Da Vinci's Reviews

AntiVirus S/W List

Bitdefender
PC-Cillin
F-Secure
McAfee Antivirus
Norton Antivirus
AVG Antivirus
CA Antivirus
Panda Antivirus
PCsecurityShield
Kaspersky
Eset NOD32
Webroot Spysweeper
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Bitdefender AntiVirus v10

End User Experience
Size/Speed
Customer Support
Effectiveness
Ease of Use
Spyware Blocker
USP of the product
USP:On the whole, currently, this is the best product one can have with a near-perfect way of maintaining Internet Security.

Bitdefender is an award winning antivirus software, which comes with a built-in firewall & Anti-spyware. It runs on Windows 98, Me, 2000, and XP. It has a both 1 year & 2 year subscriptions.



End User Experience
Bitdefender installs smoothly without any problems. It is a little bit heavy on the memory & processor. Applications run a little bit slower on PCs with Bitdefender. This is one of the main complaint by users. The previous version (Version 9) runs better than the current version. When compared to other AntiVirus software, it could be improved to reach the user expectations.

Size/Speed

Speed
Considering all the reviews given by the users, the overall speed is not up to the mark. There are complaints, that it gives extra load to the PC & makes the system slow.

Size
Minimum 128 MB of RAM & 60MB of hard disk space. we suggest the RAM size of 256MB, as a 128 MB RAM may make the system slow too slow.

Customer Support


Support by phone is available. There were complaints about the support. It seems that users have to wait on hold for long times.

It has Live online assistance. Once you login into your account, you can access it. http://www.bitdefender.com/site/Live-Assistance.html

Apart from this, Biddefender's official site (www.bitdefender.com) has good technical resources & product documentation.
Support will be provided for 1Year, as the subscription period is 1 Year for 1 user. Once your subscription gets expired you need to renew it.

Effectiveness

It detects for rootkits (malicious programs designed to control victim computers, while staying hidden) and removes them on detection. Scans and disinfects infected files on access, minimizing data loss. Provides filters against viruses that spread via instant messaging and file sharing software applications.It also provides safe and enjoyable web experience by filtering the Web traffic in real-time even before reaching the users browser. Monitors and prevents potential spyware threats in real-time, before they can damage the system

Ease of Use


Installation 
It installs easily on most of the PCs with given minimum specifications.


Uninstallation 
It uninstalls easily, with a click of an icon, which can be accessed from the programs list. After uninstallation, it asks for a restart of the computer. Thats all. The con we saw is, it leaves some files & registry entries left over after the uninstallation. The uninstall process could be better.


Dialy Use
The user interface is pretty simple & easy to understand. It has a tiny Black Box just on the top of the notification area. This is called as BitDefender's Scan Activity monitor. A green line indicates when files are scanned for viruses and spyware; BitDefender Antivirus 10 Plus customers will also see a red for firewall activity. A right-click hides this feature but never fully removes it. To remove the monitor, which we found to be distracting, you'll need to go into the system configuration settings. Also on the settings page, you can change the skin of the application from the default red to a much calmer blue.

Coming to the interface of the control panel, it has navigation controls on the left sidefor General, Antivirus, Antispyware, and Update. The general section contains options like ScanNow, update & settings. There is a security level slider, which can be used to modify the security settings, according to usage, with a click. There are other options like, whether to scan the core files or the entire file system. You can set these options according to your security needs. It has a built-in firewall. when a program tries to access internet, it notifies us to act, whether to grant or deny permission.


Updates
The built-in update manager regularly checks for any available updates. It depends on how you set this feature. Either you can schedule this or you can do a manual update. Most of the updates come into action instantly, while some asks us to restart the computer.

Spyware Blocker


This is one of the Anti-Virus programs which provides built-in spyware & firewal. The other good feature in it is, it has a built-in privacy protection module, which protects the information. For example, when some program tries to send credit card information online. It asks us, before it sends. By default this option is disabled. You can enable this under the advanced settings menu.