Avoid ZoneAlarm Firewall!

[Morsec0de]

Microsoft Security Essentials is good!

Look here I have reviewed a lot of Anti Virus software:
http://hardwareinsights.com/category ... e-reviews/

What you said doesn't give me confidence in the program.

Edit: Lately, (at school and at work), I have witnessed many things that Microsoft Security Essentials missed completely. It didn’t detect them, even in a full scan, while other programs, (Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware or SuperAntiSpyware found multiple infections)…

Therefore, I am inclined to lower the score on Microsoft Security Essentials. I still recommend it, however, I do have a little less faith in it.

Value: (Free)Edit: 9/10

- Surely that should be 10/10 or just 'Free', you can't rate something out of 10, under 10 for value(price) if it's free.

Security: 8.5/10 Edit: 6.5/10

- I would rather not be using something knowing that I'm at a 4.5/10 risk of getting infected.

[shovenose]

No, it's still not a value of 10/10. because it doesnt protect you properly why would be rated 10/10?

[LongRunner]

lti on Badcaps.net forums said that MSE removes hosts file entries without asking permission or telling you about it.

I'm never going to put an antimalware tool without an override on my system (as far as I remember, that includes McAfee).

McAfee is designed around the demographic knowing very little about computers and that would freak out at the very presence of a virus warning, so they'd rather say something reassuring (even if it means silently modifying the HDD contents) than ask the user a question they wouldn't know how to answer. They can't test against obscure freeware programs, of course, and I use a lot of those, for the record. The absence of an override is done to make it "idiot-proof". Kinda like smoke detectors - most people (including me) have had the ear-piercing experience of the detector over-reacting and alarming for no good reason, but they won't document how to adjust the sensitivity (or the volume, for that matter), because that would mean the next person who sets it all the way down, gets taken out in a fire, and has their family sue for failure to respond would make the smoke detector manufacturers look irresponsible for even providing user settings.

It's more about prevention than cure, after all. I wouldn't expect anyone who buys into rogue security software to be safe no matter how good the real scanner on their system is.

[shovenose]

Yes but something good like Avast will block that shit before it's installed... MSE just sits there and goes lalalalalalalalalalalalalala...