AVG is the most popular free antivirus software available. The company claims to have over 80 million users (including the paid version). Like any company AVG have continued to develop their technology and from 2006 has included spyware protection as well as antivirus protection.
Like any product that offers both paid and free versions you will get more from the paid version. The AVG anti virus free edition provides enough for most peoples needs though. If you want the added protection of identity security and other features then the paid version is not particularly expensive as far as antivirus software goes.
The AVG free virus scanner does its job very effectively and the latest version is designed to make good use of multi-core computers. This means the scanning is faster and won’t slow down your computer as many scanners can. The AVG free anti virus software is designed to run on Windows, Linux and FreeBSD platforms. While some people experienced problems with the earlier version using the ‘search-shield’ this has been rectified.
There seem to be only two small issues with using AVG anti virus protection. The first is if you decide to uninstall it. Like many self updating programmes changes can be made to your registry that your uninstaller may not pick up. The second issue is that in 2008 the AVG virus checker tried to identify a virus (smallBOT) on iTunes. If you should still find this on your edition don’t follow the antivirus directions or you may end up with problems.
Other than these two issues AVG seems to be the most efficient and unobtrusive anti virus software available, particularly if you are looking for something free. It is also very quick and easy to install. Just do a Google search for AVG antivirus free download and your software will be up running, giving you effective protection, within about 8 minutes (depending on your connection speed). It is no wonder this product remains number one for free virus protection.
