I am at that time of year for renewing my AV software. Currently running McAfee. I am happy with it, but have been looking at Kaspersky as a possible alternative.

Anyone have any comments on the pros and cons of each?

Chris

Will keep an interested eye - My McAfee needs renewing later this week :( Quite pleased with it, and a renewal price of around £20 for the full package isn't too bad I thought.

Kaspersky has been winning awards recently and I tried the 30-day trial and was suitably impressed. McAfee is frankly rubbish - it's caused no end of trouble on every machine I've ever seen it on.

McAfee and Norton (Symantec) are just trading on their name these days if you ask me.

I've been using Avast anti-virus which is a free product. It has certainly worked for me and has not caused the PC to slow up at all. I think it's well worth a look as it does update automatically.

Been running Kapersky for about 2 years on my main PC - I like it and, as a plus, it works with Vista.

Got Avast on my laptop and I don't like it but hey, it's free

Avast Pro for me.

Used to use AVG Free - which was 'OK' but let a few slip through in three years or so.

Kaspersky supposed to be good.

Norton / Symantec and McAffee :thumbdwn: :thumbdwn: :thumbdwn:

The best thing to use is a bit of common sense - don't open dodgy email attachments, don't run files you've downloaded from dodgy sites, be aware that everything is a scam etc - and for a while I went without any AV at all...but eventually the paranoia got to me

These 'Internet Security' packages are bordering on protection rackets these days, I swear the renewal emails I was getting from Trend were like "It's scary out there, you don't want to lose all your stuff do you? DO YOU???"

Been hearing good things about kaspersky recently though i have never used it, i have personally used AVG Free for years with no issues at all..

Please Please Please avoid Norton at all costs!! It will really slow your machine down with the 101 processes and startup items it requires and once on its a nightmare to remove.

I have setup several new pcs recently for friends, and the first thing that gets removed is the trial version of norton. I used to like norton, but its a pain now. Instead I now install Avast because its free, and it works well having stopped a few viruses for me in the past.

Avast for me too .....free and it works

AVG Free for the win

It seems to do a pretty good job, however it has an annoying popup which tells you that its updating itself. You can however click minimise or click another window.

Avast is okay too, I suppose....

Thanks for the replies all.

I have run McAfee for years and never had issues with it apart from the very occasional conflict with hardware firewalls. I used to advise people not to install Norton as it is a PITA. Norton used to be good back in the day of DOS and maybe into the early Windows era, but it all went wrong years ago.

Kaspersky gets good reviews and is rated highly by PC Pro magazine, so think I will give it a go.

A lot of the free ones look good, but looking at them, they often lack some of the malware features of the paid for ones.

Chris

AVG Free here... been running on several PCs for years now!

Computer Associates EZ Antivirus here.

I know some poeple slate it and reckon it's not that great but I've used it for years since it was a freebie (Innoculate IT) and it's caught quite a few nasties before any damage was done!

They're all just about as effective as each other stopping viruses to be honest.

The biggest difference between them is how they can be configured.

Have a look here: AV-Comparatives - Independent comparatives for Anti-Virus software, on-demand detection tests, retrospective, proactive, heuristic comparisons by Andreas Clementi, new reviews of AV products. Quite useful and informative.

Now I am going to tell you something, that is probably one of the best kept secrets in the computing world. There is ONLY one choice for me and you get a free one month trial too.

NOD32 eset software, google it and read the testimonials nothing comes close in my experience

It isn't expensive, doesn't interfere with anything you are doing and I have never had a virus yet!

Important!! Make sure you uninstall all other anti-virus programmes before you install otherwise your computer will freeze and you will have to boot in safe mode.

Actually, SkodaMart is right. NOD32 is the best AV software out there....even Microsoft use it! If it's good enough for them, then it's good enough for me. It uses little in the way of resources and never lets anything through. The only other good one is FProt. I would also say if you need it free, use AVG

AVG for me.

Nother vote for NOD32 it just works. I've had Norton before, it's expensive, overly complicated, intrusive and doesn't delete viruses properly. recently had Bullguard which was simpler but didn't really work that well, too intrusive and expensive.

I use avast and am impressed with it, certainly less memory hungry to AVG and is free. Have used Mcaffee and had problems updating it (last time i had it was 5 years ago) Norton was ok, but it was cheaper to Kelkoo a new disc than it was to renew subscription which annoyed me, but again that was a few years ago as ive used avast on all my machines since.

Well after a fair bit of reading I just installed a 30 day trial of NOD32. So far it seems OK. A system scan did not pick up anything lurking from the previous McAfee administration.

First thin I have noticed is that McAfee was taking lots of time to scan web pages. Pages now load much more quickly. I need to read up a bit more to see if I need a privacy service replacement or similar, but so far, so good.

Chris

Well after a fair bit of reading I just installed a 30 day trial of NOD32. So far it seems OK. A system scan did not pick up anything lurking from the previous McAfee administration.

OK, you did a 'System Scan'. Did you do a check on all stored files - e.g. I put all downloaded files into a (surprisingly named) 'Downloads' folder. Then I scan them prior to moving them into categorized folders ?

Also, beware of 'false-positives' i.e.. some anti-virus software (due to the heuristics engines employed) see some files as infected, other software does not. This is a defo tricky area.

OK, you did a 'System Scan'. Did you do a check on all stored files - e.g. I put all downloaded files into a (surprisingly named) 'Downloads' folder. Then I scan them prior to moving them into categorized folders ?

Also, beware of 'false-positives' i.e.. some anti-virus software (due to the heuristics engines employed) see some files as infected, other software does not. This is a defo tricky area.

Every last file on the all discs.

Chris

Every last file on the all discs.

Chris

Hmm, particular are we ?

Y'know - I detected a sensoyuma there. Only fractionally mind :P

(Bait bitten)

Use Nod32 here, on all the 4 computers in the house (2 desktops and 2 laptops). I find it so much better than all the others I have tried in the past. I set them up to check everything on a scan, and whilst that takes a little longer it is totally reliable.

They do very regular and constant updates which are always a reasonable size for those still using candle power and dialup.

The support forum is here Wilders Security Forums - Powered by vBulletin.

If I wanted a free AV, it would be Avast. However when paid for is also included it's Nod32 every time.