What is the Best Anti-Virus Software for Your PC?
I hear this question a lot. So I’m taking this opportunity to share my experience and current recommendation here. Let me put it out there, so there are no questions… I am a performance nut. If there is a way to get more speed out of a PC, I want to learn about it. That’s why choosing the proper an anti-virus program is so important. As security software it has the ability to bring the fastest PCs to it’s knees (with or without the ACT! Software installed) in the name of safety. In this review you’ll learn what I consider important and why I’m currently using the anti-virus software I am.
What is the Best Anti-Virus Software for Your PC?
A few years ago, I was at a crossroads. The anti-virus software on my HP laptop was up for renewal. Since I review of anti-virus and security software every couple of years, this was my chance to try something new. What I was using was working fine for me and my clients who took my recommendation, just wondering if it still was the best option.
I tried a few of the more well known products on the market, and my findings weren’t very positive. Of course they likely do a good job of catching viruses, malware, and the like, at the expense of performance. One product rendered my PC unusable. I had to select the “Disable All” option in the software, to take my laptop’s responsiveness to a respectable level.
Then I stumbled upon a product that caught my attention. The user interface at the time wasn’t so appealing, but they got rave reviews when it comes to the performance impact.
Introducing avast! Pro Antivirus
Funny. They have an exclamation point in their name as ACT! does.
The user interface gives users the ability to easily disable the real-time protection (which can be important when installing software like ACT!)
Since that time, I have the following comments on this software:
- No software or virus signature update created any issue with my system.
- It has caught a few viruses (I had none to start with).
- Warned me on websites I was visiting that had been hacked/compromised.
- They released an affordable way to cover 3-PCs (important for clients).
- ACT! Performance: I found no degradation in performance, and the software makes it easy to specify file/folder exclusions for scanning which is important for ACT! database speed. Some other antivirus packages I tested either buried the ability to set file/folder exclusions in their interface, or didn’t have the feature at all!
How to Purchase avast! Antivirus
I’m not a fan of “free” software when it comes to protecting data, etc. The idea is, if you are on the hook to protect my PC, I want to be able to call someone for help if there is an issue. That said, they do have a free version of the software for download. In fact they have 3 products to choose from, the last of the Internet Security version protecting 3 PCs (for $20 per) with flexible options to add more PCs or more years of protection.
Free is better than nothing. I recommend one of the paid versions if you can afford it, I’m using the Internet Security version, and as stated above, which has alerted me to dangerous websites.
Checkout avast! for yourself here. Let me know your thoughts/feedback in the comments below.
Photo credit: Carbonnyc
