Today's Best Tech Deals
How does the computer perform in various areas (CPU, Graphics, Memory and Disk operations) while the AVG or Avast is installed In the boot time test where less is better, it took only 28 seconds (on average) to load Windows desktop when Avast Free Antivirus was installed. During our phishing tests, Avast didn't do as well, where it missed just under a third of the phishing sites we visited. One thing to note, which we didn't care for: a special browser antiphishing add-on needs to be installed first. How to Disable Avast on Mac If you are a Mac user, you can disable Avast on Mac by following the steps below. Step 1: Start typing “Avast” in search box and then open “Avast Security” from it. Netflix Monthly Cost. The chart below will give you most about costs of every plan of Netflix. But I have also written in detail about each and every Netflix plan which you must read before applying for any Netflix Plan. How much is Netflix? Netflix charges $7.99, $9.99 and $11.99 respectively for Basic, Standard and Premium Plans. Avast used to charge for each Mac, but has simplified things so that Mac software simply costs $59.99 per year. In New York City, a Big Mac will cost you $5.09, according to Business Insider. Essentially, you are paying about $5 a pop to get one Big Mac plus a MacCoin.
Picked by PCWorld's Editors
Top Deals On Great Products
Picked by Techconnect's Editors
Depending on whom you ask, paying for antivirus software is either a good investment or a total ripoff. In reality, neither viewpoint is accurate. You can find plenty of good reasons to choose a paid antivirus product, and plenty of good reasons to go with a freebie.
We teamed up with security testing company AV-Test, to find out what you get--or don't get--with free antivirus, and when it makes sense to subscribe annually to a fee-based program.
Antivirus, Deconstructed
Four basic levels of antivirus products exist: free, paid antivirus, suites, and 'premium' suites. As you move up the ladder from free antivirus to premium suites, you typically get more features, such as identity theft protection, firewalls, parental controls, and system performance tools.
Free antivirus software usually provides a bare minimum level of protection. It will scan for malware, and often can perform automatic scans, too. Some free apps may have additional protection tools such as a browser add-on that checks for bad links--and Comodo's free Internet Security Premium has a firewall. But such features are usually limited to paid antivirus products. Some free apps offer behavioral malware detection, which finds malware based on how it acts on your PC--a good way of detecting brand-new malware outbreaks. (Behavioral detection is standard on paid products.)
Paid antivirus straddles a middle ground between the basic freebies and the feature-packed security suites: They typically offer more comprehensive security tools (such as parental controls and identity theft protection) and more flexibility than a free antivirus package, but they have fewer additional features than suites, which are intended to be one-stop security shops.
One of the biggest drawbacks to going with a free product is the lack of technical support. While most companies offer some sort of phone support for paying customers, free antivirus users usually must fend for themselves. Avast does offer e-mail support for its free customers; most others provide only a knowledge base or forum where users can go for help.
Another tradeoff is that free antivirus products often have some sort of advertisement for the company's paid product. Avast Free Antivirus has an upgrade link in the upper-right corner of the main window, and Avira AntiVir Personal will display an ad for Avira's paid antivirus software.
How about malware signature updates? The security software companies I spoke to tell me that they treat their free and paid products the same as far as signature updates are concerned, although there may be some under-the-hood differences between their free and paid products (as is the case with Panda's software, for example). And one company, Avast, says that its free product is intended for average users, and that its paid antivirus is for more advanced users.
On the other hand, free products do give you some flexibility. You can augment a free tool's basic security with countless security utilities. For instance, you can start with Avast Free Antivirus, add PCTools's Threatfire Free (which does a good job at bolstering malware detection), toss in one of the many firewalls available and a link-scanning utility to create your own custom security setup. This approach does require you to do your homework, though, and may be more complicated in the long run.
Interface
User interfaces are typically as good (or as bad) in free products as they are in their paid counterparts. Avira and Avast, for example, use the same basic interface for their free and paid versions; they just include or leave out certain features and toggles as needed. Panda Cloud Antivirus (a freebie) is not a scaled-down version of the paid Panda Antivirus Pro, but rather a completely different product with a different interface and different internals.
Detection
Most of the free products we tested put up identical or nearly identical malware detection scores to the paid varietals put out by the same company. But we did see some subtle differences. One notable example is Panda Cloud Antivirus: The free Cloud Antivirus and Panda's for-pay Antivirus Pro 2011 performed about the same on the signature-based malware detection tests, but Antivirus Pro did a better job in 'real world' malware detection tests that help determine how well a product can block brand-new threats.
(Note: Panda recently released version 1.3 of Panda Cloud Antivirus. The company says that version 1.3 should improve its detection of new malware, but the new release didn't come in time for us to test for our roundup. Check back here for future updates.)
We found that, on the whole, paid antivirus products did a slightly better job at detecting malware than their freebie counterparts. In traditional signature-based detection tests, paid antivirus software that we tested found 96.2 percent of the malware samples overall. By comparison, free products' scores were ever-so-slightly worse, detecting 95.7 percent of samples.
In real-world detection tests, free products missed 15.2 percent of samples, while paid products missed 10.2 percent of samples. When it came time to remove malware infections, again, the results were close, but paid antivirus software held a slight advantage.
All the products we tested--both paid and free--detected all the test infections we threw their way, but paid products did a slightly better job overall at removing the active components of an infection, scoring a 74 percent success rate on average. The same held true when we tested how well the products removed all active and inactive components of an infection: Paid products achieved a 44 percent removal rate in this test, while free products averaged a full removal rate of 34 percent
Speed
Avast
Although you lose some effectiveness against malware with free antivirus, you do gain a little speed. The free products we looked at were faster on average than the paid products in 9 of the 12 speed tests we take into account. Again, the difference was slight--the largest speed difference was around 10 percent. Both free and paid antivirus increased system startup times: A test PC with no antivirus software installed booted up in 40.1 seconds on average. With free antivirus installed, the test system started up in 44.1 seconds on average; and with paid antivirus installed, startup times increased to 46 seconds. It's hard to pin down the exact reason for this difference, but again, the difference is slight enough that it's basically statistically insignificant.
Scan speeds, however, are a mixed bag. In our on-demand scan tests, paid antivirus programs edged out the freebies, scanning 4.5GB worth of files in an average of 2 minutes, 25 seconds. Free products, by comparison, completed the same test in an average of 2 minutes, 44 seconds.
Free and paid products were nearly neck and neck in the on-access scan tests, which show how quickly the software can scan files for malware when they're opened or saved to disk. Using the same 4.5GB of files, free products completed the on-access scan test in an average time of 4 minutes, 50 seconds. Their paid counterparts completed the test 8 seconds later.
Top Picks
Given how close the two classes of products are in terms of speed and effectiveness, the two biggest factors are features and customer support. With some exceptions, you get better customer support and more comprehensive security features with a paid product, but if you're willing to forgo these, it's definitely worth considering going free.
Which free and paid antivirus products are best for you?
Avast Free Antivirus comes out tops among free products thanks to its all-around strong malware-detection scores, good design, and low system drag. Avira AntiVir Personal takes second place: It put up solid malware-detection scores, but its interface is kludgy.
Norton Antivirus leads the paid-software pack owing to its excellent malware detection, very good interface design, and comprehensive feature set that includes file-reputation analysis, a cloud-based scanner (which can help identify new malware more quickly), and system performance analysis tools. BitDefender Antivirus Pro 2011 is a close second thanks to strong malware detection; but slow scan speeds and some interface issues prevented it from taking first.
Check out our lists of the top five free and top five paid antivirus products. Our summary reviews of the top two free and paid antivirus programs are below.
Top Free Antivirus: Avast
Avast Free Antivirus couples good all-around malware detection with a speedy, well-designed package. We liked its easy installation process, smooth interface design, and minimal impact on system performance.
In traditional signature-based malware tests, Avast Free Antivirus detected 94.8 percent of samples, which is neither particularly good nor bad. It also did a decent, though not outstanding, job at detecting malware in our real-world malware detection tests: It completely blocked 76 percent of attacks (which is right about average), and partially blocked 4 percent of attacks.
But on the plus side, Avast Free Antivirus didn't falsely identify a single 'safe' file as a piece of malware, the only free product we looked at that achieved this. Avast Free Antivirus also did a good job at disinfecting a PC; it removed all active components of malware infections 80 percent of the time, which set the pace among the free products we looked at.
Scan speeds are also very good. Its on-demand scan speed of 90 seconds was a close second to Avira AntiVir Personal, which completed the test in 87 seconds. And Avast Free Antivirus completed the on-access scan speed tests in 3 minutes, 40 seconds, tops among the products we tested.
Top Paid Antivirus: Norton Antivirus 2011
Norton Antivirus 2011 ($40 for a one-year, single-PC license as of 10/26/2010) leads the pack of 2011 paid antivirus products. It does a very good job at detecting and removing malware, and has a smooth interface, although its speed is decidedly average.
Installing Norton Antivirus 2011 is a breeze: The well-designed installer only requires you to click through two screens before it begins installing. Norton Antivirus has a smooth, polished interface: The main screen shows on-off toggles for its various protection features, as well as a map showing the global cybercrime activity over the last 24 hours.
When it came to malware detection and removal, Norton Antivirus put out strong all-around scores. Norton Antivirus detected 98.7 percent of malware samples using traditional signature-based malware detection. This is an above average score, but it trails Panda Antivirus Pro 2011, which detected 99.8 percent of samples.
Norton also put up excellent scores in the blocking of real-world malware attacks: Norton completely blocked 24 of the 25 samples we threw at it, but it did miss one sample completely. Norton also detected all active infections in our tests; it removed the active components of an infection 80 percent of the time, and was able to completely remove the infections 60 percent of the time--both above-average scores.
Norton put up good scores in our speed testing, but not top-notch results. It completed an on-access scan of 4.5GB of files in 4 minutes, 32 seconds. This puts it ahead of the average of 4 minutes, 59 seconds, but but it behind the top-performing product, which completed this test in 3 minutes, 35 seconds. Its on-demand scan speed of 2 minutes, one second is also above average, but again, it trails the top performing program by a good 30 seconds.
- Pros
Good speed test results. Free version available.
- Cons
Confusing pricing structure. Few servers and few server locations. No stand-out features.
- Bottom Line
Avast SecureLine offers VPN security and solid speed test scores, but it's hampered by a lack of features and servers, as well as convoluted pricing.
A virtual private network, or VPN, adds an additional layer of security to your internet connection. Avast SecureLine VPN has the pedigree of a leading antivirus company behind it, and it produced some impressive speed test scores in testing. But it comes up short of the best VPNs thanks to an expensive and inflexible pricing plan and unimpressive server infrastructure. It has the core of a good service, but one that needs fleshing out. Instead, I recommend Editors' Choice winner NordVPN, which offers a powerful yet friendly product, and co-winner Private Internet Access, which has the most robust VPN collection of VPN servers I've yet reviewed.
- $11.95
- $9.99
- $9.95
- $10.95
- $11.99
- $11.99
- $12.99
- $9.99
- $12.95
- $4.99
- $9.99
- $4.99
- $14.97
- $15.00
- $9.95
What Is a VPN?
When you're connected to a VPN, it creates an encrypted tunnel between your computer and the VPN company's server. This is why you need a VPN. Information sent through this tunnel is unreadable to anyone who tries to intercept or spy on it. If you're using the Wi-Fi at a coffee shop, for example, you won't have to worry about the owner of the network or bad guys lurking on the network stealing your data.
That encrypted tunnel also masks your web activities from your internet service provider. That's handy, especially since Congress recently gave the green light for ISPs to start selling anonymized user data.
VPNs can also be used to circumvent internet restrictions, either imposed by oppressive governments or, say, the BBC making sure that only UK citizens can stream videos. That's because a VPN can connect to servers located in places other than your actual, physical location. If your local government blocks certain websites, a VPN will tunnel out to another country where you can access the internet freely. A VPN also hides your IP address, since your web traffic appears to be coming from the VPN server and not your computer. Note that it's up to you to research local laws and terms of service before using a VPN.
All that said, using a VPN doesn't guard against all dangers. Malicious ads, malware, and other network attacks can still harm your computer and steal personal information. I highly recommend using antivirus software to keep your computer protected from all angles.
Pricing and Features
When I first looked at SecureLine, I was dismayed to find that it didn't offer a multi-device pricing tier. Thankfully, Avast has since loosened up and rolled out a pricing scheme that is far better for consumers. For $79.99 a year, you can secure up to five devices on any platform. At checkout, you can also select a two- or three-year plan for $149.99 or $219.99, respectively. It's not until the checkout screen that you also see a monthly billing option for $8.99.
If you don't feel the need to secure all the devices in your house, you can settle for Avast's device-specific plans. It costs $5.99 per month to secure one PC with Avast, or $59.99 per year. To secure five PCs, which is the industry average, you'll have to pay $79.99 per year. There are other combinations of PCs and billing cycles to explore.
The Mac-only version costs $59.99 per year, or $7.99 per month, to secure five devices. The Android-only package is $19.99 per year, or $2.99 per month, for five devices. The iOS-only version similarly costs $19.99 per year, or $2.99 per month, for five devices. Interestingly, if you opt to add Android VPN, iOS VPN, or Mac VPN plans to your PC plan, they cost only $9.99 per year or $2.99 per month. If you select the Mac version, mobile plans are still full price but the PC version is reduced to $29.99.
While I appreciate the variety of pricing options Avast allows, it can be a challenge to understand. Most other services are more flexible—with twice yearly or even quarterly subscriptions—and easier to understand. KeepSolid VPN Unlimited is the most flexible, even offering a low-cost $3.99 weekly plan that's ideal for vacations.
If you're not willing to pay up right away, SecureLine has a seven-day free trial period that is mercifully ad-free and mostly free of irritating upsell reminders. However, there are totally free VPN services out there, such as the browser plug-in for Hotspot Shield Elite. I noticed that if I tried to buy a subscription through the SecureLine client after my trial period ended, the price was a specially discounted $39.99.
The average monthly price among the ten best VPN services fluctuates, but is between $10 and $11. Editors' Choice Winner Private Internet Access comes in significantly below that threshold, at $6.95 per month. NordVPN, on the other hand, is also an Editors' Choice winner but costs $11.95 per month. It justifies that expense with unique features like double encryption servers and access to the Tor anonymization network via VPN.
While I am glad to see Avast make the pricing for SecureLine competitive, I am a bit irked at how it pushes annual plans. The finicky nature of networks means a VPN that's fast and useful one day could be fatally hamstrung the next. Consumers also aren't used to paying large, up-front costs for internet services, making these annual fees look less attractive than flexible monthly plans.
Also, Avast follows the lead of other antivirus companies and doesn't include a VPN subscription in any of its omnibus security suites. That's really unfortunate, considering that a one-year subscription to Avast SecureLine is pretty close to the price of a Avast Internet Security 2017 subscription.
If you want to secure more than phones and PCs, other VPNs have you covered. TorGuard offers routers with its software already installed, providing protection to each device that uses the router to connect to the internet. This includes smart fridges and dumb video game consoles. TorGuard also lets you purchase subscription add-ons, such as additional licenses, access to a super-fast network, and static IP addresses. SecureLine, by comparison, is a bare-bones service.
Despite the change in pricing, I still expected more features from SecureLine. There's no option to change VPN protocols, and the protocol used by the service is not easily discoverable on its website. According to Avast, SecureLine uses the OpenVPN protocol on Windows and Android devices. Mac and iOS users use IPSec instead. Avast also pointed out that SecureLine fixes a DNS leak issue, providing customers with improved security. SecureLine does not, however, provide ad-blocking, which was once rare in the VPN space but is becoming more common. TunnelBear, in particular, provides a standalone ad-blocking browser plug-in that looks and works great.
Avast SecureLine grants access to a mere 29 VPN servers spread across 21 countries. These cover several cities across the US, as well as Central and South America, China, Eastern and Western Europe, Russia, and Turkey. Notably missing altogether are African servers, though that's not unusual among VPN services. The best VPN services have significantly more robust networks, however. Foremost among them is Private Internet Access VPN; that service has more than 3,000 servers available for users.
These numbers matter. The more server locations a VPN company provides, the more likely you are to find a faster, nearby server while traveling. It also means you have more options for location spoofing. Furthermore, the more servers available, the less likely you are to be crammed into an overcrowded server and get a smaller piece of the bandwidth pie.
If you're keen on P2P filesharing and BitTorrent, you're in luck: Avast SecureLine allows file sharing traffic on its servers. That said, TorGuard has built its business on serving torrenters. That company offers several subscription add-ons, such as access to a high-bandwidth network and static IP addresses, that are sure to appeal to file sharing aficionados.
Avast, the company behind SecureLine, is headquartered in the Czech Republic. According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, there are currently no mandatory data retention laws in the Czech Republic. A representative from Avast told me that company limits the data it collects to metadata, such as the time of connection and your network location. 'We do not log any of the data content,' the representative told me. Additionally, according to the company's privacy policy, what metadata is collected is deleted within 30 days. A company representative also confirmed for me that Avast does not inject ads into users' web traffic, nor does the company profit from the sale of user data.
Hands On With SecureLine
SecureLine's presence on your computer is minimal. You can access some of its key functions through a system tray icon, but you'll probably use the main app. This is a small, single window that provides access to all of SecureLine's features with ease. I tested the Windows client on a Lenovo ThinkPad T460s laptop running Windows 10.
You can select a server from a pull-down menu, or let SecureLine choose the closest (and probably fastest) server. That's simple, but I would prefer a search box to make finding specific servers easier. Also, I really like the way NordVPN shows the popularity and latency of each server, making it easier to choose a good one.
On one hand, SecureLine presents a clean and simple design. On the other, it's not the most friendly experience I've had with a VPN. TunnelBear, with its bright colors and cute bears, is definitely the most engaging. SecureLine is simple because it doesn't have much to offer. Its settings menu is mostly bare, aside from a toggle to automatically activate when connecting to an unknown network. That's a handy feature, but TunnelBear and PureVPN also include the option to route specific traffic outside of the encrypted VPN tunnel.
Using a VPN is great for security, but it can make some basic things really tedious. For example, Netflix blocks VPNs in order to prevent people from spoofing their location and watching videos that aren't available in their real location. Surprisingly, I had no trouble watching Netflix while connected to SecureLine, but that could change at a moment's notice.
Speed Tests
With rare exception, using a VPN will slow down your internet connection. That's because your traffic has to go through more fiber and more machines to complete its journey. I try to get a sense of the impact each VPN makes by running a series of tests using both domestic and international servers on Ookla's speed test tool. (Note that Ookla is owned by Ziff Davis, which also owns PCMag.)
First, I run a series of speed tests using a nearby VPN server with and without the VPN active. I discard the highest and lowest results, average what's left, and find a percent change for latency, download speed, and upload speed between the two sets of results. This test puts an emphasis on speed, since the server I'm using is nearby. Second, I simulate connecting to a VPN server that's further afield by connecting with an Ookla test server in Anchorage, Alaska, and a VPN server in Australia.
In the domestic testing, SecureLine made a surprise early showing by improving latency by 29.9 percent. That means there was almost 30 percent less latency with SecureLine than without, a feat I've yet to see duplicated. But keep in mind that latency is really only important if you're doing intensive online gaming. SecureLine also managed minimal impact on download speeds, slowing downloads by only 6.3 percent. That's one of the better scores I've seen, but it pales in comparison to PureVPN, which actually increased download speeds by an unprecedented 346.4 percent. Notably, AnchorFree Hotspot Shield Elite is the only other VPN to improve download speeds in this test, by a respectable 45 percent. In the upload test, SecureLine also had strong performance. It slowed uploads by only 4.1 percent, the second-best score behind VPNArea, which reduced upload speeds by just 3.2 percent.
My international testing always yields worse performance results due to the distances involved, and Avast SecureLine is no exception. I found that it increased latency by 360.8 percent. That's significantly more than leader Hotspot Shield Elite, which increased latency by just 155.4 percent. SecureLine's download performance was middling in this round of testing. It reduced download speeds by 14.4 percent, which is a smidge worse than the competition. PureVPN dominates this test, improving download speeds by 403.8 percent. TunnelBear and Buffered VPN also improved download speeds, by 98.9 percent and 10 percent, respectively. SecureLine fared better in the upload test, where it reduced speeds by 3.3 percent, one of the better scores for this test. HotSpot Shield Elite pulled out a surprise win in this test; it's the only VPN to improve upload speeds that I've yet seen, even if it's only by 1.4 percent.
Avast For Mac
In general, Avast SecureLine managed above-average scores, particularly for downloads. When I look for the fastest VPNs, download speeds are my main consideration. But PureVPN is still the king of the speed heap for two years running, and has earned an Editors' Choice award for its trouble.
A Line, Secured
Avast SecureLine has a strong pedigree from its antivirus roots and notches some successes in its own right, especially in speed tests, where SecureLine managed above average results. It also plays nice with Netflix and allows BitTorrent and P2P. Unfortunately, SecureLine has a tiny number of servers and server locations, making it a tough sell in a crowded space. I'm happy to see the SecureLine pricing become more competitive, but it's still tricky to understand for the average consumer.
I'll continue to recommend my Editors' Choice winners KeepSolid VPN Unlimited, NordVPN, Private Internet Access, and PureVPN. All of these services offer more robust networks, more advanced features, and simple, flexible pricing.
Avast SecureLine VPN
Avast For Mac 10.7.5
Bottom Line: Avast SecureLine offers VPN security and solid speed test scores, but it's hampered by a lack of features and servers, as well as convoluted pricing.
- $69.99
- $59.99
- $0.00
- $0.00