
  13. smage

    smage Registered Member

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    One question though, do we really need a shield for web protection, P2P and IM? Are these not already taken care of by the normal on access scanner?
     
  14. 2Ton

    2Ton Registered Member

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    Thanks, your time and work is much appreciated.:D
     
  15. sg09

    sg09 Registered Member

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    Good job indeed....:)
     
  16. rookieman

    rookieman Registered Member

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    Great post ;) Thanks again.
     
  17. Zyrtec

    Zyrtec Registered Member

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    To the original poster (OP):

    Avira Antivir Free does indeed a boot-time scan [ at least, it did so for version 9.0 when I tested it, I'm not sure about version 10, though].

    The boot-time scan in Avira is called "SAFE START" and can only work if you selected it as an option during the the installation process on this AV on your computer. If you don't select it upon installing Avira on your PC it will never be available unless you uninstall Avira it and re-install it.

    You can check that feature during Matt Rizos' video about Avira FREE v9.0 prevention tests at Youtube. It's shown at about 4m:08s and the link is:

    --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bum1_i2P574 ---


    Best regards,


    Carlos
     
  18. sbwhiteman

    sbwhiteman Registered Member

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    Avira Safe Start is not a scan. If the Safe Start option is chosen, Avira loads (and activates its guard) earlier in the boot process than it would with Normal Start. As I understand it, the boot process is slowed a bit since the guard is monitoring earlier in the process.

    In contrast, the Avast boot scan is a full-blown scan of the files on the PC that takes place before Windows loads. It's sort of like scanning from a rescue disk.

    Make sense?
     
  19. acr1965

    acr1965 Registered Member

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    yes and thanks
     
  20. pbust

    pbust AV Expert

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    Couple of corrections for Panda Cloud Antivirus:

    * Free version does have a behaviour shield. It's just that Pro version has an additional (second) behavioural engine.
    * It does have a boot-time scanner for detecting active rootkits.
    * Malicious Website Blocking & Anti-phishing (URL filter) included in PCAV Free does not require the toolbar to work, they are separate components. Toolbar can be uninstalled and URL filter will still work.
    * It does have fingerprinting and whitelisting of known good files.
    * Simple interface mentions "update wizard is hidden". This is because there is no update wizard needed as it is connected in real-time against the cloud-scanning infrastructure. It's hard to get any simpler interface :)

    Nice chart, thanks! Would be nice to also put the AVC PUP detection rates.
     
  21. PJC

    PJC Very Frequent Poster

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    @Brandonn2010
    Keep up the good work! :thumb:

    @CloneRanger
    No problem. :)
     
  22. Brandonn2010

    Brandonn2010 Registered Member

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    Updated it
     
  23. Brandonn2010

    Brandonn2010 Registered Member

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    In an unrelated note, the most recent Avast! update caused a lot of problems for me, and I believe the problem was Threatfire. Since I uninstalled it, things are fine. Just a note to people with similar security setups to mine.
     
  24. carat

    carat Guest

    Is it possible to add PC Tools AV and Comodo AV? :D
     
  25. Brandonn2010

    Brandonn2010 Registered Member

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    I don't want to start an argument about what free AV is best, but I didn't include other free AVs as I saw the original 5 as the best. PC Tools AV and Comodo AV don't seem too well reviewed on their own. I know Comodo can be good with the Def+ but I'm comparing just the AV. Sorry.
     
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