Two things you might add to that, paid for AV does nothing different to prevent infection, that free will not do. And the biggest danger, zero day exploits are UNDEFENDABLE. So common sense is probably the most important, it helps when opening e-mails......
I used Norton Catcha Virus when I got 6 Months free with My New 2001 Gateway running ME. First Virus was someone came and wanted to show Bat a "Dancing Baby". Second Virus was somebody else tried watching a sex tape, Tonya Harding maybe ? Last Virus infected Norton itself, but don't remember who did it and where it came from ? Ran the next 6 Years without any anti-virus and Not letting anybody else near My keyboard
Although I do not use Bitdefender myself, it always has very high scores in AV Comparatives reviews (gold in 2015) so I do install the free version on other pc's, simple set up. Just sits in the corner and works without annoying you.
[FONT=&]Windows firewall, Comodo, Free Avast, Malwarebytes, SUPERantispyware, Spybot Search & Destroy and TDSSKiller will get you started. The thing is, you can't reply on any single program as none are perfect. And those suggested for you to try may not be what you need or want for various reasons. You just have to jump on in the pool and try some for yourself.[/FONT]
+1 for Bitdefender. I like the fact it's so unobtrusive. It updates itself automatically and scans in the background. You can also do on-demand scans if that's your thing. After using Avast and Avira, it's refreshing to use an antivirus app that doesn't nag to death you every chance it gets.
Secure A Plus is prob the best free AV you can get. It uses many signatures light on resources, and uses virus total for uploads. Has all the options too of paid AV's. As for paid AV Bitdefender is generally the go-to. Kaspersky is great as well. Either way, Secure A Plus is lately the best AV for free.
Well, the need for a AV really depends on your activities. You should keep in mind AV might save you from most popular or known malware and tricks, but it will not protect against all existing bad programs. Sometimes malware writers simply need to recompile their malware to go undetected again. If you are used to visiting alot of websites and do banking on Windows: - You might be good with running all applications through their own Sandboxie profiles, so they can't affect your real system. - If you allow a profile read permissions to a folder containing precious files and internet access, anything bad run in the profile could still Read and upload files if it is coded to. Also keyloggers would likely still work. - That is why I recommend running the Sandbox with multiple profiles with different permissions and make most autoclean. - You might still want to run a AV if you wish, but if it is missed through the engine and is not run in a Sandbox, it has access to the anything it has permission to (Or the whole system if it has Admin or System perm). If you are used to visiting alot of unknown websites and downloading alot of stuff everywhere: - AV 'might' be able to tell you if it might be bad. - The detection of malware depends on the quality of definitions, how active the group is and the agression of the heuristic. - If the heuristic is too agressive, it might cause false positives to happen alot more. - Just because a AV did not detect anything suspicious about some random program you downloaded, it might still be bad, but unknown to the engine (also called 0-day malware). - I recommend having a second malwarescanner like Malwarebytes, Emsisoft Portable, etc and different group then the AV your choosing, so incase you need to cleanup, anything one engine missed might be found by the other. - No AV will save you from stupidity unless it fully restricts you and everything happening on the system. AV like any program which does alot on your system might also have exploits and bugs that need to be fixed.
Norton internet security was best for me for years and i think it still best but if you want free good solution go for comodo internet security.
Well Kaspersky internet security 2016 is one of the best and if you have an account with Barclays bank in the UK...you can get it free. It's worth opening a current account with a deposit say £50-£100 and get it free every year. But in case Barclays start moaning about an unused account just shift some money around now and again.
MSE/Defender does the job for most people as far as "security" is concerned. MBAM is a good filler for if you think you just did something dumb. I find Avast to be way too chatty with the dialogue boxes. I would avoid all paid AV unless there are some of the extra features you're interested in (like IDprotection, auto-backup, password manager, etc) that sometimes comes in the suites, and even with those you can usually find better / free alternatives if you just use individual programs.
You have to be kidding! MS is simply the worst in every reputable AV independent analysis period! Yet with that said I totally agree with hearywarlot "the need for a AV really depends on your activities" I use MS and rarely have ever had any problems and I do higher than normal risky behavior online BUT I am a lot more informed than my clients. I dod NOT use MSE for my clients and I often "tier" protection which is what most security conscious IT people will recommend.
The only reasonable AV for windows is ProcessHacker (and some tools from sysinternals, winobj and procmon in particular). Most AVs behave like malware themselves, that is, do something with your computer, without your consent.