Anti Virus Programs.

[ADR]

I've been reading around a few of the recent posts and what often comes up is peoples opinions on anti virus programs. What would you recommend as a good anti virus program to clients and obviously your reasons why?

As well what would you advise your clients to steer clear from?

I've always been a fan of AVG purely because it seems to not effect my systems performance when it's running, unlike I've found with Norton, I despise that anti virus program install the full version and you may as well say "bye-bye" to a fast responding computer.

What are your thoughts?

 

[NickCat11]

There are many threads on this. Do a custom search and you'll find the answers you need.

 

[iisjman07]

I've always been a fan of AVG purely because it seems to not effect my systems performance when it's running, unlike I've found with Norton

I used to agree with you, but since the release of AVG 9 and Norton 2009 my opinion has switched. ATM, the latest Norton is one of the lightest security suites you can have (they even have a little cpu monitor on the main menu to prove it), whereas I find AVG is becoming much more resource heavy that it used to be. As for free antivirus, I usually recommend avast to customers, as I find it has little system impact and pretty good detection. I would offer Avira but the update.... grrrr... the update REALLY <profanity> me off. As for paid antivirus I offer ESET (my favourite) or Kaspersky (still good, I just prefer Nod32)

 

[MrUnknown]

like iisjman, I always recommend ESET or Kaspersky. I push more for Kaspersky because I am now a reseller and can gain a commision off of it. I also think AVG is fine, I used to resell it but any tests out there will tell you that Kaspersky performs better and has a better detection rate.

 

[TechForce]

+1 for ESET's NOD32.

 

[NickCat11]

Well if we're doing this all over again my vote is for ESET for paid and Avast for free.

 

[Zogg]

+1 Avast for free. It includes email scanning that A-squared doesn't, not in their free version anyway. Plus I didn't care for the A-squared update popups.

 

[Tweak]

Avira is one of the best in that it has a higher detection rate than the other mentioned, the reason it does not rank the highest though is because it also has more false positives than the others...to me it is worth the trade-off, the updates for the free version is absolutely horrible though due to so much usage, so that is not good and could be a deciding factor.

 

[iisjman07]

Avira is one of the best in that it has a higher detection rate

Yeah, and it's also got a ridiculously fast scanner

 

[atlanticjim]

I have been using Microsoft Security Essentials on two of my families older machines and am very pleased with it. The GUI is very simple, it is light on resources and very very quiet (few nags). It got a very good review from Arstechina.
One feature that I like is the Dynamic Signature Service, they put it this way:

MSE is the first Microsoft security product to make use of the company's new Dynamic Signature Service (DSS); the next version of Forefront will also use DSS. When MSE detects that a file is making suspicious actions (such as unexpected network connections, attempting to modify privileged parts of the system, or downloading known malicious content) and it has no virus signature for it, MSE will send a profile of the suspected malware to Microsoft's servers. If there is a new signature for it, one that has yet to be sent out to the MSE client, MSE will be told how to clean the file. In this way, DSS helps ensure users stay protected by the most current virus definitions available without having to wait for the next scheduled download. Still, this communication will only occur for malware that is not in the current signatures.

That looks like pretty good zero day protection.
On the negative side is that it requires WGA. That should not be a problem for most of us or with known licensed machines, but I throw it in there anyway.
Oh, and by the way, it is free.

 

[joydivision]

Being a life long die hard windows fan never thought I would say this but I have found a great one I have been using for the past few days while bed ridden. Linux

In all seriousness though I have been using MSE a lot lately for clients. It as a technician what I have been waiting for years. AVG just got too bloated.

Norton 2010 is also good (don't shoot me).

 

[Mouse Mate]

I always recommended Avast home edition to my customers (mainly elderly and don't have money to burn) until MSE came along, quick to install + quick scan + unobtrusive = happy customers.

This has just reminded me of something actually. Won't jack this thread, new one coming.

Spoiler

It involves Norton and Curries!

 

[gunslinger]

If they want free its Avira or AVG, if the want to pay for it its Kaspersky.

 

[Abet Computers]

as of just about a moth ago I switched, I am a very avid fan of avast! but made a switch to Microsoft Security Essentials. And My customers have agreed it was a good switch, no need to do a custom config like you have to with avast so it saves a few seconds, 1 down fall I have found with it though is you have to disable the real-time scanner on it if you are scanning the system with malwarebytes, because when malwarebytes accesses the bad file MSE will prompt you asking you to clean out the computer, unlike avast