After I read this article here on PCWorld I realised that Microsoft Security Essentials (Windows Defender) is even worse than I thought.
From the chart Microsoft’s anti-virus does not look too bad compared to the others. However, if we look at ‘Protection’ we see Microsoft’s in home solution scores just 0.5 whereas Avira (the highest scoring free anti-virus) boasts a 6.
Now if you are like me you used MSE because it was fast, it didn’t clog down your system, however neither does Avira according to av-test.org’s results with MSE scoring 5 for Performance and Avira scoring 5.5 so if anything switching may improve your experience.
As for usability they both score the same which is no surprise as neither are particularly difficult to use though I’d say MSE was easier.
So if I’ve encouraged you with that I’m sure you’d be interested in installing Avira. Well it’s available from their site here.
If you are on Windows 7 or below be sure to uninstall Microsoft Security Essentials (or whatever anti-virus you are using) before you install Avira.
If you are Windows 8 or higher Windows Defender (MSE) should disable itself. If you are using another anti-virus make sure again to uninstall it before installing Avira.
i stopped using av's long time ago... when I need something scanned i use https://www.virustotal.com/en/ and scan the file... though i know its useless anyway - even i know how to encrypt contents.
Don't see Malwarebytes anywhere on AV Test. Very interested in how that ranks as I've been using it for years now with almost no problems. (I got this terribly sneaky bitcoin miner that Malwarebytes didn't pick up, but neither did Avast, or three other antivirus programs, so I can't really fault it for that. Eventually, Rogue Killer handled it, so everything is dandy now)
The paid version of mbytes makes it an active scanner but Im not sure its classified as an AV more of a anti malware. I use panda free cloud. its ranked up there. but I only use my windows for games not really web browsing.
Malware-Bytes has a newish product called Anti-Exploit with a free version and a paid version. From what I've seen, it's very good. I've tested it with Metasploit, trying to exploit an unpatched Win XP virtual machine, and it performed excellently.
Windows 8 has Microsoft Security Essentials built in which is a good thing so that'll protect the more 'common sense' filled users though it's detection rates leave some to be desired.
You understand how your computer acts when it's infected? The vast majority of spyware does not affect a user's experience what so ever. People who think they don't need av are like the people who have "pull out game" and then wonder why they got a girl pregnant. Everyone should have av. No excuses
Yes @anon5205053 please tell us how you go in all the system files that get infected and remove all the registry entries that viruses and malware create. While making sure that they don't replicate themselves in other files. If you are, you sir are a legend and I will bow down to you.
