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PC Special Feature

PC anti-virus 2005

VERDICT

There is a good spread of products for every pocket here, from adequate free programs to fully featured, highly technical ones. The one we’d go for is F-Secure Anti-Virus 2005 due to its attractive pricing, effective detection abilities and pleasant interface. It’s closely followed by Steganos AntiVirus 7. McAfee VirusScan 2005 also impressed us.

Kaspersky Labs deserves a special mention for its well-equipped but pricy Pro program. At the other end of the pricing scale, we were pleased to see that AVG has improved its Free Edition, which should shame those companies that charge lots of money for products that don’t match AVG’s abilities.

DETAILS

Developer ALWIL SOFTWARE COMPUTER ASSOCIATES ESET F-SECURE GRISOFT KASPERSKY LAB
Version Avast! 4 Home eTrust EZ Antivirus 6.3 NOD32 2 Anti-Virus 2005 AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition Anti-Virus Personal Pro 5
Rating 3 3 3 5 - BEST BUY 4 4 - MOST DESIRABLE
Email scanner
Instant Messaging Scanner MSN, Yahoo!, AOL, mIRC, ICQ, Trillian
Rescue disk Bootable
Price inc VAT Free for home use £17 £27 £26 Free for home use £55
Free updates period N/A 1 year 1 year 1 year N/A 1 year
Cost of extended updates N/A £11 £18 £18 N/A £39
Extension N/A 1 year 1 year 1 year N/A 1 year
Supplier website Avast! My eTrust Aspect Systems F-Secure Grisoft Kaspersky Lab
Supplier phone Web only 01753 577733 01202 548888 01223 478800 Web only 08700 113461
Details Avast! My eTrust NOD32 UK F-Secure Grisoft Kaspersky Lab

 

Developer MCAFEE NETZ PANDA SOFTWARE STEGANOS SYMANTEC
Version VirusScan 2005 9 InVircible 7 Titanium Antivirus 2004 AntiVirus 7 Norton AntiVirus 2005
Rating 5 1 2 5 - BEST BUDGET BUY 4
Email scanner
Instant Messaging Scanner MSN, Yahoo!, AOL MSN, Yahoo!, AOL
Rescue disk Bootable
Price inc VAT £31 $60 (around £32) £30 £30 (£24 for download only) £36
Free updates period 1 year 1 year 1 year 1 year 1 year
Cost of extended updates  £10 $36 (around £19) £21 N/A £17
Extension  1 year 1 year 1 year 1 year 1 year
Supplier website  Amazon InVircible Panda Steganos Amazon
Supplier phone Web only 00972 3902 7777 08704 445640 008800 7834 2667 Web only
Details  McAfee UK InVircible Panda Steganos Symantec

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First Published in Computer Shopper, issue 204, February 2005.

The above article is © Dennis Publishing Limited 2004-5. UK property of Dennis Publishing Ltd. This article may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form in whole or in part without the written consent of the publishers.