Free antivirus software may be the only option for those on a limited budget. The question, of course, is how well free antivirus software protects your PC, how easy is it to use, and if something goes wrong will you be left out in the cold? The answers may surprise you. This review looks at three free antivirus solutions: AntiVir PersonalEdition Classic, AVAST 4 Home Edition, and AVG Free Edition.
Each of the products tested has been certified (VB100%, ICSALabs, or Checkmark) to be effective at detecting 100% of in-the-wild viruses. But the list of in-the-wild (ItW) viruses is miniscule in comparison to the number of actual known viruses. The ItW list also omits certain types of threats, including adware and spyware, thus it may not be representative of the actual threats confronting users today.
For this reason, we turned to AV-Test.org, a project of the University of Magdeburg and AV-Test GmbH, Andreas Marx. Each year, Andreas subjects antivirus scanners to a wide range of tests, extending the basic wildlist testing to include a collection of 159322 zoo virus tests, as well as the ability to detect viruses in 37 compressed and archive formats, and any false positives (detection of viruses in non-infected, legitimate files) resulting from these tests. We also performed our own in-house tests to determine whether any of the free products were capable of providing a high level of protection against adware and spyware.
The Scorecard
To ensure objectivity, we rated each of the free antivirus scanners based on system impact (install size and number of active running processes), detection of zoo viruses, detection of spyware/adware, compressed/archive types handled, number of false positives, product support options, and response times (how quickly the vendor releases updates after a new virus is discovered in-the-wild).
Scan speeds were not included in scoring, as these can vary widely depending on system configuration and whether any infections are present and, in any event, have no bearing on detection or capability of the product. Likewise, though we comment on ease-of-use and costmetics of the interface, these are subjective opinions that will vary from user to user and thus were not used to score the products.
Each of the products tested has been certified (VB100%, ICSALabs, or Checkmark) to be effective at detecting 100% of in-the-wild viruses. But the list of in-the-wild (ItW) viruses is miniscule in comparison to the number of actual known viruses. The ItW list also omits certain types of threats, including adware and spyware, thus it may not be representative of the actual threats confronting users today.
For this reason, we turned to AV-Test.org, a project of the University of Magdeburg and AV-Test GmbH, Andreas Marx. Each year, Andreas subjects antivirus scanners to a wide range of tests, extending the basic wildlist testing to include a collection of 159322 zoo virus tests, as well as the ability to detect viruses in 37 compressed and archive formats, and any false positives (detection of viruses in non-infected, legitimate files) resulting from these tests. We also performed our own in-house tests to determine whether any of the free products were capable of providing a high level of protection against adware and spyware.
The Scorecard
To ensure objectivity, we rated each of the free antivirus scanners based on system impact (install size and number of active running processes), detection of zoo viruses, detection of spyware/adware, compressed/archive types handled, number of false positives, product support options, and response times (how quickly the vendor releases updates after a new virus is discovered in-the-wild).
Scan speeds were not included in scoring, as these can vary widely depending on system configuration and whether any infections are present and, in any event, have no bearing on detection or capability of the product. Likewise, though we comment on ease-of-use and costmetics of the interface, these are subjective opinions that will vary from user to user and thus were not used to score the products.
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