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- EPD 81: Fan Mail Friday’s (02/17/2012)
- AVG Internet Security 2012 (2012.0.1913) – Full Review
- AVG Free Anti-Virus 2012 Version (2012.0.1913) – Freeware Review
| EPD 81: Fan Mail Friday’s (02/17/2012) Posted: 16 Feb 2012 09:30 PM PST Dear CSW Admin Team, How often do you post content ? and will we be seeing and new "Scam Watch" features anytime soon ? Sent In By Taleya —————————-
—————————- Remy's Reply: We post content everyday 7 dayz a week. The posts go live 15 mins after Midnight in my time zone. Which would be the EST or Eastern Standard Time Zone. Which is my local Canadian Time Zone. Now about your second question "Will we be seeing and new "Scam Watch" features anytime soon ?" Yes, you will be seeing new Scam Watch features. You will also be seeing content updated and some cases like this past week upgraded. Danny's Reply: Taleya…. Of course that does not included news and other such time sensitive features or reviews. Remy is just talking about our 7 core posts for the week. We often have other reviews, features and or news. That does not fit into that 15mins after Midnight time line. —————————————————————— Return To The Main Features Page —————————————————————— Till Next Friday, Remy "Se7en + Danny Advertisement |
| AVG Internet Security 2012 (2012.0.1913) – Full Review Posted: 16 Feb 2012 09:15 PM PST The Rating Scale Breakdown:
————————– Price: $49.49 USD A. Installation AVG – 4.0 "Great" – Slower then AVG claims. B. Un-installing AVG – 3.5 "Average" – A little faster then AVG 2011 ——————– C. Stability Of Program –5.0 "Excellent" – We have received absolutely no e-mails about the lack of stability. ——————– D. Has AVG Free Been Compromised By Hackers Or Virus – 5.0 "Excellent" – AVG Internet Security 2012 has not been compromised or disabled. E. Speed of Scan – 5.0 "Excellent" – Very quick on most computers. Also now you can decide how much memory you want to take up during each system scan. F. Does AVG Free Do Automatic Updates By Itself Without Issue – 5.0 "Excellent" – Yes, and this time around there seems to be no stalling and or hanging. When we manually update AVG. As we have seen in older versions of AVG. G. Internet Browser Cookie Detection Rate And Removal Test – 2.5 "Poor" - Getting better. But you are way better off with SUPERAntiSpyware or CCleaner to remove your Internet cookies. ————————– 1. Anti-Virus Detection Rate Test - 1A. Windows XP - 4.0 "Great" 1B. Windows Vista – 4.0 "Great" 1C. Windows 7 – 4.0 "Great" ————————– 2. Anti-Spyware – 2.0 "Poor" – AVG still seems to miss very common and not so common spyware/adware. You are much better off with SUPERAntiSpyware or Spybot as your adware, spyware, malware protection. 3. One Click Fix – 4.5 "Great" – I really like this idea. But I am not a fan of the idea that if I wanted to de-activated a service. Such as the Link Scanner that AVG should still show my PC as not being fully protected. 4. Anti-Spam - 3.0 "Average" - Tough to setup and GMail has better spam mail protection. 5. FireWall - 3.5 "Average" — Not the best Firewall I've tested. But it does do what it is suppose to most of the time. 6. Link Scanner - 4.5 "Great" - Can be very very useful to some. 7. AVG Security ToolBar – 3.5 "Average" - Not a big fan of any toolbars. But at least this time around it seems to not crash my browser. 8. AVG SideBar Gadget – 3.5 "Average" – Less functional then most other sidebar gadgets and or widgets. But it can be very useful for quick AVG interactions. 9. Residential Shield Test – 3.5 "Average" – I find that AVIRA and or AVAST still seems to grab the virus way before AVG does. ————————– 10. Family Safety - 4.5 "Great" - Cost $19.99 CAD per year for 3 PC's to activate this just newly added option. But it covers unlimited profiles. So you can have just one or two kids or 11 kids and your good. Provided it is only used up to 3 PC's. 11. LiveKive - Not Tested – This option has just been added to AVG Dashboard. But it cost money to activate. -See below for cost to activate said option- *Cost FREE for 5 GB of storage per year. *Cost $49.99 USD for 25 GB of storage per year. *Cost $59.99 USD for 50 GB of storage per year. *Cost $79.99 USD for Unlimited storage per year. *** DISCLAIMER: Both 10 & 11 are not included in our overall score. As they are not included and cost extra. ————————– 12. E-Mail Scanner - 3.5 "Average" - It's ok, But I find it is way more difficult to set-up then it needs to be. 13. Update Manager – 5.0 "Excellent" – No issues here at all. And it even updates faster then past AVG versions. 14. Online Shield - 4.0 "Great" – Still not really sure. How really effective this option truly is. 15. Anti-Root Kit – 4.5 "Great" – Very hit and miss. But can be very useful if there is a reason to believe you may have a deep rooted virus. Never hurts to run this every few weeks just to be on the safe side. And AVG has it as a completely separate dedicated scan option as well (Which makes it way quicker to run and it uses much less system resources.) 16. System Tools – 3.5 "Average" – Great idea but very poorly done. Now the information is there but it is very very hard to decipher even for the more Computer Savvy of us. 17. Identity Protection - 4.5 "Great" - A very useful feature that lets you know when you maybe at risk for identity theft and or other important information maybe at risk. Such as with Peer 2 Peer file sharing programs, certain add-ons and some toolbars. 18. SpeedTest – 4.5 "Great" - I found this addition to be very useful and very accurate as well. If only all speed tests apps/programs and or sites were this worry free. 19. PC Analyzer – 0.5 "Abysmal" – If you don't mind that you only can fix your errors for free once then great. But if you are like me and you probably feel this options is both somewhat misleading and out right bait to buy this extremely expensive add-on. Then you are probably with me on my conclusion. ** On a side note. I fully expected with the paid version of AVG Internet Security 2011. That the PC Analyzer would be an included as a usable option. 20. AVG Support - 1.0 "Terrible" – Even with e-mail support and phone support. AVG remains as one of the worst main stream software companies for help with their paid versions of their software. And yet again this is very disappointing and sad thing to report as AVG is in the top 3 Anti-Virus solutions out there. ————————– My Verdict (with regards to changes made between AVG's last version (2012.0.1901) to the current AVG (2012.0.1913) version) - My score has remained pretty much the same. As I did not really see any real new additions and or improvements with this minor update. I have noticed however a slight fix for the people who wish to update from AVG 2011 to 2012. But I have not tested this improvement as all my computers are already at the new AVG 2012. I have also noticed that the tool bar has been updated. But again I don't really use that feature, so it has no real impact for me. My Final Verdict Part 1: The main difference in AVG Internet Security 2012. Is the minimalist UI (User Interface). For most users this won't be a big issue. But I find it very frustrating as it seems that AVG decided to move all of its technical information. Such as the version codes over to the AVG "Help" section. My Final Verdict Part 2: I'm not really sure why AVG feels the need to hide its primary assents. Instead of having them all visible and active via the main user interface. Now I understand certain features by default should be non-active. But why are so many important features need to be activated by hand. Seems some what bewildering to me. When the bulk of the features are so important and often are the main reasons you spent nearly $50 dollars in the first place. **As per the norm it is highly recommend that you upgrade to the new AVG Internet Security 2012. As soon as possible if you are still using one of AVG older versions. So you can insure you have the best protection AVG has to offer. Important Overall Score Side Note: I have in this review added for the first time a feature/app called SpeedTest. So you will notice the score has been tweaked to now included that. So now instead of th3 score bing out of 130. It is now out of 135. Which boosts the overall score by .02 of a %. (Just in case you guys were comparing my last review to this new review.) ————————– My Overall Score: 101/135 74.8% = B - ————————– Here are 2 links to download the 30 day trailware version of AVG Internet Security 2012: 1. http://free.avg.com/us-en/free-internet-security (AVG Main Site) 2. http://download.cnet.com/AVG-Internet-Security-2012/3000-2239_4-10710160.html?tag=mncol;2 (Via download.com/Cnet) —————————————————————— Return To The Main Reviews Page —————————————————————— Till The Next Review, Remy "Se7en" Advertisement |
| AVG Free Anti-Virus 2012 Version (2012.0.1913) – Freeware Review Posted: 16 Feb 2012 02:31 PM PST The Rating Scale Breakdown:
————————– Price: Free A. Installation AVG – 4.0 "Great" – Slower then AVG claims. B. Un-installing AVG – 3.5 "Average" – A little faster then AVG 2011 ————————– C. Stability Of Program - 5.0 "Excellent" – We have received absolutely no e-mails about the lack of stability. ————————– D. Has AVG Free Been Compromised By Hackers Or Virus – 5.0 "Excellent" – No issues reported thus far. E. Speed of Scan – 5.0 "Excellent" – Very quick on most computers. And now you have the option to choose how much Memory/Ram you want each scheduled scan to take up. F. Does AVG Free Do Automatic Updates By Itself Without Any Issue – 5.0 "Excellent" – Yes, and this time around there seems to be no stalling and or hanging. When we manually update AVG. As we have seen in older versions of AVG. G. Internet Browser Cookie Detection Rate And Removal Test – 2.5 "Poor" - You are way better off with something like SUPERAntiSpyware or CCleaner that is more dedicated to removal of Internet cookies. AVG Internet cookie detection rate is terrible even with the option active and checked off. ————————– 1. Anti-Virus Detection Rate Test: 1A. Windows XP – 4.0 "Great" 1B. Windows Vista – 4.0 "Great" 1C. Windows 7 -4.0 "Great" ————————– 2. Anti-Spyware - 2.0 "Poor" – AVG still seems to miss very common and not so common spyware/adware. You are much better off with SUPERAntiSpyware or Spybot as your adware, spyware, malware protection. 3. One Click Fix – 5.0 "Excellent" – I love this idea and is saves a lot of the headaches. When I'm trying to figure out what is wrong with my AVG. 4. Link Scanner - 4.5 "Great" - Not a fan. But it can be very very useful to some. ————————– 5. Family Safety – 4.5 "Great" – Cost $19.99 CAD per year for 3 computers to activate this just added feature -But it covers unlimited profiles. So you can have just one kid or 11 kids and your good. Provided it is only used with up to 3 PC's 6. LiveKive – Not Tested – This feature has just been added to AVG Dashboard. But it cost money to activate. -See below for cost to activate feature- *Cost $49.99 CAD for 25 GB of storage per year. *Cost $79.99 CAD for Unlimited storage per year. *** DISCLAIMER: Both 5 & 6 are not included in our overall score. As they are not included and cost extra. ————————– 7. AVG Security ToolBar - 4.0 "Great" - This toolbar in the past versions have caused crashes. But thus far no such issues to report. 8. AVG SideBar Gadget – 3.5 "Average" – Much better then AVG 2011 as it appears a little less bulky. It does cause problems when you already have your side bar full of way more useful widgets/gadgets already. 9. Residential Shield Test -3.5 "Average" – I still find AVIRA and AVAST seems to grab the virus way before AVG. But there is indeed some major overall improvements here yet again. 10. E-Mail Scanner - 3.5 "Average" - This is option great if you can figure out how to set it up. 11. Updating - 5.0 "Excellent" – No issues here at all. And AVG even seems to be a little bit faster then past versions of AVG. Barely even noticeable to most users. 12. Anti-RootKit – 4.5 "Great" – Very hit and miss. But can be very useful if there is a reason to believe you may have a deep rooted virus. Never hurts to run this every few weeks just to be on the safe side. And AVG has it as a completely separate dedicated scan option as well (Which makes it way quicker to run and it uses much less system resources.) 13. Identity Protection - 4.5 "Great" – A very useful feature that lets you know when you maybe at risk for identity theft and or other important information maybe at risk. Such as with Peer 2 Peer file sharing programs, certain add-ons and some toolbars. 14. PC Analyzer – 0.5 "Abysmal" - If you don't mind that you only can fix your errors for free once then great. But if you are like me and you probably feel this options is both somewhat misleading and out right bait to buy this extremely expensive add-on. Then you are probably with me on my conclusion. 15. AVG Support – 1.0 "Terrible" – With only a free forum that is both hard to use and very disorganized to boot. I can't recommend using it as it will just end up in a fit of pure frustration and often just un-installing AVG altogether. Or of course you could visiting a site like ours. ————————– My Overall Score: 92.5/120 77 % = B + ————————– My Verdict With Regards To Changes Made Between last version (2012.0.1901) to the current (2012.0.1913) version - My score has remained the same as I have seen no real new additions and or improvements with this very minor update. I have noticed however a slight fix for the people who wish to update from AVG 2011 to 2012. But I have not tested this improvement as all my computers are at the new AVG 2012 for quite sometime now. I have also noticed that the tool bar has been updated and patched. My Final Verdict -Part 1- The main difference in AVG Free Anti-Virus 2012. Is the minimalist (less detailed) UI (User Interface). For most AVG users will be just fine with this UI change. But I find it very frustrating as it seems that AVG decided to move all of the technical information. Such as AVG's version codes over to AVG's "Help" section. My Final Verdict -Part 2- I also noticed it looks like AVG stripped down many of it's features that were present in last years AVG Free 2011. But actually I am happy to say. That is not the case. AVG instead for some reason decided hide both the main interface icons and said options in a more user unfriendly manner. You maybe asking me Kirbe "Where did AVG put those options ?" Well I'm glade you asked. They hide them in the "Tools tab" under "Advanced setting". So there you go. They appear to have vanished, but instead they are very well hidden from most basic AVG users. **As per the norm it is highly recommend that you upgrade to the new AVG Free Anti-Virus 2012. As soon as possible if you are still using one of AVG older versions. So you can insure you have the best protection AVG has to offer. ————————– Here are 2 links to download AVG Free Anti-Virus 2012: 1. http://free.avg.com/ww-en/download-free-antivirus (AVG Main Site) 2. http://download.cnet.com/AVG-Anti-Virus-Free-Edition-2012/3000-2239_4-10320142.html?tag=rb_content;main;pop (Via download.com/Cnet) ————————– —————————————————————— Return To The Main Reviews Page —————————————————————— Till The Next Review, Kirbe Advertisement |
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