Hi Apteryx...
Honestly, I don't think that it would even be possible to design
a study to accurately answer this question. There are simply too
many variables, in that viruses are being created and added to
the definition files of various AntiVirus programs on a daily
basis.
Additionally, 'best' is a very subjective term. Even if one could
somehow track which AV program developers were the quickest to
add definitions of the newest viruses to their software, there
are many other factors which enter into the definition of 'best'.
How friendly and intuitive is the user interface? Does the program
cause glitches in the normal funtioning of Windows or other systems?
Does the program allow for easy checking of a single file? Will it
run on a schedule, with no user interaction? Does it offer options
to deleting the file, in case this is not possible, such as renaming
or quarantining the file? Does it catch files that other AV programs
miss? Does it work equally well on all operating systems? Etc...
Most of the major players in this field have done their best to
provide a 'yes' answer to all of the above questions. In practice
some have been found to consistently cause problems under Windows
or fail to catch viruses which others identify. Norton is one such
vendor.
For example, here is a Microsoft Knowledge Base Article which
refers to Norton Antivirus causing the error message I was
troubleshooting in the other question you referred to:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=http://support.microsoft.com:80/support/kb/articles/Q263/0/50.ASP&NoWebContent=1
My own experience has consisted of looking for a program which is
initially free, and performs well. I have experimented with these
(in alphabetical order) in recent months, and others which have
fallen by the wayside years ago:
AntiVir:
http://www.free-av.com/
BitDefender:
http://www.bitdefender.com/scan/licence.php
Computer Associates:
http://www3.ca.com/virusinfo/virusscan.aspx
Grisoft:
http://www.grisoft.com/us/us_index.php
McAffee:
http://us.mcafee.com/virusInfo/default.asp?
Panda:
http://www.pandasoftware.com/activescan/com/activescan_principal.htm
Symantec:
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/
Trend Micro:
http://housecall.trendmicro.com/housecall/start_corp.asp
I experimented by downloading and installing the free Windows
version of a particular vendor. When I had scanned my entire
system with such a 'resident' program, I would go to the online
scan of another vendor, such as Trend Micro, and scan my entire
system again. If the online version found things the resident
version hadn't, I would download the Windows version of that
vendor and repeat the process. The last one I had, and the most
effective until then, was BitDefender, but after an unnanounced
'trial period' expired, I looked for another, completely free,
version. That's when I found AntiVir.
And I'll here repeat what I said in my comment on the other
question:
"Just last night it managed to identify viruses in a screensaver
and an image downloader, both of which I had downloaded but
hadn't got around to installing."
Which means that they were on my system when I used every
program I listed above, including BitDefender, and they
were never identified until last night. That speaks very
well for AntiVir, in my opinion.
Please do not rate this answer until you are satisfied that
the answer cannot be improved upon by way of a dialog
established through the "Request for Clarification" process.
Best regards...
sublime1-ga |
