BleepingComputer.com: Experiences with Kaspersky Antivirus on Windows XP`

I am thinking about switching from McAfee to Kaspersky antivirus. I run a Windows XP machince with McAfee antivirus, and I think it uses too much cpu resources on my machine. I have been reading a lot about different antivirus products and come to the conclusion that it is not very easy to draw a conclusion at all about which antivirus to use. Tests, reviews, and experiences seems to vary a lot between different products and reviews/users. However, I am wondering if anyone has experience using Kaspersky's antivirus (or internet security suite) on Windows XP? Kaspersky seems to offer good protection on Windows XP according to some tests, but I am worried that it will be a resource hog. Also, it seems like several users have had problems uninstalling Kaspersky's products, so I am hesitant to just give it a try and see how it functions on my system...

EDIT: I would also like to hear about experinces of using ESET NOD32 on Windows XP. For some reason, I thought NOD32 was only for Linux. Not sure where that came from...

This post has been edited by endum1: 01 December 2011 - 11:22 AM

Speaking from the past year I've been using it. I'd say a huge NO to Kaspersky. It's done nothing but make my computer run slow and if I had known about their site getting hacked that one time I would have never touched them in a million years. Resource hog it is indeed.

Normally I've been using combinations of Avira/Avast and Comodo Firewall, just so I do not have to pay for protection. It saves me allot of time trying to figure out what program I want to spend my money on. But, I'm pretty sure that using two separate programs may chew on resources a little, though probably not as bad as Kaspersky does on it's own. I would simply recommend the full versions of Eset, Avira or Comodo for the best paid protection you can get. All the old well known companies are so full of it nowadays.

In terms of how much resources the individual programs use, I'm not entirely certain. I've never personally tested each of them but I've noticed that since Avast's last big update my computer has been running somewhat slower. Comodo is also a little frustating to deal with due to how the firewall is controlled but typically is not a problem once you get used to it. I don't know much about Avira because it's the program my older brother uses, not me. He's never complained though. As for Eset, well the scanner is excellent but I know little other direct experience than that.

But yeah the best advice I can give is to stay away from McAfee, Kaspersky and Norton. They all have tons of useless features and hog resources. I'm just speaking from past experience though. Oh, and you do use backup scanning tools right?

This post has been edited by VicVegas: 01 December 2011 - 07:33 AM

Thanks for your thoughts, VicVegas. I have looked a little at Avira and Eset as well, but a recent test by AV-Test(My link) on Windows XP machines made me hesitant. According to the test, Avira offers good protection and relatively good removal of malware on XP, but they also gave lots of false positives for installation of legitimate software. I also considered Microsoft Security Essentials (since it is supposed to be fairly light on system resources) together with Comodo's free firewall, but MSE didn't score very well on protection against new threats on XP. Maybe the heuristics engine needs a little tuning... It seems like whichever choice you make about AV protection software, there are pros and cons. What makes it even harder is that all AV software seems to be evolving fairly quickly and you can't rely on past years' statistics...

Those kinds of comparative testing results will vary depending on a variety of factors to include but not limited to who conducted the testing, what they were testing for (type of threats, attack vectors, exploits), what versions of anti-virus software was tested, what type of scanning engine was used, and the ability to clean or repair. There are no universally predefined set of standards or criteria for testing which means each test will yield different results. As such, you need to look for detailed information about how the tests were conducted, the procedures used, and data results. Read Anti-virus Testing Websites: An overview of testing sites

in my personal Opinion Eset offer a good protection and it's very lite compared to
other product and has a good Reputation
anyway if you care about resources you can Look at the New webroot secureanywhere

FWIW: I was a long time(5+ year) user of various Kaspersky security products. I became disenchanted with their bloat and less than stellar performance as the years went on. I switched to ESET as a trial a year ago(subsequently made it permanent) and have been more than pleasantly surprised in all phases.

And yes this is all on an XP system.

Thank you. I think I might install a trial version of ESET. It seems to offer good protecion without consuming too much resources, which is important for me since I don't exactly have a supercomputer at my disposal...

Hi,

ZoneAlarm uses the same scan engine as Kaspersky but costs a lot less. I have used it for years and won't even consider using anything else. I am not using the latest version because I am happy with the version from just a little over a year ago and see no reason to change.

I do not find it to be resourse intensive at all. In fact, it says it requires 1 gig of ram and I am running it with only 640 meg of ram and it does not slow my system at all.