4.0 out of 5 stars
Symantec has finally figured it out
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on 26 March 2012
I am not an security expert, and I don't pretend to be one in real life. This review is based on what I found, and my own preference on how security software should function. You might look at it differently, but hey, this is my review, go write your own. I completely "trashed" Norton Antivirus 2006 in one of my reviews on PC World. And I read a lot of users had similar problems, and turn away from the product back then. so I am going to do some comparison to its old self, and give it some justice.
Before reviewing for this particular software, I want to get to 2 points, because they are going to be relevant latter in the writing.
1) Security software is like a car insurance, you really don't know how good it is until something bad happens, and you are caught in the middle of the mess. no virus -zoo tests (perform by independent labs) can emulate what is going to happen in the real world. I am just need to get it out there, the first line of defense is the user, not the antivirus software. If the users are clicking on random links, and running P2P softwares, while downloading torrent, something is going to go through, no matter what you have running on the computer (unless you are running Linux, then your risk is lower).
2) It is almost impossible to remove a virus once it excuses on your system. Someone out there is going to tell you it is possible, but my response is always the same. "How do you know it is all clear?" (Look up Rootkit on wikipedia)
Now back to the review. This writing is based on few standards I have. 1) Does it actually slow down your system 2) Is the user interface clean enough
1) Antivirus 2012 won me back. I have been a Norton Antivirus fans up until 2006. That was the time Symantec lost it. That was a period of time where Norton Antivirus itself functions more like a virus. It takes forever to startup, program would lag for 10 to 15 seconds after I clicked on it. Wrost, scanning a 20 GB drive took 2 to 3 hours to finish. A lot of users were complaining about it, an I was one of them who switched to a different software (NOD 32, if you care, and it is still a great software). Symantec took the feedbacks and completely rewritten their engine. At first, I was skeptic, and continued to use solution that was little known to people back then (NOD32 and Kaspersky), mainly because they were light, and have great detection rate (Kaspersky was the first antivirus offered hourly update, while other offered update every 2 to 3 days). After my NOD32 license expired recently, I decided to give Norton another look. And, Man, I was impressed. The software load up pretty fast on my computer (Intel P4, 2 GB RAM, Windows 7) with little system slow down. Just like NOD32, Norton finished loading into memory in few second after login, and just sits there waiting for the next action. Solution such as Kaspersky (Sorry Kaspersky, you used to be one of my two favors) will take a minute or so to finish "doing something". I don't know what that is, but the something is writing to and from the disk constantly for the first minute or so when Kaspersky was on the system (even with boot time-scan options turn off). This happened pretty often for few other software brands, I am not going to point them out one by one.
2) User interface is something most of the antivirus software designers don't get. They are either super complicated, that makes you feel like you are about to launch a space shuttle. Or they are so "simple" that nothing can be change at all. I remember the Norton Antvirus from old day had about ten taps on the type of scan you can turn on and off from the program, such as POP, SMTP, integration to Word, and Outlook, AIM, IE etc. I remember writing a review on PC World, a lot of these options are pointless, forced integration into other software will only A) slow the third party software down, and B) Likely to break when the third party software update. For example, the integration into AIM never worked for me, because I was using a "Green" version of AIM that didn't have ads. Another thing that stuck to me was the notification box. Back then, the software would pop you a notification, and let you know it is working on something (that is the wording; Norton Antivirus is working on background tasks; something along that line) , but it doesn't tell you what the tasks were, and no potion to pause it. What is the point?
Norton 2012 is a lot better. The user interface is easier to navigate. I like the new design where it lightup at areas where a virus is reported. It is pretty. Options are fairly easy to access, and the scan option is right there at the first page, so I don't have to look for it. Furthermore, the software tells you when it was last updated, and whether there is a problem. And the notification is no longer intrusive. That's is great! although some of the options are still confuse, (ie: the reputation scan {why can't this be part of the smart scan? Doesn't bad reputation often means ad ware?}, and reliable scan {This sounded like something from the Norton system work days, but this is an antivirus, why do I want to know whether a file is going to crash?, save it for Norton 360})
So does it detect virus in real world? I don't know, it is more of a blind faith. Look at it this way, if the software tells you it caught something, it must be working, but when you don't get a wanring in 100 or so days, while you are doing daily tasks, does it mean it is working or does it mean something got through the real-time protection, and you just don;t know about it?
The good thing is, Norton Antivirus 2012 appeared to be doing pretty well on all the independent lab tests, along in reviewers from PC World, and PC Mag.
But then again, the user is the first line of defense. You got a flu shot doesn't mean you want to let other people sneeze at you.
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