Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2009, 3-Desktop, 1 year Subscription (PC)

I'd hoped that this product would simply replace AVG which I've been using for a few years now however it appears that there are some clashes with these two products which I found out while trying to install Kaspersky Internet Security 2009, 3-Desktop, 1 year Subscription (PC) (see lengthy review). Similarly with this product installation has rendered my system unstable and I have had to recover in safe mode and uninstall. More technically minded people have advised that uninstalling AVG doesn't completely remove it from the system. One could argue from two points on this, either AVG is at fault for not removing itself properly, or Kaspersky is at fault for clashing with a widely used antivirus. I'm sure I can be shot down for either of these but I'm just Joe Public who thinks you should be able to install something and it work correctly.

I should point out that this is not an internet security suite. It does not contain a firewall, nor does it protect your Wi-Fi network and there are other limitations compared to a full internet security suite. What it does provide, is antivirus, anti-malware, email scanning, IM scanning, OS vulnerability scanning and more. It also claims to be installable on infected systems. If this is true and I have no reason to doubt it, it would make this a very useful thing to have sitting on the shelf as a contingency.
It installed easily. It has been running without causing any system slowdown. It performed a "Quickscan" after the installation reboot, which was, indeed, reasonably quick. It didn't find anything, but wasn't expecting anything. However on running a full scan, it managed to find a couple of possible Trojans that McAfee had missed.
Kaspersky has all the features you would expect of an antivirus program. They are well presented in an appealing GUI and it is simple to configure, including scheduling of updates and scans. On default settings Kaspersky automatically checks if there are updates available every hour and the release dates of the updates have a time signature as well as a date. This cannot be a bad thing, unless you are using a really old computer, in which case it could slow things down, but it does claim not to be resource hungry. This has proven not to be entirely true. Under normal circumstances it will not slow down my PC, however when it came to scanning my storage drive this was not the case. I am guilty of storing a lot of stuff on there I don't really need and need to clean it up, but when it came to scanning archives (.rar, .zip) it hung. This happens to me with all antivirus programs and like the rest it is possible to adjust the scan settings to avoid this problem. In its favour this was considerably easier to do than it ever was on McAfee and I was able to achieve what I wanted after a couple of attempts.
On the negative side, it is completely paranoid. Now, this is not necessarily a bad thing for an antivirus program, however it did prove annoying and I had to turn the keylogger detection function off after it flagged every game I was playing as a potential keylogger.
In summary, this seems to be a good application. Its features, which after my experience of one week on the system, work as claimed and are good. It has a simple, attractive interface which is considerably easier to use than McAfee (2008) or PCCillin (2007). It can be a little too efficient, but again, this is something easily adjusted to get it back below annoyance level. I would recommend this to all levels of user - if you are a basic user then you're not going to have files that make the scan hang and if you are the type of user that has large archive files you're likely to find getting over that issue relatively simple. Good stuff.

Anti-viral programs are very hard to evaluate unless you're attacked and the attack is blocked. There's always the chance that you get attacked and the AV program doesn't see anything, in which case, how do you know (unless it is a really malicious attack)?

I've had Kaspersky 2009 installed on my PC for several months now and so far nothing to report. I've received a few infected emails, which Kaspersky cleaned efficiently, and a few other minor threats have been detected, but there have been no major challenges. Then again, I'm a bit of a cautious bunny, believing the best antivirus is the one that keeps your finger off of the left mouse button.

So, what else can I tell you about Kaspersky? Well, I've previously run Norton, McAfee and Avast over the years and I have to admit that Kaspersky is the most discrete of them all. Database update notifications are almost shy in announcing themselves and most of the time you wouldn't know it is even running. There are occasional progress bars when running unknown executables, making sure they're safe, but this doesn't happen often and it is more reassuring than annoying.

Like most antiviral programs these days, Kaspersky does not just offer antivirus protection, but protection against spyware, phishing, malware websites, checks your system for exploitable vulnerabilities and pretty much everything else that you would consider essential protection.

One of the big problems I experienced with previous versions of Norton, and the reason I started avoiding it like the plague, was that it would take over your PC, eating up all available resources and slowing networks to a crawl. I've heard that this year's Norton has finally realised that we buy PCs to run programs other than the anti-virus and leaves some CPU to other applications, so a free trial might be worthwhile to offset my previous bad experiences. I found McAfee and Avast (a freeware program) were not too bad in terms of slowing down the PC, though Avast felt about 10% slower than McAfee. As for Kaspersky, I did notice some degradation of performance at first, but since then a couple of updates have rendered it unnoticeable, on a par with McAfee, if not better.

I left McAfee because they had formed a love affair with my bank card. It started when, last year, they just helped themselves to the annual subscription fee without asking, a couple of months in advance. Seems they had initiated an automatic renewal system which they subscribe you to automatically and you need to jump through hoops to unsubscribe from. I found this practice despicable and have now vetoed their product. I find the fact that they can opt you into such a program without your consent and then make it a chore for you to opt out of pushes the limits of legality.

Anyway, I'm rambling, back to Kaspersky. I did have one problem, just after the first install, where some sort of registry error led to system crashes. I had to uninstall and then re-install to fix it, but since then I've had no problems.

My remaining point could be seen as a plus or minus depending upon what sort of user you are. There are not many configuration options available for the program. For non-technical PC users, who want to keep things simple, this is a bonus, the interface is uncomplicated and fairly straightforward. However, if you're an experienced user who wants to be able to tweak their protection in all sorts of different ways, you'll be pretty disappointed I expect.

So, in the end I find Kaspersky to be a pretty good antivirus, providing an effective shield against most threats to your PC. It is discrete, both in terms of notifications and system resource usage, which I personally appreciate a lot. And on top of it all you get three licenses to install across three different PCs (now becoming a common, but good, practice), with each license running from its own installation date (not the date of the first license installed).

A recommendable product, though it is always worth downloading a free trial before you make a final decision. But, as my previous experience with McAfee revealed, bad surprises are not just limited to the running of the software. My Kaspersky renewal is not due for a few more months yet, so I'll have to come back to you on that one.

I'm giving it 5 stars, not because I consider it a superior product, but simply due to the fact that I have nothing to say against it.