What's the Best Anti-virus?

I only use Microsoft Essentials cuz I got tired of paying for antivirus.

Free Antivirus You Can Trust - Page 2 | PCWorld
reasonably recent [april].
MSE stinketh. back to the drawing boards, MS. Why don't they just buy AVAST? Aha! the answer is, if they did, in short order they'd ruin the operation.

IMHO the problem with pcworld and other 'test lab' processes is that they are outdated by years. very few infections anymore are "virus" related [I think its around 3% of all malicious cases... somebody correct me]
The line between "malicious" and "marketware" is and has been very fuzzy, very subjective.
I worked on a poor old Vista system sunday that was virtually impossible to use with IE8 [the worst thing ever put out by MS], but the better tools really didn't detect anything particularly viral or "malicious".
But there was a motherload of toolbars, multiple search helpers, then the usual crowd of updaters. together they were making it awful for a user of IE - not so much chrome or other good modern browser. On a whim, I dl'd and ran the latest complete rev of Spybot, still officially in 'Beta'. It is very aggressive and identified over a dozen targets [this was AFTER I had removed a lot of BHO's and other miscreants with HJT]. A handful were legitimate useful items, just consumptive, which I had to uncheck [leave].
So, it illustrates what I'm saying - some are just poorly written, self-serving junkwares, while other's cross the line into malicious. Sadly, some of THE MOST MALICIOUS items floating about are never detected, don't cause obvious system issues, are unknown to 95% of all users. I speak of the "watchers". This is WELL worth the few minutes to 'get smart' on the topic: Gary Kovacs: Tracking the trackers | Video on TED.com
The "common man" needs a way to strike back at these malefactors, and Collusion is a step in the right direction.

it's not kaspersky that's for sure i'm fed up of getting trojans and whatever else i'm sure is hidden on my system currently.i use a lot of memory cards , usbs and electronic devices on multiple systems though.

I go for..

Norton IS and Malwarebytes Anti-malware..

BitDefender Total Security 2012 or Kaspersky Total Security 2012 for the win!

I have 3 PC's all useing Zone Alarm internet security suite for the last 5 years.
I have Win7 Firewall and Defender turned off.
Never had a problem ever.

Microsoft security essentials and malwarebytes for me.

Never had a virus to date.

Can't understand anyone using or paying for norton or mcafee.

I have nothing but problems with both products.