How good is Microsoft's free antivirus software?

[LFCJohnSmith]

Well I suppose the only reason that it is being ranked as one of the best or the best is because it hasn't been released yet and as such hackers have not had a chance to get their mits on it so they can write some viruses to get around it. So after a few months with it going to be installed on every pc in the world proactically it will become a mecca for virus writers and it will then end up hopeless and a waste of space. I think the advantage that it has is probably because it hasn't been released yet.

 

[KSoD]

No. It is not that. This is based off of the OneCare product which has been out there for several years. This uses the same exact engine that OneCare did. Which is why it will get close to the same rating. Not cause it is new.

The OneCare product at the test time was out for several years and was out there for the hackers to go after and it still got that rating.

So if they were unable to dismantle OneCare after several years and it still got the Advanced+ Rating then they wont dismantle this. Saying that it will be a virus haven is so far from the truth. Cause it holds no ground.

MSE is based off of a product that has been out and already throught the wringer. Just as NOD32, Kaspersky and the others before it. They took the best part of that product and put it in this one. How is that going to make it a haven for problems? If anything that will make it stronger.

 

[LFCJohnSmith]

Well maybe they didn't bother as it was unpopular so they focused all their energys on hacking norton and mc afee and co. But hopefully this will actually be a good av and with it beng free then maybe it will spare us having to buy a av subscription every year.

 

[carnageX]

Well maybe they didn't bother as it was unpopular so they focused all their energys on hacking norton and mc afee and co. But hopefully this will actually be a good av and with it beng free then maybe it will spare us having to buy a av subscription every year.

You can already avoid having to buy a subscription every year if you use Avira, AVG, or Avast . Plus Norton/McAfee have been around for years already and have already been exploited enough times they look like swiss cheese.

 

[LFCJohnSmith]

Yes but the free AV's you have listed are not very good and although they do the job I find them very annoying and un user freindly. So what I was hoping was that MS would have a AV which worked well and was as user freindly as say imo Mc Afee or Norton.

 

[carnageX]

Um, the 3 I listed are some of the best free ones out there... AVG is very user friendly; Avast isn't as much, but AVG is.

 

[synergy]

One thing I really don't like about AVG, McAfee, and others is that you can't temporarily disable them if you need to. False positives are pretty frequent nowadays and the ability to disable to run a file I know is fine is nice. I use Trend Micro and it's not the best, but it uses very little resources and I can turn it off if I need.

 

[yzmxer608]

I like Webroot, I noticed they weren't in that test. You can shut it down if you need to, it also as a gamer mode. I've never used it, but it would probably come in handy if you have a slower computer.

 

[LFCJohnSmith]

Um, the 3 I listed are some of the best free ones out there... AVG is very user friendly; Avast isn't as much, but AVG is.

Yes they may be the best free AV's but free AV's are not as good as subscription AV's.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

Yes they may be the best free AV's but free AV's are not as good as subscription AV's.

Some subscription av's are garbage or close to it including Mcafee and Norton. You couldn't pay me to run either of those on my system.

So far MSE seems to be very impressive and I am seriously considering using it on my system when it is officially released.