Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2009 [OLD VERSION]
by Kaspersky Lab
![Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2009 [OLD VERSION]](/images/Kaspersky-Anti-Virus-2009-OLD-VERSION-B0018EI3H4-L.jpg)
|
List Price: Our Price: $39.00 You Save: $20.95 (35%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used and New: from $3.98 (click here) Category: Software See more product details and other editions |
|---|
Software Reviews of Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2009 [OLD VERSION]
Customer Review: Never going back to Symantec
Summary: 5 Stars
Kaspersky is simple effective program that only makes it self known when it needs to be. I think its faster, simpler and better than Norton. Give it a try and you'll never go back. The only think is its cheaper to buy a new disk from amazon every year than to update the program electronicallyCustomer Review: Solid product but ....
Summary: 4 Stars
I used pretty much all the big antivirus packages out there. Currently I am using F-Secure antivirus and I have mixed feelings about it.
Previously I used Kaspersky Security Suite and I didn't like it mostly because of the annoying firewall. As an antivirus I was always happy with it.
This package includes only the antivirus and is pretty solid. It installs without problems and it works. If you are worried about having on the CD an earlier version (build) that might have installation issues, you can always download the latest from Kaspersky and activate it with the serial number provided.
Kaspersky is a well-known name in the security software community and it always has one of the top places when somebody does a test on multiple security suites or antivirus programs.
The load on the system is not slowing it down, at least not on my machine, but maybe on older computers it could be a problem.
The only issue I have with this software is again the Kaspersky firewall. Since the firewall is not part of this package it is indirectly affecting it. Like most users, I would like to have a security suite rather than individual products made by different software vendors. In this case, I cannot have the anti-virus without having the Kaspersky firewall, therefore, no matter how good the antivirus I will not use that in combination with say Norton Firewall. This makes this product of limited value for me and I will probably not buy it by itself. The only use I can see for this as a standalone antivirus is on a test machine when you want to scan your suspect files with different antivirus programs.
Customer Review: Mostly Invisible
Summary: 4 Stars
Installing Kaspersky was mostly uneventful, however, it did require me to uninstall Spybot first (which seemed strange to me -- but not as strange as Spybot's response to being uninstalled). During the installation it did an update which took roughly an hour.
After that, it bacame mostly invisible. I haven't noticed any performance issues, and have been been pleased with this product.
I cannot say how well it is working, because there has been no virus alerts. I can say that it is mostly invisible and I like that.
Customer Review: [4.5 stars] Solid but unobtrusive performer.
Summary: 4 Stars
Malware, viruses, click-jacking, oh my!
Unfortunately, any Internet user has to be aware of how these words can affect how safely they navigate the Internet today. They have become as normal a part of Internet culture as an email address or facebook membership. If you are careful, and I mean *really* careful, you can get away with using the Internet without a "security" product--or more likely these days, a suite of products. I know some who do this without issues, but they're all systems administrators with decades of security administration under their belts. Most however should not venture out into the wild unprotected.
Enter Kasperksy. I have used various other A/V (anti-virus) programs in the past--McAfee is the choice anti-malware at my work--and there are a few things I judge them by, starting with what I call the overhead factor. Because these programs run constantly, just how much CPU time and system memory do they require? Like a good butler, I judge these programs by how little I notice them until (hopefully not) I need them. Of course, there are other judging criteria such as the heavily important one of how effective it is in catching and eradicating malware, and then how easy is it to use and finally, what's the upkeep? Downloading updates, how often the virus signatures are updated, etc.
I'm happy to say that Kasperky AV 2009 scores quite highly in each of the above departments. The installation itself was simple although not quick. On my Vista 32-bit Ultimate PC, it took almost 25 minutes and one restart to get it installed. In addition, it took a few more minutes to install updates; in total, set aside about an hour to get it installed and fully operational. This is a bit long, as you may imagine.
Thereafter, but for one little problem [update below], Kaspersky ran without problems. It was quite straightforward to configure and the reports of its activities are easy to read. The memory and CPU overhead are minimal considering what it does which is categorized in three general areas: anti-malware, system security and online security. For anti-malware, we have files and memory security, email and IM security and web traffic security. System security covers what it calls "proactive defense," which means it protects against the usual suspects (Trojans, worms, keylogger detection, hidden driver installation, OS kernel modifications--this is not a default however--and hidden object detection).
Setting all of these via the intuitive GUI is ... well, intuitive. There are some great real-time graphs of system and software activity which is all logged for later reference. Statistics are kept for a year while reports are kept, by default, for 30 days or 1GB whichever is less. It's all quite simple to manage.
The problem I spoke of before has to do with a pet peeve of mine and the reason I uninstalled McAfee from this very same computer. I fly online with Flight Simulator on a network known as VATSIM. Both McAfee and Kaspersky prevent normal operations of multiplayer function on VATSIM (and some others, I've heard) even though you have paused protection. I would like to be able to completely turn off anti-virus protection when I want and not have it actually continue to work regardless of setting.
[Update: Boy, was I wrong! Kaspersky does not interfere with VATSIM traffic. I'm not sure why it happened a time or two when I tried initially, but I've since discovered there are no issues whatever with running Kaspersky and VATSIM concurrently. This could have been because of the numerous updates to the software, but regardless, this bumps it up into the 4.5 star class.]
Apart from this, I judge Kaspersky A/V 2009 to be a top player in the field. I only wish the free update time period would be for more than one year for what it's worth, but that's a measure of how valuable I believe the software to be. A solid effort at 4 stars [4.5 stars!]
Customer Review: Kapersky is the top choice
Summary: 5 Stars
I've found the bigger name virus protections to be not my cup of tea. They generally take too much space, they try to do too much and it's almost as if they need to impress you that they're finding "stuff" on your computer.
I've tended to use smaller company's protection; it's almost as if the #2 guy has to try harder.
I need to tell you my biases in virus protection; I think they do less than people think, but in general people should have them as we seem unable to avoid click on everything we get or see. So as a necessary evil, I want the thing to not use lots of my CPU and I don't want it to take over my computer, adding toolbars to browsers, putting flashing icons etc etc. Just sit in the corner, and don't do anything until there's an actual threat.
I haven't found that perfect virus protection yet, but Kaspersky is a step in the right direction. I use AVG on my desktop and Kaspersky on my laptop. Both use Vista 64, so keep that in mind.
First some deatils. In addition to anti-virus, Kaspersky comes with an anti-spyware component, although it's anyone's guess how well this works. I tend to avoid clicking on attachments or installing random software from the internet, and I use alternate browsers on Windows. So I rarely see viruses, and no I didn't not try to infect my computer. I'll leave that to people who have infinite time to rebuild their computer.
The interface is good, even for people who aren't particularly computer inclined. If you like to tweak settings, Kaspersky allows that as well. I've found that many anti-viruses tend to give a lot of false positives. Kaspersky does that "not so much...".
Like all installations these days, it tries to do too much, and add too much protection (again, more is not better. add the minimum).
Here's the bottom line: I can live with Kaspersky. I don't use their anti-spyware, their firewall, I think all of them are unnecessary in Vista and a little bit of common sense.
Kaspersky's core anti-virus is more than competent. It doesn't slow your computer down. If you insist on adding every last bit of protection then yes it will do that. If you want a minimal setup, it will do that too.
This will work for you and not drive you crazy. That's a pretty good complement for software these days.