ClamAV www.clamav.net

Clam AV is an opensource product, published under GNU license. Cooperation with developers is very straight forward, and can easily match commercial products. Moreover, it is possible to modify the code to fit your needs better. It is available for download, and since it's GNU, free to distribute under it's conditions.

Clam AV is very savvy resource wise. The scanning speed is not the most impressive, but I can run it in the background and remain productive at the same time. It fits my needs perfectly, and should be a consideration for every person valuing time. The interface is clean and uncluttered. Availability of CLI interface along with GUI front-ends gives it an edge in various scenarios. You might say that it is one solutions for all, from personal laptops, through workstations, on servers ending. Also, Clam AV is available on multiple platforms, Windows, Mac, Linux, *BSD, and pretty much on everything your IT guy or yourself can compile it on.

The virus detection is very good, and the fact that this is the only task of this software makes it compact, fast, and resource savvy. No bells and whistles, just get to work attitude. Due to CLI interface you can script it into almost unlimited scenarios of productivity. A real workhorse if you ask me.

The price is more than great, it is perfect. It is simply free, under very liberal GNU license. That means that you have an opportunity to review the code, or modify it, as well as keep the copies of it, or redistribute under GNU license. If you are representing commercial world you might want to pay for support, which is available, but for home use the open source community on IRC channel is more than enough.

It looks impressive...it says I am protected from 13,187,028 threats and that there are 241,232 people in the ClamAV Cloud. What I am wondering is this ... do I have any protection if I am no longer connected to the Internet? Am I totally dependent on having a connection to the Internet to protect me from any and all threats? If this were my only protection, it seems like all a virus would have to do is stop the connection.

I believe that some people do a great job and the creators of ClamAV definitely have done.

ClamAV is a comprehensive virus scanning package. It is clear that it does not protect your computer against spyware, but with some common sense, that is scanning all new files that are being introduced through downloads or portable devices ( eg. iPod, cameras, flash disks, etc.). If you use Windows, make sure to turn off Auto-Play for all drives.I see no point in buying a commercial package when Clamwin AV does all that one needs.