14 DAY TRIAL // What's your antivirus solution? Softwares like Kaspersky, Norton, NOD32 or Avast are the most wanted protection tools on the market. Once in a while, a new antivirus emerges or draws our attention. I am not too concerned about viruses as I fully trust my own home antivirus and, to be frank, I never had the least of troubles with it (Avast! Home Edition). But everyone is entitled to have an opinion, depending on the feedback you get.
Healing your computer can be a difficult or an easy task, depending on the remedies you use. I wanted to try something new today and I accessed the Softpedia software database in search of an antivirus tool. I bumped into Quick Heal. I was surprised to learn that the software is at its 8th version. The developer of the software is Cat Computer Services and they offer a fully functional copy of the software for free for a period of 30 days. The evaluation version of the application also includes two updates. After the 30 days have expired and you decide to buy the software, you will have to pay an annual fee of $30.
The easy-to-use interface is designed to help novice users get along with the software and, from its looks, I can say that equal attention has been paid for both the aesthetics and the protection of your PC. Today's viruses will have to avoid the proactive and reactive technologies used by the developer in order to affect your computer. And if you take into account that the application has received the VB100% award, than this should prove to be a pretty trustworthy program.
Let's see what it is all about. When you launch the application, the software will perform a memory scan that can take a while. After the scan is complete, you will be displayed the status window where you will see which features are activated and which are not. The services provided by the software are Online Protection, Email Protection, Automatic Update, Alert Messenger and DNA Scan.
The Online Protection tool will continuously protect your computer against malicious threats. This means that everything you try to download on your computer will be scanned by the application and you will be able to choose whether you still want that file on your computer or not, depending on the scan results.
The Email Protection feature checks every email you receive and verifies its content before you access it. Some viruses are nowadays sent via emails, so the fact that it also scans your emails seems a logical effect. For not having an obsolete copy of the software and to always be up to date, you are provided with the Automatic Update option that automatically updates the copy of your software so that your computer is protected against the latest threats.
Alert Messenger tool must not be understood as a chatting tool, but as a device that alerts you about the latest threats and product updates. DNAscan option will detect and eliminate new and unknown malicious threats. Before taking any action, the software will copy the suspected file in the Quarantine directory. All the quarantined suspicious files can be submitted to the developer's lab for further analysis.
The Scan option of the application has two tabs for you to choose from: My Profile and Drives. For the first tab, the user can add or remove the items to be scanned at whim. In the Drives tab, the only options are scanning the local drives, network drives and removable drives.
The Tools provided by the software comprise Quarantine, Virus List, Emergency Disk, System Information and Schedule Scan. The Virus List will open a new window containing all the viruses the software provides protection against (including variants). There are five categories in here: DOS (16 bit), Linux, Macro, Script and Windows (32 bit).
The Emergency Disk option is useful for removing viruses in case the system is infected before installation. If your machine is infected, then you can use Emergency Disk and Command line scanner to get it cleaned.
System Information is an easy to use tool to trace new malware. This creates a system report that will let the developer know if your system is infected with a new type of malware or a new virus/worm/backdoor/trojan/spyware/adware. It makes available notifying the support team about your problems with malware or with using Quick Heal.
Scheduling function allows the user to set the software to perform a scan at user defined time. You can also set the frequency of the scan or its recurrence. The scans can be configured so that only the files, folders or drives you want will be checked for viruses.
The Reports section provides a detailed log for scan, email protection, scheduler, memory scan, online protection, startup scan and quick update.
The Options menu in the upper right side of the main application window is where you can configure the settings for all the options in the software. You can select which files to be scanned (executable files, all of them or only a range of extensions specified by the user); while scanning, you can set the advance options to be used (scan srchives, DNAScan, scan mailbox, etc.) and you can access the Archive Settings to define which types of archives should be verified.
Online Protection can be loaded at Windows startup, together with the Alert Message and DNAScan. Email Protection can be activated from this menu.
The Good
The software is designed to be used by less experienced users as well as advanced ones. The interface is nicely drawn and easy to use. The scan is thorough enough for you to feel protected.
I was not too impressed by the scanning, because it took a whole lot longer than I expected.
The virus database is impressive and so is the DNAScan function that detects unknown malware.
The Bad
With the installation of the application my computer began to slow down. And my email client was blocked every time I activated Email Protection feature.
Once I got the application off my computer everything came back to normal. My CPU functioned above normal (between 70% and 98%). The process working my CPU is EMLPROXY.EXE. But after killing it and restarting the application, everything came back to normal again.
The Truth
The software is very easy to use and it should not pose any problems, no matter if you are an experienced user or a novice.
$30 per year does not seem too much, but - if you consider the cost of an upgrade for other antivirus tool - it seems OK.
Except for those little inconveniences I had no trouble with the program.
Here are some snapshots of the application in action:
