2012 Antivirus Software Reviews

Avira Antivirus Premium 2012

Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 is a feature-rich program, particularly for a "basic" antivirus offering. It even includes features not found in most basic antivirus software.

Unfortunately, its antiphishing filter missed some of the phishing sites most competitors nailed, and its rootkit detection was able to detect--but unable to remove--some of the nasty rootkits we test with.

On the plus side, Avira does offer free phone support, which is a huge plus, particularly if you're having problems with your PC and suspect a virus infection. There are also plenty of easy-to-use self-help options.

The user interface is clean and simple, with an "Expert" mode that offers all the advanced features you'd expect to see in top antivirus software, even if it might seem overwhelming to novice users.

In the end, Avira shapes up to be a good antivirus engine with only a few setbacks. Avira has proven itself to be a viable antivirus program over the years, and Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 is no exception, particularly thanks to their free phone support.
Overall Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 scored quite well during testing.

All of the major independent testing labs agree that Avira has a strong antivirus engine, is good against blocking spyware, but could use some work in the antiphishing and rootkit protection departments.

• VB Bulletin
• AV Comparatives
• Anti-Malware Test Lab
• PC Security Labs
• AV-Test
• ICSA

Avira's most impressive feature this year is their core, real-time antivirus engine. In our test Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 detected and stopped the majority of zero-day viruses and other emerging threats.

Unfortunately, Avira's antiphishing filter missed some known phishing sites. If you're using Firefox or Chrome, you've already got great antiphishing, but the added protection from drive-by downloads is a good idea.

When scanning for embedded virus infections, Avira had trouble detecting and removing some stubborn rootkits. It cleaned most, but some required contacting tech support for help.

Ultimately, Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 has a solid antivirus engine with a good reputation.
Avira's resource usage was quite respectable with realtime protection enabled. CPU usage was just below 1% when the system was running idle and memory was right in line with most competitors. Overall, it was a good performance in this regard.

During a full, manual scan of our test PCs, Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 was a little high, but still acceptable: CPU at 62% and memory at about 69%. We didn't experience and noticeable system drag during the scan.

On the plus side it was also one of the faster antivirus products at performing one of these scans. It was a good balance between resource use and speed.
There are two levels to the Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 user interface: Basic and Expert.

The Basic mode gives the big picture without letting the user feel overwhelmed with details. The Expert mode gives full transparency and control over everything in the software.

What's the downside? The Expert mode can feel somewhat confusing--almost as if there are too many options. If you like full control, and lots of check boxes and buttons to select, then you'll be fine.

Overall, the interface is a nice, modern design. Everything is clearly labeled, and you won't have to dig to find what you need.

Some buttons were occassionally sluggish to respond to our clicks. For instance, the "update" button more than once took a few seconds to launch a new window. In cases like this, most users will click multiple times. In this case, it's just a minor thing, and you get used to it.
In the end, it's an interface that's easy to like.
The technical support for Avira Antivirus Premium is better than we expected, and in fact is better than everyone's but VIPRE. Most importantly, they offer completely free phone support.

You'll need to enter your purchase ID number to access their phone support, but other than that, it's very quick and easy to get a real person.

Everything from basic installation questions to full virus removal is completely free. On the self-help side, their support pages are clean, easy to navigate, and lead us to the information we were after quickly. There's a searchable knowledgebase, video tutorials, and a forum.

All in all, solid support. Why Avira and VIPRE have support that's this good and no one else does is a mystery. If they can do it, surely companies like Norton and McAfee should be able to also.
Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 has their antivirus definition updates set to download and install automatically every 2 hours. You can set these intervals to any day, hour, or minute you like (with a minimum of 15 minutes).

There are no immediate options to select how and if you want virus definition updates to download and install unless you go into the "Expert" settings, where there's a manual update button you can click anytime you like.
Two extra features worth mentioning with Avira are the Email Protection and Rescue Disk.

A rescue disk is common for most antivirus software, but not all antivirus software offers email protection as a core feature. Both are nice extras for Avira this year.
Avira's email protection is a welcome add-on for this basic antivirus software. Avira is automatically set to scan incoming emails via IMAP and POP3. You'll need to manually set Avira to scan SMTP/outgoing emails.

Dangerous emails are be automatically deleted by default, or you can set them to be moved to a designated folder for further investigation.

There's also an option to replace the body content of an email with pre-determined text, which makes it easier to see that a dangerous email has been detected. Quite handy.
Avira lets you download a rescue package of their antivirus engine and latest updates that you can burn to disk in the event of a system crash.

If your PC becomes so infected that you can't scan or boot normally, this rescue disk allows you to boot up and scan with Avira in attempts to remove the virus. Nice.
Avira 2012 is a solid antivirus engine. Yes, we did see some issues we didn't like, particularly in the way of rootkits it couldn't remove from systems that were already infected, but overall, Avira Antivirus Premium was surprisingly good.

The user interface strikes a good balance between basic and expert with enough customization to make even uber geeks happy.

The antiphishing proved to be mostly solid, but a few known phishing sites weren't blocked during testing. Not great, but if you're using Firefox or Chrome (which already have excellent antiphishing filters), you should be well protected.

We love Avira's free phone support for all issues, technical and otherwise, including free virus removal. Their support web pages are also nice, tidy, and easy to navigate.

The bottom line is even though Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 has some weaknesses with antiphishing and rootkit removal, it was fast, reliable antivirus software.