Which is the Best Free Anti Virus for Win 7

[Vicky]

Hi My Anti Virus Provided by Dell for Laptop Inspiron 1440 has expired and I am looking for Light/effective and free anti virus for my Laptop with Win 7. Please suggest.

 

[zigzag3143]

Hi My Anti Virus Provided by Dell for Laptop Inspiron 1440 has expired and I am looking for Light/effective and free anti virus for my Laptop with Win 7. Please suggest.

Vicky hi and welcome

many of us like microsoft security essentials. small footprint low resources. It just works


Ken J+

 

[Tews]

Microsoft Security Esentials... -=> Here

 

[Juxhin]

I would prefer Avira as a free antivirus.
i Currently use Eset Smart Security 4 and looks to work fine

 

[manhunter2826]

Definitely Avast for me

 

[pparks1]

You can search this topic and see that it has been discussed to death. While people are usually extremely passionate about their own personal choices, it seems that Microsoft Security Essentials, Avast, AVG and Avira all get pretty high marks.

I have been using AVG on my older machines and Microsoft Security Essentials on my Windows 7 machines.

 

[Victek]

Hi My Anti Virus Provided by Dell for Laptop Inspiron 1440 has expired and I am looking for Light/effective and free anti virus for my Laptop with Win 7. Please suggest.

.
If you don't mind trying a beta product have a look at the new Avast! 5 beta. Users say it is very stable and very close to feature complete (they're still implementing the behavior shield). You could also try Panda Cloud AV.

As others have mentioned there's no one "best" product - at least not one that everyone can agree on.

 

[polarbear]

Try MSE and Avast side by side to find the one you like best. ( will work side by side ) I have tested both and would say either or will do the job. GL

 

[Vicky]

Hi All, thank you very much to all of you for helping me out, really appreciate your suggestions, after reading all of yours comments, for the time being I have decided to go with MSE first. For the AVG I have read on net that their latest version is eating up lot of system resources and system is getting slow, so will start from MSE, any idea correct place to get MSE from?

 

[Tews]

Why go anywhere if you find that it fills your needs??

 

[jav]

any idea correct place to get MSE from?

http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/

 

[Vicky]

Hi Jew & Tews, many thanks for the site address, right now I am downloading it

 

[manhunter2826]

Good to see you being security conscious Vicky

 

[Vicky]

Good to see you being security conscious Vicky

Thanks manhunter, i have suffered a lot in the past because of virus and since this is my first new laptop so just extra care

 

[manhunter2826]

^Good to hear. Yes, once bitten...and with MSE you get in-built anti-malware protection too.

As I use Avast, I have Windows Defender as a separate install .

 

[ryan7]

I'm currently using and have been using for years, AntiVir which is free (or has a free version I should say).

I've also tried MSE and must say that it is just as good if not better then AntiVir.

 

[chev65]

AVG breaks Homegroups in case you guys were wondering. I have another name for AVG = Sabotage and Norton isn't far behind. The fact of the matter is that I've seen just about every Anti Virus cause problems with Windows 7. Anyone who reads this forum can see this is true. The situation should improve in the months to come.

 

[Victek]

Hi All, thank you very much to all of you for helping me out, really appreciate your suggestions, after reading all of yours comments, for the time being I have decided to go with MSE first. For the AVG I have read on net that their latest version is eating up lot of system resources and system is getting slow, so will start from MSE, any idea correct place to get MSE from?

Here is the home page for MSE:

http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/

 

[smarteyeball]

I don't like MSE because to individually scan a single file via the context menu, the resident shield has to be active. (from the quick play I had with it anyway)

I prefer to not having a resident scanner enabled.

Avira is good, but there are a few 'nag' screens promoting other products in it's range. It's also pretty big on 'false positives' (I'm not a fan of promoting nag screens)

Avast 5 beta root kit scan gives you options to select with a keyboard when completed - which none seemed to work with a USB mouse, requiring a hard reset.

Then again I have a few different versions of Seven installed to test each A/V and haven't spent barely enough time with each apart from Avast 4.8

And Chev65 is right, AVG and Norton are just as bad as viruses themselves - they cause more harm than help

 

[GeorgeB]

Microsoft Security Essentials, it has very good reviews and did well
in the AV-Tests.