Top Ten List of FREE Antivirus Software

It would be of little secret to the world that we humans simply love free stuffs. It would even be adding icing on the cake if the free stuffs we get is superb in quality and functionality, sometimes even better than the paid stuffs! Likewise, if we think that people would not consider free stuffs in terms of PC security, we are very wrong indeed. Even when malwares, spywares, bots and rootkits are increasingly on the wild and threatening our daily computering lives, some of us still want free security software.

Of course, if i was writing anything on this little informational blog, it was not just to educate or remind you, but also to help you with all that i can. I am here to tell you with great joy that if you like antivirus security for FREE, there are many free yet good antivirus out there, which i'd singled ten of them as the best you could get and give you a brief introduction to them all.

My Top Ten Best Free Antivirus Security Download List: ===========================================

1. Avira Antivir Personal Free
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Simply to say, this is in my opinion, the BEST FREE antivirus in the current market. It offers strong, consistent and reliable virus protection in real-time and it specializes against the detection and removal of virus, worms, trojans, rootkits and dialers. Avira is well-known for its heuristic detection capabilities and its antivirus engine is one of the best out there. Although the annoying Avira-adverstising and slow update speed are always the bad thing about Avira, there's not much to ask for from the best free antivirus out there.

2. AVG Antivirus Free Edition
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It does not top the best free antivirus out there, and certainly its detection are not of the first class, but AVG is always consistently there, and it is universally the most famous free antivirus, having an estimated fan base of more than 80 million users worldwide. The latest AVG free edition combines AVG antivirus, AVG antispyware and internet surfing protection in one body, and it is sweet to know that afer all that first-time combination, it luckily only impacts moderately on system resources. It protects you in real-time and offers daily virus definition updates.

3. Avast! Antivirus Free
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Avast! is the third antivirus i've used in my computing life after Norton and AVG, and suffice to say, it offers rock solid real-time protection with daily updates plus full featured protection such as mail, P2P, instant messenging shield, network shield, self-protection and resident protection, making it one of the most complete free antivirus out there. Avast! is also interactive, fun to use, supports 64-bit PCs and most importantly, it owns one of the best real-time protection engine out there; all with its clever management on system resources. Even though it does cough up a couple of false positives at times, users could care less for an antivirus as good as Avast!: so long as it does not miss the important threats!

4. Comodo Internet Security Free Edition
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The only free internet security protection in my list, with a real-time antivirus+firewall protection module combined in one package. Comodo has always been the frontrunner on the firewall protection scene and it is of no doubt that it will do well on the antivirus industry too, having released Comodo Antivirus before to moderate success. Although this security package is pretty new and currently still on the uprising stage unlike Avira or AVG which has settled down at the top pretty firmly, it might soon be the free antivirus to beat.

5. PC Tools Antivirus Free Edition
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The famous creator of Spyware Doctor, one of the market-leading antispyware solution wows users with a free offering of PC Tools Antivirus. With IntelliGuard, its trademark real-time protection module and comprehensive system scanning based on years of security solution offerings, we can say that PC Tools Antivirus is also a strong free antivirus out there. Although lacking a high-speed update feature, it does little to impact the fact that PC Tools Antivirus is as good as it gets.

6. BitDefender Antivirus Free Edition
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Who can forget Softwin's BitDefender, the fastest-growing security company's offerings? Even with several product such as BitDefender Internet Security and BitDefender Total Security, BitDefender, like regular rivals Avira, AVG and Avast, has come out with a free antivirus solution. Unlike the top five free antivirus, BitDefender Antivirus Free only works up to Windows XP and is an on-demand scanning antivirus with no real-time protection offered. Despite these two setbacks, users still gets the same update module and the same certified BitDefender scanning engines found in their paid version, making it a free antivirus with a certain degree of PC protection quality.

7. ClamWin Free Antivirus
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With its own developed scanning engine, long-time commitment towards providing free security solutions and high detection rate which rivals paid security products, ClamWin has come a long way and is still an excellent free antivirus. Like the Free Bitdefender, ClamWin does not have any real-time protection and required manual scanning to detect virus. However, it works just as well as your average antivirus. It does have automatic update features and its popularity with software developers even allows its integration with Spyware Terminator, a free antispyware solution.

8. DriveSentry Antivirus
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DriveSentry is a front-edge antivirus for home users which utilizes protection based on both blacklisting and whitelisting technology together with signature-based detection; a plus for a free antivirus. It works well together with other existing antivirus software and allows user participation in the facilitation of detecting unknown virus of the future. Features available includes virus, HIPS and encryption to mention a few. Because of its user-interactive characteristics, it does takes some time getting used to.

9. ThreatFire Antivirus (formerly CyberHawk)
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If DriveSentry is being unique because it is based on blacklisting and whitelisting technology, then ThreatFire can be considered unique too because unlike contemporary front-line antivirus, it is totally dedicated towards behavioral protection instead of signatures, heuristics or blacklisting/whitelisting technology. As suggested, it traces malicious behaviour by analyzing the PC's background activity and informs you when neccesary: whether any program is trying to log your keystrokes, send an unknown network signal outbound, make changes to critical areas of your system files etc. Once known as CyberHawk Security and now developed by PC Tools, ThreatFire is a trustworthy antivirus that you can use as a standalone protection or as an additional antivirus to your existing one; without being an expert in computering!

10. Rising Antivirus Free Edition
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A China-based antivirus solution, Rising Antivirus Free offers similarly strong protection with an antivirus engine that successfully won the VB100 antivirus detection award in recent testings. Like all modern antivirus, it offers protection against malware, virus, worms, spywares and dialers. It also offers a user account protection module which protects user's online account information such as bank accounts and e-mail accounts. Rising is currently the top free antivirus which is based in Asia, with its popularity eclipsing even the Indian-based QuickHeal.