*NEW!*
Panda Antivirus Pro 2010
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$49.95 
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Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 makes solid improvements this year to its core antivirus software.
As one of the few antivirus applications that includes a firewall by default, Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 performs well in most areas.
Where it counts, Panda maintains its record of good real-time protection and even offers a built-in firewall (rare in a non Internet Security Software version), making it a good choice for antivirus firewall software.
Their spyware and adware removal rate wasn't as clean as we'd like to see, but it was still effective.
IMPROVED FEATURES
Good, low resource usage
Better manual scanning
Excellent firewall
Panda's overall system usage was very low compared to most other antivirus software we've tested, and we're glad to see a nice, simple user interface.
Where Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 falls behind this year is in the anti-phishing and customer service departments.
Unfortunately, the anti-phishing feature was virtually worthless in our tests. IE and Chrome browsers did far better with default settings alone. Given that phishing is a
serious threat, we can't give Panda a higher score.
Another thing we weren't thrilled with was Panda's lack of adequate phone and chat support. They offer email tech support and a knowledgebase, but given the excellent support
options that competitors like
VIPRE and
BitDefender 2010 offer, email and knowledgebase support isn't enough to meet the demands of today's
antivirus firewall software user.
All in all, Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 is solid antivirus firewall software. And if you don't think you'll ever need phone or chat-based technical support, Panda may be a good choice.
For core antivirus protection, it gets the job done well. If, however, you think you'll rely on technical support with your total Internet Security, we think you may be better
off with one of our top three picks for
best antivirus software this year instead.
Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 Features
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- Real-time Protection
Helps protect your computer from viruses, spyware, and other types of malware. Prevents threats from harming your PC in real-time.
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- Spyware Removal
Keeps spyware and adware from infecting your computer. Identifies and deletes spyware already on your PC.
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- Email Protection
Keeps your inbox free from viruses and malicious software. Scans incoming and outgoing messages for potential threats.
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- Instant Messaging Protection
Stops viruses and other malicious files from being transferred through your IM conversations.
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- Anti-phishing
Helps identify potential phishing websites that want to steal personal and sensitive information. Helps stop identity theft.
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- Firewall
Your first line of defense against viruses, spyware, and other malware. Keeps unwanted programs from installing on your computer.
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- Vulnerability Check
Checks to make sure there are no vulnerabilities in these areas: Application updates, up-to-date programs, Windows updates, and Windows account passwords.
Panda Antivirus 2010 Assessment
Here we list a breakdown of each category we've tested for Panda Antivirus Pro Software 2010. Each category was given a percentage rating based on those tests.
Antivirus Installation: 95%
$49.95
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Panda Antivirus Pro installed easily with no significant issues. A basic memory scan is performed during the install. (Note: this is not a thorough, full-system scan, so
you'll need to run a manual scan once the installation is complete).
The firewall is not active by default. A reboot is required to activate it. We encourage you to reboot and to activate the firewall, too.
Strangely, antivirus definition updates don't download automatically, but they will eventually download within 10 minutes of using the software. We recommend you opt to
run a manual download to update Panda with current antivirus definitions.
Total installation only took about 4 min.
Un-installation: 95%
Un-installation was easy and didn't require any extra steps (you'll have the option to give feedback if you choose).
You can uninstall via the Windows ADD/REMOVE Program, or through Panda's self-uninstall. A reboot is needed to completed the uninstallation. Total time for uninstall was
only about 1 min.
A few registry keys were left behind, but they're harmless and shouldn't cause any problems down the line.
User Interface: 89%
Panda's user interface (UI) is not as attractive as other antivirus products, but it's easy to use and navigate. We give them kudos for that especially given the
tendency of some antivirus vendors to go overboard with pop-ups and poor interfaces.
The main control panel uses tabs to separate each section. This makes for a convenient way to display any features and data you may need to configure.
Each section has a corresponding help page link that explains each feature in more detail. The help pages include plenty of information, but are still easy to understand
without being too long.
While the interface may be called "plain" by some people, the only complaint we have about Panda's UI is that it's divided into two sections: known threats and unknown
threats. Each of these require separate configurations.
It would have been more economical to include both options on the same page for easier access. Especially given that they're both there for the same purpose: to configure
how you want Panda Antivirus Pro to respond to virus threats.
Real-time Protection: 95%
Real-time protection wasn't as solid as we'd hoped. Our testing showed that Panda antivirus only successfully blocked 70% of the viruses we tested against it.
The more aggressive antivirus software programs we tested usually caught the remaining 30% that Panda couldn't.
70% isn't too bad, but the best antivirus software performed better.
Real-time protection memory usage was quite low, coming in under 3MB.
Panda's real-time antivirus protection proved to be average at best, but still adequate for our testing purposes.
Manual Scan: 92%
$49.95
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Panda antivirus correctly identified and removed 93% of the malware files during a full-system, manual scan (far better than their real-time protection score).
We were really happy to see how light the manual scan was on the system: only 3MB of memory was used.
All files, memory, registry, and emails were scanned during a full-system scan. Total time was only about 25 min.
Resource Usage: 89%
Panda's memory usage was very low overall. Only 3.5% of memory was used during real-time protection.
Only about 60-105MB of memory was used during a manual scan.
These are all fairly good numbers that should be light enough that most users won't be tempted to disable their antivirus protection because it's too burdensome on their computer.
For the most part, CPU usage was less than 10% when scanning text files, but peaked to almost 75% when scanning compressed files.
Pretty good for most antivirus software.
Panda Antivirus Pro 2010
Antivirus Scanning Resource Usage
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| Real-Time Memory |
3.5% |
| Manual Scan Memory |
105MB |
| Manual Scan CPU |
75% |
Note: These are the average results we found during our testing.
Every PC is different, of course, so your results may vary, but we expect these results to be fairly representative.
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Spyware/Adware Protection: 93%
Real-time protection didn't detect any active or previously installed spyware programs, but all were detected when they tried to pass through the firewall.
While not ideal, because we would have hoped the anti-spyware engine would have caught these threats, we're still pleased to see the threats identified at all.
Furthermore, that the Panda firewall stopped the threats serves as a reminder of just how important a bi-directional firewall is to an
Internet security suite.
All spyware and adware programs were eventually found and deleted when a manual scan was run.
What this all means is, Panda's real-time protection isn't as powerful as is should be when protecting against spyware and adware. However, their full manual scanning is
strong enough for us to give them a higher score.
Virus Removal from a Pre-infected Machine: 75%
We installed Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 onto a testing computer pre-infected with viruses and malware to see how well it would perform. Unfortunately, Panda didn't do as
well as we expected.
During the installation process, Panda didn't detect any of the pre-infected viruses or malware. Even the initial memory scan didn't find any.
After the installation reboot, the real-time protection didn't detect anything either.
Only after running a manual full-system antivirus scan were all viruses and malicious programs finally identified and deleted.
Even though Panda finally removed all malicious software, we feel like you shouldn't have to take such steps for your antivirus software to protect your PC, especially
because many consumers only purchase antivirus software after they suspect their machine has already been infected.
Because of this, we feel this antivirus program is worthy only of an average score.
Email Protection: 92%
$49.95
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Antivirus email protection is supported by both IMAP and POP email clients. All attachments are scanned for malicious software threats, and the email protection will warn
you of any suspicious files.
Unfortunately, Panda's email protection only scans viruses in Outlook Express and Outlook and doesn't cover Thunderbird, which we were surprised to see.
However, your email is still protected by Panda's real-time protection which scans any attachments you attempt to open or save to your PC.
We didn't notice any sluggish behavior on our testing PC when email protection was engaged. Memory usage was average and CPU activity was under 5% during email and
attachment scanning.
Firewall: 92%
It's nice to see a firewall as one of the default features for antivirus software. Panda's bi-directional firewall is easy enough for anyone to use.
You can configure the firewall software to ask for permission every time a program tries to access your computer, or you can just set it and forget it with automatic
permissions.
Rules can be configured for public or home networks, making it great for someone who travels regularly with a laptop.
Rules can also be set for individual programs, IPs, protocols, and ports, giving a degree of flexibility not all antivirus firewall programs have.
The firewall help pages are quite good. They should be simple and thorough enough for any user to navigate easily and figure out what they're doing.
Even with Panda's default settings, the firewall successfully blocked most viruses and malicious files attempting to access our testing PC.
Overall, a complete, and very effective firewall.
IM Protection: 98%
Instant Messaging (IM) protection scans each file transfer for viruses and other malicious intent.
Panda's IM protection works with Yahoo Messenger, AIM (AOL), MSN Messenger, and Trillian.
Our testing showed very good results with Panda's Instant Messaging scanning.
Anti-phishing: 70%
We were disappointed the Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 anti-phishing feature scored very low during our testing. Less than 20% of known phishing sites were successfully
filtered.
In fact, Internet Explorer (IE) and Chrome scored 90% in blocking phishing URLs with their default settings alone.
Given the strength of the Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 antivirus engine, we're surprised at the poor anti-phishing results. They'll really needs to improve the effectiveness
of their anti-phishing filter in the next version.
Antivirus Definition Updates: 85%
Antivirus definition updates are available every 24 hours. We weren't able to find a setting to adjust these intervals, so it seems Panda only makes their definitions
available once a day.
You can, however, set the updates to be automatic or manual (the default setting is automatic, which we recommend).
Even though Panda's definition updates are consistent, they really need to give the option to increase the update intervals. Virus and malware threats are created so
quickly, you should be able to update the definitions much faster than 24 hours for maximum Internet security protection.
Customer Support: 80%
You can submit an email support ticket from the main control panel, or you can access their Internet tech support (which is their knowledgebase).
The email support and knowledgebase are free, but Panda offers no phone support or chat.
While email support is easy to access, having no phone or chat tech support is a major blow to Panda's score. We've found that solid, free chat and phone support is crucial for customer satisfaction and antivirus security.
Panda Antivirus 2010
Review Conclusions
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Panda Antivirus 2010 Scores
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Antivirus
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$49.95
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| Overall Antivirus Protection |
93 |
| Real-time Antivirus Protection |
95 |
| Manual Antivirus Scanning |
92 |
| Antivirus Resource Utlization |
89 |
| Virus Removal (Pre-infected Machine) |
75 |
| Antivirus Definition Updates |
85 |
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Additional Internet Security Features
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| Spyware/Adware Protection |
93 |
| Email Protection |
92 |
| Anti-Spam Protection |
* |
| Firewall Software |
92 |
| Parental Controls Software |
* |
| IM/Instant Message Protection |
98 |
| Anti-Phishing Protection |
70 |
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Other Antivirus Software Ratings
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| Installation |
95 |
| Un-installation |
95 |
| User Interface |
89 |
| Customer Technical Support |
80 |
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* These features are available only in
Panda Internet Security 2010.
For the most part, Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 performed well during our testing. This year's version is at least as adequate as last year's, with only a few flaws.
Testings showed good results for real-time protection, manual scanning, and low resource usage. This year's version has a very light footprint compared to years past when
Panda was known to be a much heavier application.
We commend them for addressing this issue--and for addressing it so well.
The included firewall is a nice touch for any antivirus software, and we're glad to see it performed fairly well. Not as strong as some of our best antivirus software
choices this year, but Panda still holds its own.
- Average real-time protection
- Good manual antivirus detection
- Poor anti-phishing
- Excellent firewall
- Easy-to-use interface
What keeps us from giving Panda Antivirus Pro a higher score are two major deficiencies: poor anti-phishing and lack of more tech support options.
The anti-phishing tested far worse than most other antivirus software we tested. As we noted, Internet Explorer (IE) and Google's Chrome browser performed with flying
colors. An antivirus software with a so-called "anti-phishing" feature should have easily conquered these results. But Panda didn't.
Phishing is a major threat to users these days and needs to be taken seriously.
If you're using other anti-phishings tools like those built into Google's Chrome, Microsoft Internet Explorer, or Mozilla Firefox, you might take that into consideration
and feel justified in purchasing Panda.
From our perspective though, with less tech and customer support than competitors and weak anti-phising, we rank Panda Antivirus Pro 2010 lower than we otherwise might.
We believe good customer and tech support by phone, email, and chat is essential in the best antivirus firewall software--not to mention customer support. Panda does offer
email support and a knowledgebase, but free and easy to access phone support is a must in our eyes.
Overall, Panda Antivirus Pro does a decent job with antivirus protection. It's still not as good as some of our other choices this year, but good nevertheless, and
particularly good considering Panda's previous versions. We like Panda, and hope they can improve their anti-phishing and offer better tech support options soon.
Panda Antivirus 2010
Windows XP / Windows Vista / Windows 7
System Requirements
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- Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 or higher
- Mozilla Firefox 2.5 or higher
- CD-ROM drive
(NOT required for installation via the Internet)
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| Software
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Microsoft Windows XP (32 bit)
Windows Vista (32 and 64 bit)
Windows 7 (32 and 64 bit)
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| Processor/CPU
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Intel Pentium processor 300 MHz or faster
(or compatible)
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| System Memory/RAM
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1 GB
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| Free Disk Space
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275 MB
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| Email
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- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft Outlook Express
- POP and IMAP supported clients
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| Instant Messaging
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- Yahoo Messenger
- Windows Live Messenger
- AOL / AIM
- Trillian
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