“Antivirus 2011: Digital Defenders” plus 2 more |
| Antivirus 2011: Digital Defenders Posted: 24 Jan 2011 08:03 PM PST
So which paid antivirus program should you pick? That's where we come in. PCWorld teamed up with AV-Test (av-test.org), a respected security-software testing lab based in Germany. Together, we looked at 13 paid antivirus products from a number of leading security companies. We provide links here to full reviews of all 13, plus summaries of the reviews' key points. AV-Test's multifaceted testing procedure looks not only at how well an antivirus product can detect malware using traditional, largely signature-based methods (that is, employing a database of known malware types), but also at how well it can block brand-new, as-yet unknown malware. AV-Test also examines how well a security product can clean up after an infection in the event that a piece of malware does get through. This article focuses on paid stand-alone antivirus products, not free antivirus software or full-fledged security suites. Paid antivirus usually comes with better technical support options and more-comprehensive protection features than free programs. Suites go further still, offering features such as firewalls, parental controls, identity theft protection services, and more. See "Fee vs. Free: Free and Paid Antivirus Programs Compared" (some of our rankings have changed since that roundup appeared in November) and "Battle of the Security Superpowers," which lists our top security suite picks. Antivirus TrendsThis year, more and more antivirus packages come with tie-ins to so-called cloud services, in which fresh information on brand-new threats pushes down from the vendor's Web servers to your PC. This is a trend we began to see over the past year or two, but it has really taken off in this year's batch of products. Cloud-based detection takes many forms. In some products, such as Norton AntiVirus, it's used in reputation-based systems that pull together information on files and file types from users around the world to better detect suspicious files more quickly. Norton calls its system Quorum, but each company that offers a reputation-based process has its own name for the feature. In other products, such as Trend Micro Titanium Antivirus, the bulk of the malware detection actually takes place in the cloud--remotely, on the company's servers, rather than on your PC--with the intention of catching malware sooner and reducing the performance impact on your system. And the Winner Is...
It was a close race overall, but Symantec Norton AntiVirus 2011 took home the top prize with its excellent malware detection, blocking, and cleanup. BitDefender Antivirus Pro 2011 and G-Data AntiVirus 2011 round out the top three. In order of ranking, here are the antivirus products we reviewed.
Pros: Has a good interface and strong malware detection. Cons: Scan speeds lag behind those of the top performers. Bottom line: Norton AntiVirus 2011 is a great choice thanks to its strong malware detection and smooth interface. Symantec Norton AntiVirus 2011 review
Pros: BitDefender is effective at cleaning up infections and at detecting known malware. Cons: It struggles at detecting new malware, and its interface may be confusing to some users. Bottom line: BitDefender Antivirus Pro 2011 does a good job at detecting malware and disinfecting PCs, but it had some difficulty in blocking brand-new malware. BitDefender Antivirus Pro 2011 review
Pros: Excellent malware detection and blocking; good at disinfecting PCs. Cons: Lacks some features common in other antivirus products; scan speeds are inconsistent. Bottom line: G-Data AntiVirus 2011 is a solid package, with strong malware detection, blocking, and removal capabilities.
Pros: Has strong malware detection and blocking, and a great interface. Cons: It slows PC startup times and file copying. Bottom line: Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2011 is very effective at blocking new malware attacks and is easy to use, but it slows system performance more than we'd like to see. Kaspersky Anti-virus 2011 review
Pros: Easy to use, with good malware blocking. Cons: Not ideal for advanced users. Bottom line: Trend Micro provides solid, simple protection against malware, but advanced users may find its lack of customizability frustrating. Trend Micro Titanium Antivirus Plus 2011 review
Pros: Has a good interface and excellent scan speeds. Cons: Its detection performance is only average. Bottom line: Avast Pro Antivirus 5 has a slick interface, but its middling malware detection performance prevents it from achieving a higher score.
Pros: Excellent at detecting known malware; good disinfection capabilities. Cons: Slow scan speeds. Bottom line: Panda Antivirus Pro 2011 is an effective defender, but it's one of the slower antivirus products we tested. Panda Antivirus Pro 2011 review
Pros: Has excellent malware detection and blocking, and excellent scan speeds. Cons: It's somewhat light in features, and its main interface needs refining. Bottom line: Avira AntiVir Personal does an great job at blocking and detecting malware, but its interface needs a makeover. Avira AntiVir Premium 2011 review
Pros: Great speed-test results. Cons: Malware detection and blocking is subpar, and the settings interface is poorly designed. Bottom line: Eset NOD32 Antivirus 4 is fast, but its malware detection capabilities are lacking.
Pros: Has fast scan speeds and little impact on PC performance. Cons: Struggles at blocking new malware, and the interface is rough in spots. Bottom line: GFI Vipre Antivirus is fast, but it's ineffective at blocking new malware. Checkpoint ZoneAlarm Antivirus Pros: Good blocking of new malware. Cons: Running it generates a sizeable hit on PC performance, and it manages only middling detection of known malware. Bottom line: ZoneAlarm Antivirus put up reasonable scores in blocking new malware, but mediocre detection of known malware and speed issues drag its score down. Checkpoint ZoneAlarm Antivirus review Comodo Antivirus 2011 Advanced Pros: Great blocking of new malware. Cons: Below-average detection of known malware; struggles at cleaning up infected PCs. Bottom line: Comodo Antivirus Advanced does an excellent job at blocking of known malware, but this can't offset its problems at detecting known malware and removing infections. Comodo Antivirus 2011 Advanced review Webroot Antivirus With Spysweeper 2011 Pros: Easy to use. Cons: Slow scan speeds and below-average malware detection and blocking. Bottom line: Although it's straightforward and easy to use, Webroot Antivirus With Spysweeper 2011 trails the competition at blocking and detecting malware, and it is hit hard by slow scan speeds. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| Posted: 24 Jan 2011 06:48 PM PST Panda Antivirus Pro 2011 ($50 for one year, 3 PCs as of 12/18/2010) does a lot right: It proved to be effective at detecting and , blocking malware, and disinfecting your PC malware, but it's slow performance brought it down to seventh some speed issues bring its rank down to seventh in a tightly packed race. Antivirus Pro's main interface is usable, but not without issues. Its status screen is functional, but sparse. If Panda finds a problem with your PC's protection, status it'll display a warning across the top of the screen. Panda is based in Spain, and I found some of the translations to be a little wonky. Panda Antivirus Pro also tends to be a little over-paranoid--it identified that tracking cookies wereas spyware. While you could make the case that a tracking cookie is technically spyware, it isn't in the same league as "true" spyware such as keyloggers, so calling it that may be a little excessive. Panda's detection scores were good overall--and in some cases, very good. It detected 99.8 percent of known malware samples, which was the best score out ofamong the paid antivirus products we looked at. And it did a solid--though not outstanding--job at stopping new malware in our "real-world" blocking tests (where we pit it against brand new malware found online): It fully blocked 84 percent of attacks, and partially blocked an additional 12 percent of attacks. No package we looked at blocked every threat, but the top scorer fully stopped 96 percent of these attacks. Disinfection scores were good as well. Antivirus Pro detected all infections on our test PC, removed active malware components 80 percent of the time, and removed all remnants of malware infections 60 percent of the time. Antivirus Pro did have a little more of a problem with false positives than some of the other products we looked at; its six false positives was tied for the most among paid antivirus software that we tested, though as a percentage, it was still quite low. Scan speed was another issue: ItAntivirus Pro had some of the slowest scan speeds out of all the antivirus products we tested. It completed the manual "on-demand" scan of 4.5GB of files in 4 minutes, 22 minutes, a far cry from the 90 seconds that the top performer put up. The on-access scans--that run when files are opened or saved to disk--were also abysmal: It scanned 4.5GB of files in 7 minutes, 6 seconds--more than twice the fastest performer. Although its overall impact on PC performance was moderate, Panda Antivirus Pro dragged down some operations significantly. Our test system booted up in 53.7 seconds with Panda installed--the slowest of the products tested (our test PC booted in 40.1 seconds with no antivirus software installed). Panda Antivirus Pro is definitely worth considering based on the strength of its malware detection and removal performance, but keep its speed issues in mind before you decide to buy it. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| Trend Micro Titanium Antivirus 2011 Posted: 24 Jan 2011 06:49 PM PST Trend Micro Titanium Antivirus Plus 2011 ($60 for 1 year, 3 PCs as of 12/15/2010) finished fifth in our roundup of 2011 antivirus products. It's simple--some may say too simple--and easy to use, and it did a reasonably good job at blocking malware.
As for actually using Titanium Antivirus, well, saying it's set-and-forget simple might be an understatement. When you first launch it, Titanium Antivirus touts its "Cloud" capabilities, and how you won't have to download updates--it takes care of all that for you. The main interface is extremely straightforward: A big green checkmark indicates that you're protected. There are only a few buttons--one for scanning, one for settings, and one for stats. This super-simple approach isn't for everyone--if you like flipping toggles and tweaking settings, Titanium Antivirus isn't for you. If you can't be bothered with adjusting settings, you'll love Titanium Antivirus. The downside, though, is that Trend Micro's documentation is rather scant and provides few specifics. In terms of detection performance, Trend Micro put up very good scores, though not quite top-notch ones. It detected 98.4 percent of samples of recent known malware--a strong result. It also fully blocked 88 percent of brand new malware attacks, and partially blocked an additional 8 percent. This puts it above average, but not quite at the top of the leaderboard (the top performer in this test fully blocked 96 percent of new malware attacks). Titanium Antivirus also proved to be effective at disinfecting PCs: It detected all infections on our test PC, removed all active components in 80 percent of the cases, and removed all traces of an infection 60 percent of the time. Trend Micro had a low rate of false positives overall, but it was one of only two products we looked at to flag a good file as bad using its behavioral detection engine (which detects malware based on how it acts on your PC--a good way of stopping new, as-yet unknown malware). Overall, Trend Micro Titanium Antivirus had a moderate impact on PC performance in our tests, finishing right around average for the products we looked at. Scan speeds were a mixed bag, though: it was one of the better performers in on-access scans which kick off when you open or save a file, but its on-demand scans--which you start manually--were a good bit slower than average. This is better than the reverse scenario where on-access speeds scans lag--those scans happen much more frequently--but it can still be frustrating to deal with. That said, Trend Micro Titanium Antivirus Plus 2011 performed well in most of our tests, and is worth your consideration. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
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