How to Select a Good AntiVirus Software and a Good Diskdrive

I see the article has a link to MS security essentials, and says it's better then nothing. My observation is, it's always updating with new definitions (seems daily). At work they used McAfee, which caused major performance issues, and about twice a year, some major virus would make it through into the enterprise system. They gave us employees a free license for home use, but I un-installed it within a hour for performance issues.

So what did you decide to install for AV?

Nice link for drive info, thanks.

I use AVG. I've never had a problem with it, and it's always done it's job. AND it's free.

In tests here in Germany, it has some serious issues that put me off it.

Its only good point is that its free to my mind.

I buy Kaspersky for 3 PCs on ebay for between 10 - 20 US Dollars, check it out.....and its effective and fast.

I have Kaspersky on my laptop now, paid for, and despite the fact that it is paid for, from day one after it's installation it constantly nags me to buy the new copy, to avoid the high price of waiting for it. They could at least have waited till 6 months or so had passed before nagging me about it. As a result, I'm going back to AVG the instant Kaspersky runs out its one year subscription.

I also run Adaware, the Zonealarm Firewall, and SpybotSearch&Destroy (the first and last of those three do not run continuously, by have to be run monthly, or so. I consider that a small price to pay, to kick them off when I go to bed, and see them done in the morning). All are free, and all offer free and regular updates. Zonealarm and AVG update automagically. The other two, I update before I run them.

Mine doesn't do that till around the last month of usage....

Its a small price to pay for above average safety and speed.

That is not a valid reason to use a substandard product unless NOTHING on you PC is worth saving....then why bother at all?

But whatever you want....

"That is not a valid reason to use a substandard product unless NOTHING on you PC is worth saving....then why bother at all?"

That's what I like about you, Andy. Never shy, never uncertain. Not always right, but NEVER uncertain.

I am actually using test infos from high quality German magazines for Antivirus software. I don't test myself, I am only a user (and a reader of tests!). They show how inadequate AVG is, not me....

This ZD-NET info simply supports that further......or do you disagree on that?

Here are some tests from the German tester "translated" by Tom's Hardware, it demonstrates differences:-

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Microsoft-Security-Essentials-AV-TEST-Malware-Certification-Bitdefender,19452.html

The final results are here:-

http://www.av-test.org/en/tests/home-user/windows-7/sepoct-2012/

But as I said before, we must each make our own decisions in life.....I am not selling for a financial profit....

Have a great day with no bugs.....

I use AVG, Lavasoft, and C Cleaner

I have been using Kaspersky for 3 years.

After recently buying a powerful laptop with Win7 64 bit some months ago, McAfee was delivered with the OS as a test freeby for one month, after 2 weeks I just had to get rid of it as it was regularly hanging the Laptop.....

Back to Kaspersky.......

I was happy to see that it did so well, I am still happy with it.

I used Norton some years ago and it slowed my PC down to a crawl, they say its better nowadays, but who cares? Since then, almost always McAfee, except what I wrote above!

I thought the article did not provide enough information to make an informed decision. It provided links to the sites and they provided how their product will protect you in only the broadest of terms. I got the feeling most may not be very adequate.

Key functionality I consider critical

1 - Heavy duty and very configurable firewall.

2 - Web page scanning scanning

3 - Sophisticated heuristic logic

I saw only one business package by Sophos that provided real time web scanning. This is the only sure method to prevent Polymorphic server side attacks (most botnets created in the last few years use this method of attack) which are the biggest threat you face. It is possible that heuristic logic may detect the threat once it is installed and taking over your computer but I prefer to deny them access to my computer. From what I gather, once installed the first thing these bot nets do is damage your computer's security system so it continues to run but I will not find anything.

I think there is a growing movement to try to hack into computers without you doing anything. It is like having a crook walk down a row of houses and check to see if the door is locked. If it isn't just walk inside and look around. I keep my office computer which is my 'safe computer' physically disconnected from our network when I am not using the internet. Unfortunately, these crooks can break into your computer even if you have a firewall up and running. You need a heavy duty firewall to keep anyone out these days.