AVG
Anti-Virus Free Edition
AVG Free provides the bare necessities when
it comes to security, but that should be
enough for savvy Windows users.
You'll get a combined antivirus and
antimalware engine, LinkScanner, and e-mail
scanning. AVG Free 9 introduces a few new
features, with improvements focused on
performance, including claims of faster scan
and boot times.
One new feature is the Identity Theft
Recovery Unit. Only for users in the United
States, ITRU is a business partnership with
Identity Guard which provides "consumer
identity theft solutions," accessible only
from the AVG toolbar in Firefox and Internet
Explorer.
The interface is nearly unchanged from the
last version, and generally it's easy to
use. From the main window, though, you must
double-click to get further information on
any feature, whether virus scanning,
LinkScanner settings, or updating.
Streamlining this to one click would be
helpful.
A scheduling utility automates both scans
and updates, while the upgrade ad at the
screen's bottom can be easily hidden using
the Hide Notification button. When starting
a scan, a slider makes it easy to jump
between Slow, Automatic, and Fast scans: the
faster the scan, the less comprehensive it
is, so users should take advantage of the
scan optimization that is recommended during
installation to speed up that first scan. A
progress meter for regular scans would've
been useful, though. Should a virus create
serious problems, AVG creates a rescue disk
to scan your computer in MS-DOS mode.
The LinkScanner feature protects you from
third-party code exploits before they load
in your browser and for ranking search
results. Annoyingly, when you install its
optional toolbar, it commandeers your
new-tab page, decidedly inappropriate
behavior.
The program doesn't obviously tax your
system when scanning or when running in the
background, although CNET Labs determined
that it will significantly slow down your
system's boot time, and slightly delay
shutting down. AVG also detected some image
files as threats, when two other scans
decided they weren't--we decided these were
false positives. AVG might not be the
fastest or the most effective free security
option, but it still gets the job done and
you're better off with it.
AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition is an
anti-virus protection tool available free of
charge to home users. Rapid virus
database updates are available for the
lifetime of the product, thereby providing
the high level of detection capability. |
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