AntiVirusKit 2006 Columbia MD

Rating: 8/10

Reviewing an anti-virus package is not as easy as you might think. Unless you purposely infect your machine to see if the program identifies the problem, it's mainly down to the features on offer combined with the usability of the software. Surprisingly this latest release from GData managed to impress me on both counts, by firstly finding three (that's three) viruses lurking in my system that my existing virus checker missed. At the same time it provides an all-encompassing security solution that not only covers virus infections, but offers protection for e-mail and against spyware as well.

Installation is quite straightforward and followed by the customary registration and updates to the virus signatures that ship with the product. At this point you're advised to carry out a full system sweep to make sure you're starting with a clean hard drive; (In fact the program checks your boot sector before installation begins). The program will also create a bootable anti-virus rescue disk based on Kaspersky Anti-Virus for Linux; unlike the installation CD this will use the latest virus signature available.

I have to say that the system sweep took much longer than I expected (just over four hours for a 120GB drive) although as I've already mentioned it found and fixed a problem that my current virus killer missed, so I considerate to be a worthwhile exercise.

The AntiVirusKit provides e-mail protection for all the major e-mail programs including Outlook, Outlook Express, Mozilla, and Eudora. This is a fairly inconspicuous procedure with no perceptible disruption to the send and receive process. The system also incorporates an Outbreak Shield that will protect you against programs that mass mail from your IP address; which is capable of detecting and stopping such an outbreak even if the virus signature has not yet been updated. The same applies to the virus monitor which lives in the system tray, working in the background checking all your files as they are accessed.

Naturally you can schedule times and frequencies for automatic scanning and the program includes a security agent that you can tuck into the corner of your screen. This shows a clock and a tickertape style display of current IT events, together with the latest news about viruses.

For more information, visit Micromart.co.uk