Best antivirus for Windows 7?

JDR13

SasqWatch
Original Sin Donor
Joined
October 21, 2006
Messages
39,138
Location
Florida, US
I finally got around to installing my copy of Windows 7 Pro 64 bit, and now have a dual-boot rig with WinXP-Win7. Now I just need an antivirus program that's compatible with Windows 7.

So who do you think makes the best overall AV program for Windows 7?
 
Joined
Oct 21, 2006
Messages
39,138
Location
Florida, US
Skipped AV in win7. Haven't regret this decision so far.
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
6,027
Got the same OS.

Still using avast! (home edition) after GG's recommendation, it's working well enough for me.

Might go back to Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) some day to see if it's gotten any better. That one was very slow for me when downloading files in Firefox and I wasn't sure about MS' update cycle, but others didn't have any problems with it. What I liked most about it was that it was really, really quiet and stayed in the background.

I'd still like to recommend running Secunia PSI as well if you aren't already, and keep it running in the background, to know when there is insecure or out-of-date software on your computer.
 
Last edited:
Joined
Aug 30, 2006
Messages
3,486
I'm just using the Microsoft antivirus. It's free and seems to be very light on the load (reason why I stopped using other commercial AVs, at one point or another they would bring the system down to a crawl)
 
Joined
Sep 23, 2008
Messages
5,645
Location
Tardis
My tests so far w/ MSE is good for basic users, noobs, techno-phobes - auto updates, seems to be low on resource usage, lets you allow/disallow files, and has a nice detection rate. It does it's thing in the background and leaves you alone. The scan function seems like it's a bit quicker now, but realistically I dont hold scan rate all that high on the priority list. It shouldnt get to that point. Nobody's perfect, stuff slips thru as attacks become more sophisticated, and you should have a firewall enabled to help, but still if youre catching things in a scan at a later time it's not doing it's job sufficiently at present imo.

As for the advanced users, people that can put up w/ some nagging n stuff I'm a steadfast Avira advocate, I think it's an excellent free product.
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
5,228
Location
San Diego, Ca
Unless you're talking strictly free, the best AV program I have ever used is Kaspersky, hands down.
 
Thanks for all the suggestions so far, I didn't realize MSE was free. A friend of mine also offered me a copy of Avast!. I think I'm gonna try MSE first.

The best AV I ever used for Windows XP was Symantec Corporate Edition, but a new version of that would cost me around $100.
 
Joined
Oct 21, 2006
Messages
39,138
Location
Florida, US
Avast! works for me, but if you are running your windows with non-admin account, there isn't that big need for anti-virus software.

Just remember to turn off those extra modules from avast and put it to silent mode. ;)
 
Joined
Mar 9, 2009
Messages
495
Location
Finland
Still using nothing other than Microsoft Security Essentials, and it seems to be doing a sufficient job by itself so far.
 
Joined
Oct 21, 2006
Messages
39,138
Location
Florida, US
I don't really know which one is the best for windows 7, but I do have found a website where they say about the best ten anitvirus software from 2010, I guess those work on windows 7 too.
 
Joined
Aug 4, 2010
Messages
1
Back
Top Bottom