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One of the most important, but not the only, line of defense in keeping your PC safe, sound and free from harm is virus protection. One of the true standards for many users is Norton Anti Virus. For the longest time I believed it was the only game in town when it comes to protecting your PC from viruses. There is still much to recommend it as a great tool. However, it is not the only tool on the market and its supremacy is not something one should assume to be unshakable.
While Norton AntiVirus may be ubiquitous, McAfee’s entry is far from being a dark horse in the protection market. After giving McAfee’s latest virus program VirusScan 7 a test run I discovered some rather interesting elements to the program.
The first is that McAfee’s is appreciably faster than Norton. While Norton is complete, McAfee manages to run a bit faster, and the closing and opening screens are a bit easier to read. The entire aesthetic that permeates the product line is streamlined for maximum legibility. Much like their SpamKiller, Firewall and QuickClean programs, the look, feel and location of features is much the same. Everything is kept as clear as possible with little if any distortion or difficulty.
The installation of VirusScan was a breeze. Literally it involved popping in the disk, selecting install, and you have instant protection. As soon as the install is complete, you are prompted to go online for updates. As is always the case, anti virus protection is only as good as the list of files it can protect. McAfee has made this very simple.
One of the features that sets McAfee VirusScan apart from the competition is the inclusion of a built-in firewall. Utilizing McAfee’s own firewall coupled with virus protection makes a great deal of sense. Everyone online will need both for comprehensive protection. This integration just adds more value to a solid application.
Another feature that McAfee VirusScan includes is the creation of an emergency disk in case trouble starts and you need to scan while infected. Hopefully you will never need to use this feature, but it is nice to see it is still implemented for those moments when you need that functionality.
Much like many anti virus applications, one has to be aware of the whole interface which works much like a Web page with links that access features. Unlike office applications with tool bars and menus, the interface for McAfee is built around links that direct you to the features you need. For newbie’s this is probably a bit easier to navigate. For those more accustomed to the menu tool bar format, it takes some getting use to when it comes to moving around the application to locate features, functions and settings.
What it does not take long to get used to is the fact that McAfee is noticeably faster than Norton, and it seems to take up less overhead. I had noticed that some anti virus applications can slow a system down. Version 7 in my experiences did not slow performance and managed to work well with other aspects of my test system.
The one feature I did miss and wished McAfee had incorporated into 7 is the tight integration that Norton AntiVirus has with Outlook and Outlook Express. While McAfee does offer built in protection with Outlook, it does not offer the same built in feature with Outlook Express. This is unfortunate since Norton AntiVirus does such an excellent job of capturing virus carrying emails quickly. Plus, the interface for McAfee leaves something to be desired. While efficient, it is large, clunky and simply put not all that visual arresting. It resembles a left over from an earlier version, and does not carry over the look of the rest of the application. If you did not know better you would assume it is part of another program. Nonetheless, it does do the job.
Where McAfee excels is with their HAWK feature. HAWK in this case stands for Hostile Activity Watch Kernel. What this does is look for odd activity like mass mailings and alerts you to the fact that mass mailings are being sent via your mailbox. It is the perfect feature for spotting virus activity for viruses yet to be detected and offers a solid layer of protection. This coupled with McAfee’s new script stopper technology means that virus like activity is stopped dead. This can be a good thing. Several times it alerted me to virus like activity and was correct, as well as making clear that the activity in question could be normal usage. So I was impressed with the warning message and the speed at which it works.
In addition VirusScan 7 comes with PDA synchronized scanning, the ability to check PC points for entry and free chat and email technical support. Also, the firewall and virus scanner are updatable to make sure you are up to date and running with the latest definitions.
I have to admit I have always had a preference for Norton AntiVirus protection. It has always worked well in the past. However, I am starting to see clearly that McAfee VirusScan is a value packed feature rich fast anti virus program. Being fast, offering solid protection, and a built in firewall, there is much here to admire. While every computer is different, I did notice that my entire PC worked a tad faster with Virus Scan 7. Plus, VirusScan also takes up fewer system resources when running. This translates into your computer running smoothly while fully protected. The latest version of VirusScan is an application well worth considering if you are a new user, or one willing to see the advantages of a virus scanner that is capable and price point wise excellent.
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