The best AV - free or otherwise

I like to hear from those who have lots of experince. I think it costs about $39 US. Right. I just hate to pay that much. I think 1 yr. subsrcripts to AV should be no more then $29 US. Just my 2cents worth. I am really addressing NOD I am not sure how much KAV costs.

 

• Kaspersky Personal $41.50
• Kaspersky Pro $66.50

So not exactly below $30.
I don't mind the price as long as it gives me good protection, is configuration friendly, works well on my system and updates regularly.

I've tried several in the past, starting with NIS2004 (pre-installed). Didn't like their update policy & support. Updating definitions was done about once a week. Sometimes twice, but only in case of an emergency.
Changed afterwards to Avast Pro which worked well on my system. The only thing I didn't like was the configuration with certain spam blockers. It can really give you some headaches.

Next in line was BitDefender, liked it very much. Easy to setup & almost no configuration needed and above all frequent updates. Changed it after I got update problems, because for two weeks it wouldn't update.
The new version 8.0 eliminated this problem, but in the meantime I'd already bought KAV Personal.

I'm certainly no expert in AV's, but from my experience with these antivirus I'm really pleased with KAV. Never tried NOD32, but who knows I may trial it some day.

As you can see I never tried free versions. Why? Maybe a habit of spending money on security software. If you don't have the money for it, then your only choice goes to free AV's or less expensive AV's.

You're paying for the best, so you'll have to dig deeper into your pocket, whether it's NOD32, KAV, McAfee, ...

 

Nicely spoken Eldar...however there are cheaper av's and sometimes other things will be more important then detection and cleaning... but I definately know what you are saying

 

Fellow Creatures,
I run EZAV on one PC and BigC suggested, Command AV on the other. I use to run NAV Ugg.

 

I just couldn't stop myself.

The best one? It's the one most people don't use. The one between their ears.

Thanks
Wildman


"There are none so blind as he who will not see".

 

I like avast the most.

 

Update!!!!!!!
I seem to have missed a pair.....

Extendia AVK Pro - uses KAV engine + Reliable AV engines - RAV bought over by MS and is rumoured to beincluded in next release of windows in 2006.... last rumour said McAfee was about to be bought over by MS as well
www.extendia.com
GDATA AntiVirenKit Pro - uses KAV+BitDefender engines
They are said to have larger AV def. databases than other commercial AVs.

Also, how do we feel about "corporate" AVs... Has anyone used them?

What about eScan (paid) and ClamWin(free, opensource) www.clamWin.com?

 

Try doing the "This could be Fun" post in the Other Anti Virus Software section.

Thanks
Wildman

 

I tried Extendia AVK Pro and I would like to say personally... I think it is a washed down version of just about any AV you can find. It has less options than AVG free. I went to check out GDATA AntiVirenKit Pro, but I noticed that the logo on the box was almost exactly the same as the Extendia AVK Pro logo, exept instead of two circles ther was only one. I have reason to beleive that they are made by the same company but for different languages.

 

a question
for BitDefender lovers.....
v8 is paid
v7 is free
both have IDENTICAL updates
why should you pay for the newer version?

 

I tried Extendia AVK Pro and I would like to say personally... I think it is a washed down version of just about any AV you can find. It has less options than AVG free. I went to check out GDATA AntiVirenKit Pro, but I noticed that the logo on the box was almost exactly the same as the Extendia AVK Pro logo, exept instead of two circles ther was only one. I have reason to beleive that they are made by the same company but for different languages.

It is basically the same company, Extendia is liscensed in the U.S. and Canada with RAV instead of the Bitdefender. Both include the KAV engine.
If you think that AVG is anywhere near the league of KAV based AV's, you may want to research this forum a bit more.
It consisitently ranks 2nd to Kaspersky in detection test. I do not know what options you are looking for, but it is an effective AV and that is what I look for.
Caution, it will slow your system with both engines on in the RTS but there are plenty of options to minimize this.

 

I can get experience for only $39?!? Sheesh, & all this time I thought it only came 1 day at a time.

But seriously folks - I voted for DrWeb. He's a good doc. (Bend over & cough)

Also, why isn't zLock antivirus on the list?

 

Because it's not widely known as an AV.
Also, their website is *tacky*... which puts off many potential users. That's my personal opinion anyway.

 

I like Panda the best of all I've ever used.I've also used:trend micro,avast PCcillian,norton and antivir,they were all good av's but Panda is my favorite
Rita

 

For me, the best is NOD32...

The free AV goes to avast! Home Edition...

 

I trialled most anti viruses out there in web, and if I have to recommend or raise my voice for best AV - free or otherwise , I would vote for AVG, Avast and Etrust as free scanners ( Etrust comes with 1 yr free subscription).
And when I go for the over all league which includes paid AVs too, as the results already is showing, its mainly NOD and KAV fighting for top spot. I myself am using KAV personal pro right now , and believe me it has got the BEST heuristic scan right now in the web. If I am to pay I will pay for either NOD or KAV , and with AVG, these three are best AVs out there with KAV a lill ahead as I have seen. Etrust is very good too, but not ok with irc bots or some wild trojans out there.
For me
1. KAV
2. NOD
3. AVG

 

The two antivirus programs I entrust my computer to is nod32 as on demand scanner and mcafee 7.03.6000 as my on access. Together they should catch just about anything.

 

I use NOD32 for my on demand and on access scanner. For a back-up on demand for a second opinion I use AntiVir PE....

 

Hey what happened to Panda, you been playing again...

 

I play around with av programs a lot but I will always have mcafee back on here. And now I will add nod to the list that I will have as one of my two default av's from now on. Like I stated in my above post between nod and mcafee there shouldn't be much that would have a chance of getting through.

bigc

 

Don't let a tacky website turn you off. You might just have to dig a little deeper to find the gems. Trust me it was pretty hard to figure out how to get Command AV. The company name ah...ah begins with an A... ah. Yep, Axxxx is a tacky website it would certainly hurt sales. Just keep in mind webmasters and creative folks and engineers are two different departments in the same company. The software engineers may be tops, while the marketing department is out on long lunches!

 

But the program itself is worse! { I tried it and hated it... once again, just a personal opinion}
It failed to detect stuff even norton could find. The program itself was badly behaved, and the interface was very poor and counter-intuitive. The fact that the use of english wasn't upto the mark also meant that I won't be using it (I believe professionalism should be self evident in all facets)

Edit: Am talkin' about ZLOCK AV... sorry for the unclear talk

 

Hi Bigc
I thought it was advisible to only have one av at a time-conflict or something?
Rita

 

Hi all,

I also like the idea of having two good AV's for verification purposes. I pretty much have two of everything (AV, AT, AS) for verification purposes. It helps.

I too liked the Mcafee/Nod32 combination but decided to purchase KAV 4.5.140 Pro and amy trialing NOD32 as an on-demand AV. McAfee worked very well on my system but I didn't like the once a week updates. Also, I get excellent support from ICE Systems, which is an KAV reseller. I felt like I had someone to talk to. But both AVs seem to be comparable and I think it ultimately depends what runs best on an individual machine. KAV version 5 was a disaster on my machine. I think it caused me more trouble than the AVs that it was suppose to protect me from.

BTW, I passed on renewing NAV because of numerous support issues.

Rich

 

I have spent a week to check the the best Antivirus progz. All was checked with latest versions and virusdefinitons (period sept 20-27 2004).
I looked for a AV who have a good detection rate, but also is light in system resources so I can use my PC without slow downs.
And I wanted just a AV prog, not a "suite" with firewalls, spyware etc.
I use better prog's for these tasks: Recommed Sygate Personal Pro or ZoneAlarm Pro (firewalls), Spydoctor or/and Giant Antispyware (antispyware...), Ad-bockers and Pop-up progs do I not need becourse I have Avant Browser (best brower).

Here's my AV-opinion:

NAV 2005
After have used NAV for all year, I was disappointed with the latest version. It slowed down my PC, use way too much system resources, and (as I found out later when I runned the other AV's) missed some virus and trojans. But still a very competent AV, and nice interface.

Kaspersky Personal 5.0
Very good detection, probably the best of them all. Updates very often. Best AV prog to detect trojans too. Scans all compressed formats (zip, rar etc.)= very good. But KAV slows down my PC to unacceptable level. Main problem is the real time-protection. If I turned this off, it was ok. But then you don't have so much use of it's protection...

NOD32 2.0
Nice prog, but overpromoted by some powerusers I think. NOD have a fair detetction rate, scans quick also. But as with most of the other AV's the speed is limited when you turn on real time-protection.

Avast 4.1
Quicker than NOD32 with real time-protection on, but loose becourse of lowest detection rate of them all. One nice feature was that if a virus was found, and Avast couldn't delete it, there is a option to boot up again and run Avast before Windows loads. I was able o kill a virus that way.

PC-cillin 2004
Used to be a good AV, but I think PC-cillin is an average-product now. And slow.

Bitdefender 8
Bitdefender act like NOD32. Nice and talented, but too slow with real time-protection on. But NOD32 is better.

Etrust EZ 6.2
One word: ****.

F-Secure 2004
Two words: installation-headache + ****.

F-prot 3.15
I found F-prot was the best of them all!! Great speed, you do not notice that F-prot runs even if you do a full scan. Real time-protection do not kill speed, very simple setup. Found some trojans too. Bad is that F-prot does just check compressed files in zip-format. It can not scan other formats.
In fact, F-prot was so speedy that I got worried that it missed virus when operating. After all, AV's first task is to catch virus - and not to run quick - but after checking various reviews most has plasced F-prot very high on detection rate.
I will continue use this prog and can higly recommend F-prot

Appriciate comments