These 3 are the top anti-virus suits in the world. There’s no doubt about that. Individual test lab reports and many user reviews have proved it. But finding the best among these three is really hard. But, at the end you have to pick one! So, let the battle begin!
I have used all the three apps in my machines. Used each of them for several months before trying a new one. So, I’m qualified to review them. Before reading my review, I think you should check these video reviews create by Languy99. He’s a well-known security app reviewer who likes to play with a list of highly dangerous malware links and a zip file full of malware files which can actually kill your computer. He’s going to throw them at these security suits and… Lets see whats going to happen…
Before I start my review, I should mention this… None of the anti-virus apps in the world can protect you from all the malware threats. None of them are 100% perfect. Another thing… I’m not going to do a side by side comparison and go through each and every feature. That’s not right… Each of them have their own unique features. So, we are going to see an overall review off the apps… Understood? Perfect! Then lets start…
Norton :
A long time ago, Norton was the number one security suit on earth. If we ask about an anti-virus, everyone answered “Norton”. It became the default app for most of us. But with the rise of other suits like Kaspersky, and because of the high resource usage of Norton, its popularity went down. That’s the past. The new Norton is one of the most lightest security apps I have ever used. The impact on system resources is very low.
When it comes to security, Norton now offers some complicated protection systems. They have a very solid app. But, their detection rate is a bit low. According to both the above mentioned video and the AV-Test reports, Norton stays at the bottom of our list.
But I should say that the app is very stable. Some of the other security apps have some nasty habits of conflicting with your software and crashing. But Norton worked really well in my machine. But stability is not the most important factor!
When it comes to features, Norton is not the most feature rich app I have used. It have some nice features like scanning and rating the downloaded files immediately. But they are trying to make things as simple as possible.
Kaspersky :
This is the security suit that I have mostly used in my systems. It’s very stable and I can’t even remember the last time it crashed. But it is a bit heavy on system resources. Even in the current release (according to the video), they need to do some more improvements on the performance.
When it comes to the detection rate, Kaspersky have a really good protection system. But according to the video review, it failed to detect many adware and PUP files. I can remember once it failed to block a bot-net in my dad’s PC. Luckily OpenDNS detected something’s wrong and I used Norton rescue disk to detect and remove the infected files. But as I said, none of them are perfect and ironically, Norton have a lower detection rate than Kaspersky.
Stability and reliability… According to the video, Kaspersky had a hard time removing the detected malware from the system. I also faced the same issue. It takes a very long time to delete a single malware file. But I should say that they do a very good job in cleaning. After cleaning some malware, the system asks us to reboot and it scans again for threats and damaged system files and settings. This is really good because most of the anti-virus apps just remove the infected files. If those files are critical system files, your system might break!
When it come to support. I don’t think these Russians know how to handle their customers. I can remember waiting months to get an answer from their support system. One of my friends also had the same issue.
I think the biggest weapon Kaspersky have is marketing! They know really well how to grab the market. I know some local PC shops and according to them, occasionally, Kaspersky organize parties in one of best hotels in the country and invite all the retail partners to enjoy the day. So, if some one come to the shop asking for an anti-virus… They all say “Kaspersky”!!!
Bitdefender :
I don’t think Bitdefender is doing a really good job in marketing their product than the other two. I was unable to find any local shop which sell Bitdefender. But according to many test results, they are the number one security suit. Even according to the above videos, Bitdefender managed to catch the most number of malware threats from Languy99′s big zip file. They have a really good detection rate and it have been proved by many individual test labs.
The weak point in Bitdefender is the stability. The previous versions of this suit suffered some serious issues like, Internet slow downs, conflicting with some apps, crashing, etc. But I have been using the latest release for several months and I think it’s really stable just like the others. I didn’t face much trouble with it. It’s really solid.
Talking about the features… Actually, I think Bitdefender is the most feature rich security suit on earth. You name a feature they got it… Why all these features? Most of them are to make sure that they can catch most of the malware threats even before they can reach your machine. For example take the above video reviews. Check the first part where Languy99 play with the malware links. While both the other apps allowed to visit some of those links and catch the virus later, Bitdefender managed to block most of them right in the browser. Now that’s what we want. We don’t even want to have a look at the virus.
Bitdefender had a heavy resource usage like Kaspersky but the new release it lighter. But not lighter than Norton. It’s in between Kaspersky and Norton. I don’t think you’ll notice any slowdowns.
Conclusion :
Currently I’m using Bitdefender 2013 on my machines and I’m really satisfied with it. With Bitdefender, I feel more secure than the others. I don’t know why but I have that feeling. This is for me… This is my choice! For you, it might be different. Considering all the facts that we have talked about, I think you should pick either Kaspersky or Bitdefender. I think Norton have to do more in-order for us to consider it as an option. First, watch those videos, read the whole review, read more reviews if you want, and then take a decision because you are going to hand over your computer’s or sometimes even your own security to this security app that you choose! So, what will you pick?
