CNET editors' review
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CNET editors' rating:
stars
Very good
Detailed editors' rating
- Reviewed on: 03/01/2007
- Updated on: 03/16/2007
- Released on: 01/15/2007
After years of beefing up its Trend Micro PC-cillin Internet Security suite by adding security tools beyond basic antivirus solution, Trend Micro has finally released a standalone antivirus-and-antispyware application, Trend Micro Antivirus plus Antispyware 2007. It's debatable whether there's a real need for a standalone antivirus app for the desktop in an age of all-in-one security solutions. Trend Micro Antivirus plus Antispyware 2007does protect against viruses, spyware, and rootkits, and we found its antispyware protection to be much better than its antivirus protection. But Trend Micro Antivirus plus Antispyware 2007 doesn't support popular mail clients outside of Microsoft's Outlook, Outlook Express, and Windows Mail, nor does it protect against increasingly popular instant-messaging viruses or phishing attacks on your Web browser. In short, it is a modest product, offering nowhere near the overall protection and value of our Editors' Choice, Kaspersky Anti-Virus 6.
Installation and Setup
We installed Trend Micro Antivirus plus Antispyware 2007 without incident. It requires 100MB for installation and 256MB RAM for operation, and runs under Windows 2000 through Windows Vista. It supports Internet Explorer, but not Firefox or Opera. It will scan e-mail for Outlook, Outlook Express, and Windows Mail (Vista) but not Eudora. It does not monitor or scan IM clients. Like Norton Antivirus and Mcafee VirusScan, Trend Micro Antivirus plus Antispyware 2007 includes only one PC license. The interface is a simplified version of the one used in Trend Micro Internet Security 2007.
Should you decide to remove Trend Micro Antivirus plus Antispyware 2007, the program includes its own uninstall icon. However, after the reboot, we were surprised to find system registry entries and several files in several folders still on our system. We do not recommend deleting registry files without assistance, although the system folders can be deleted without worry. Only Kaspersky Anti-Virus 6 removed every trace of itself upon uninstall.
Features
Trend Micro Antivirus plus Antispyware 2007 combines antivirus and antispyware scans, which should save users time and system resources. It seems that Trend Micro has finally found a way to merge its Intermute SpySubtract antispyware technology with its PC-cillin antivirus technology. But while we found the antispyware protection excellent and the anti-rootkit defense to be adequate, we were surprised by what was missing from the new software.
McAfee included firewall technology in its standalone antivirus product, and we thought that might have distracted them from concentrating on antivirus prevention. Kaspersky and the other antivirus applications we tested did not include firewall technologies, but instead offered very robust antivirus solutions. Trend Micro lacks both a firewall and comprehensive antivirus defenses.
No antivirus defenses are provided for non-Microsoft e-mail clients, so if you use Thunderbird or Qualcomm Eudora as your desktop e-mail client, malicious e-mail will not be stopped until the malicious code begins to execute. Other products, like Norton Antivirus, can stop potentially malicious e-mail at the gateway, before it lands on your desktop.
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