G Data Anti Virus – The way Anti Virus should be?
I am quite delighted to announce that I have found an Anti Virus package that I am 99% happy with!
The software goes by the name of G Data. I recently installed the 2010 version on my personal computer at home for reviewing purposes. Initially the installation is a bit of a lengthy process, taking an odd 30mins or so. On top of that it had to download about 60mb of virus definitions and updates. To justify this it does run a dual engine virus protection module, which means you have two different monitoring modules keeping your PC safe with both these engines needed to be updated. I was also pleased that there were no tedious registration forms and activation processes, I was simply asked to enter a email address and a desired password, that’s it.
After installation I can with all honesty say that I did not have any hassles at all. I have a network setup of 5 PCs at home, one of them running as a remote desktop only. When sharing files on my PC I did not encounter any firewall or permission problems, there were also no issues regarding networking in any of the games I tried. It even runs on the Windows 7 RC without any hassles. G Data just quietly runs in the background doing its job, or did it?
G Data Anti Virus
I decided to put it to the test and see if it can really be so quiet and fully functional?
I jumped onto Limewire and downloaded the first “dodgy” file I could find. The specific one I tried first was a “Transformers 2 2009 Bluray Dvd Rip [L33735Group].zip” with a file size of 480KB; this was sure to be a good version of the movie, ?X%@$!
After downloading the file I opened it up and double clicked the “Open Transformers.exe” file, G Data immediately detected a Trojan horse (who could have guessed?), and popped up a notification. After you have told G Data what to do a second window came up telling me all threats have been removed from my PC, it even notified me which of the two engines it used to fix and detect the threat. It doesn’t have access to the zip file so the original exe was still present. I tried another 2 different files just to test it. Both detected immediately and removed the virus. After 2 mins or so it came up with another message alerting me of the dangerous files still inside the zip files and asked if I want to delete, or quarantine the files. I was impressed.
Speed
After putting it to the test I had to ask the question everybody asks when it comes to Anti Virus Software. Does it slow down my system? Especially since it runs two engines and is very capable of serving its purpose. I recorded my start up time of windows prior to installing G Data. With a relatively fresh install of Windows 7 RC my PC managed to boot in 27seconds from power up. After installing G Data I recorded a time of 36 seconds. I found this hard to believe but this was the result on numerous tests.
Performance
Next was a performance test. I was delighted to see that the G Data console itself has a System CPU usage Indicator, and right above that a G Data CPU usage indicator (how much of the CPU G Data is using itself). Quite neat to have when running benchmarks. I was surprised to see that while browsing the internet and browsing around on my PC, the G Data CPU Usage averaged a 9%. When copying a large amount of files CPU usage goes up to 22%. The speed impact of copying files G Data claims to be 8% loss which In today’s day and age, a necessity to have some kind of virus protection, an 8% loss of copy speed is hardly a big sacrifice to make in my opinion.
I have to admit that I was a big fan of Norton before my G Data encounter. I never had any problems with Norton and found it to be one of the only packages which could actually remove viruses and not only detect them. The only honest issue was that Norton did increase my start-up time by as much as 20 – 25 seconds, and I’m quite positive that it did slow everything else down as well. It seems like G Data has now compared and possibly exceeded my expectations when it comes to Anti Virus software.
The next impressive point was the pricing. Pricing is in the region of R 250.00 for the Anti Virus Package, R 300.00 for the Internet Security Package and R 380.00 for the Total Care Package. All of these packages are 3 user 1 year packages which more than justifies my comment regarding the price.
Some of the features in the Total Care package are:
- AntiVirus
- Firewall
- Data-Backup
- AntiSpam
- AntiPhishing
- Child-Protection
- System-Tuning
G Data Console
The console window displays a complete overview of all the elements and their status. Configuring them involves only a double click and choosing a desired option, simple as that.
G Data also installs a web toolbar where you can choose web-monitoring options on the fly; the web monitor can even be switched off if you do experience any problems with sites, scripts or elements being blocked. There are also hourly virus definition checks to ensure up to date security, the console displays a date and time stamp for the last definition update and update check.
As an individual I am concerned about data, security and reliability on my PC. I am however also a passionate gamer and understand the importance of PC performance. G Data does really satisfy my needs when looking at Anti Virus software; I can now relax and just enjoy the experience of having a functional, high-performance and totally safe computer.
It’s no wonder that G Data has been the Top Record Award winner in Europe for a while now. It has now raised the bar of what I look for in an Anti Virus Package and honestly at this stage considering the price, performance and reliability of G Data I will stick with G Data as my preferred Anti Virus package for now. The software is very new in South Africa and will start appearing in stores all around the country from here on.
PC Specs:
AMD Athlon X2 64 6400+ (3.2Ghz)
Gigabyte AMD MA790X-DS4 SLI Motherboard
4Gb DDR2 800 Dual Chanel Ram
1.5Tb Total Storage
Sparkle nVidia Ge-Force 9800GTX+
Windows 7 Ultimate 64Bit (RC)
G Data TotalCare 2010 Installed
For more information visit http://www.gdatasoftware.co.za/.
This was posted by eben who has posted 7 items.
→ Robert Bravery said on: August 24, 2009 at 12:45 pm
There are loads of anit-virus software packages around. The challenge is to have a balance of functionality while being able to detect and stop the greatest amount of viruses.
I found that the newer AV packages while fast and very user friendly do not compete with the other guys out there when it comes to actually stopping those illusive viruses.
I’ve been hit with a few viruses lately, and must say that Avast did me proud. I have also found that Avast have at times found viruses that others have not.
And it’s Free for Home use.
Haven’t had the opportunity to test GData out. That’s why we rely on guys like you to di the testing for us.
Speed for me is also very important as a developer, I don’t want to spend most of my day being held up by AV scanning.
→ TolecnaL said on: August 24, 2009 at 2:19 pm
I am quite pleased to say that the developers of G Data are the same people who worked on Avast and Bit Defender. So the same level of expected security can definitely be expected from G Data. At the office where I work we use to have a recurring problem with MSN viruses, we installed G Data Enterprise on our server (each individual PC runs a client interface). The problem has since subsided except from the 2 PCs where it was not installed…
You can download a trial version of any of the 3 packages from the website should you want to give it a bash.
EbeN