5 Free Antivirus – Download Free Antivirus and Save your computer from Virus Attack!

Posted by Anees Jafri ||

August 17, 2008 ||

4,672 views ||

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Today I switched my computer ON just like any other day and the hell broke lose. Computer was running slow, high-speed internet was acting choked and I almost thought my monitor belongs to a 16 year old sexually charged with adult pop-ups all over the screen.

By the time I could figure out what went wrong (virus attack), I had already lost some data on my hard drive and my Operating System was acting weird.

A computer that is inadequately protected is vulnerable to all sorts of viruses, spyware or malicious codes which could attack your data or even your operating system.

Some malware are programmed to damage the computer by damaging programs, deleting files, or reformatting the hard disk. Other malware programs are not designed to do any damage, but simply replicate themselves and perhaps make their presence known by presenting text, video, or audio messages. (Wikipedia)

I gathered information on about 5 most popular free Antivirus softwares which do a good job of protecting your computer and keep your data safe from such attacks.

Why pay for Antivirus softwares when free ones are equally good? Following is the list of top 5 free antivirus softwares.

Avast Avast.com – avast! is a fully featured free antivirus designed specifically for home users or for non-commercial use, however, it requires you to register your free version with Avast within 60 days of installation. It is compatible with Windows Vista/XP/2000/NT/ME/98. The latest version of Avast 4.8 comes with 39 downloadable skins to personalize your free copy of antiviurs software.

Some of the features of avast! Free Antivirus for Home Edition are listed below.

Anti-spyware built-in
Web Shield
Anti-rootkit built-in
Automatic updates
Strong self-protection
Virus Chest
Antivirus kernel
System integration
Simple User Interface
Integrated Virus Cleaner
Resident protection
Support for 64-bit Windows
P2P and IM Shields
Internationalization
Network Shield

Click here to visit the official site and here to download avast!

AVG AVG.com – AVG’s is one of the most popular free Antivirus softwares available online. AVG has a strong userbase of 70 million users and the number just keeps going up! AVG is easy to download, install and use. It is compatible with Windows Vista & Windows XP and freely available for home and non-Commercial use.

AVG keeps it virus database udpated with the latest virus definitions, this helps its users detect the latest virus threats as soon as it hits internet.

Her are some of the key feature of AVG FREE Edition

Automatic update functionality
The AVG Resident Shield, which provides real-time protection as files are opened and programs are run
The AVG E-mail Scanner, which protects your e-mail
The AVG On-Demand Scanner, which allows the user to perform scheduled and manual tests
Free Virus Database Updates
AVG Virus Vault for safe handling of infected files

Click here to download AVG

Avira Avira.com – Avira AntiVir Personal – FREE Antivirus is a another reliable free antivirus solution, that constantly and rapidly scans your computer for malicious programs such as viruses, Trojans, hoaxes, worms, dialers etc. It also monitors every action executed by the user or the operating system and reacts promptly when a malicious program is detected.

“AntiVir is also low-profile. By that I mean it spawns only two background services and if there weren’t a system tray applet to access the program, you probably wouldn’t even know it was running.” – (pcworld.com)

Avira is a Free Antivirus protection for Windows Vista/XP/2000 and also for Linux users. It has over 30 million users worldwide.

Some of the features that Avira AntiVir Personal has are following.

Protection from viruses, worms and Trojans
Protection against expensive dialers
Protection from hidden rootkits
Faster Scanning up to 20% faster
Protection from phishing

Click here to download Avira AntiVir Personal.

BitDefender.com – Bitdefender offers its version of free antivirus and it also publicizes that it is “one of the world’s most effective antivirus engines for free!”

Bitdefender’s Free Edition is an on-demand virus scanner, which is best used in a system recovery and is ideal for users who connect to the internet on a regular basis; however it’s not for users who are “always-on” the internet. For these types of users Bitdefender recommends them to upgrade to a more powerful version of their software which is the paid version.

Few features offered by BitDefender are listed below

Antivirus
IMPROVED Proactive detection
Spyware scanning and cleaning
IMPROVED Deployment and use
IMPROVED User Experience
Hourly Updates
NEW Rootkit Detection and Removal

Bitdefender also comes with other features such as Skinable Interface, where you can customize the looks of the scanner.

Also included in this version is the “Quarantine” and “Report” feature. In Quarantine you can isolate the infected file to reduce the risk of your other files and OS getting infected any further. In the Reporting feature you can check the statistics of your last scan.

Click here to download your free version of Bitdefender..

Clamwin ClamWin.com – Clamwin offers a free antivirus program for Windows users. Clamwin is an open source project which helps it suers keep their machines from getting infected.

Clamwin has a high detection rate for viruses and spywares however it does not have a real time scanner. Clamwin does not yet automatically scan files. It is currently possible to add this functionality by using Winpooch. You need to manually scan your computer to detect a virus or a spyware.

The latest version of Clamwin Free Antivirus is 0.93.1

Its features are as listed below

High detection rates for viruses and spyware
Scanning Scheduler
Automatic downloads of regularly updated Virus definitions
Standalone virus scanner and right-click menu integration to Microsoft Windows Explorer
Addin for Microsoft Outlook to remove virus-infected attachments automatically

Click here to download Clamwin

Do leave a comment or let us know if you know of any other Free Antivirus which you can download and use.

Tags: Anti Spyware, Antivirus, Antivirus Protection, Download Antivirus, Download Free Antivirus, FREE Antivirus

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