Free anti-virus programs: are they worth it?

[DJNgoma]

Avira is the best out of all AV packages in terms of overall protection and performance but the GUI is fugly as hell. I'm thinking of moving back to MSE, but I suppose the best things in life aren't necessary the best looking.

 

[ponder]

Avira is the best out of all AV packages in terms of overall protection and performance but the GUI is fugly as hell. I'm thinking of moving back to MSE, but I suppose the best things in life aren't necessary the best looking.

+1

The gui however does not bug me, I rarely look at it anyway.

 

[hawker]

*linux fanboi in the house

I don't need anti-virus!!

/runs away

 

[gregmcc]

As much as we all hate MS, their free MSE is a excellent package and well worth running at home.

 

[T3rminator]

+1

The gui however does not bug me, I rarely look at it anyway.

AVIRA is one of the top scoring AV's in the AV-comparative benchmarks. Really good and yes, forget about the GUI!

 

[metalcore]

Free Anti Virus programs are pretty much hit and miss for me. I used to use AVG Free and it worked ok until a couple of years ago when viruses started creeping through. I definitely feel you get what you pay for and since the cost of anti virus software is so low, who cant afford 200 bucks for peace of mind?

The bests ones I have used are NOD32 and Kaspersky. NOD rocks because its so fast because its written in assembly language apparently.

Don't buy Nortons its so slow and hogs up resources. What upset me the most about Nortons was that I installed the trial version that came for free with my mobo. It worked for 2 or 3 months until time came to purchase the licence. I never got around to doing that even though I was going to and suddenly my PC slowed to a crawl. Nortons kept on running a task that asks you register and this caused Windows to become all but unusable until I pay. That was when I said screw you Nortons for blackmailing me to buy your product and I went and bought Kaspersky instead.

 

[Voicy]

I have been using Avast for the last two years with no issues. One of these days I am going to the MSE but for now I am happy. I think an important factor in security is not downloading dodgy applications and being careful on the sites you visit.

I got more than I paid for

AntiVir or Avast! FTW! I prefer not to use Norton cause I like doing stuff on my machine.

Yep, been using Avast since '04. Haven't had a moment's trouble with it.

 

[Alan]

I've been using Avira for years. However I run scans with other anti virus programs every few months to pick up anything Avira might have missed, which has happened once.