Best Lightweight Anti-Virus?

By Royalty
in Smart Home, Network & Security

 Share

Recommended Posts

Experienced

Buio

Posted
Posted
Anyone have an idea of what the best lightweight antivirus is? It can be paid as I think paid will include more features. Thanks!

"Lightweight" and "More features" are sort of opposite. You can have leightweight with more features, but only compared to another with the same amount of features.

MSE is good enough, free and very unobtrusive. It might use slightly more RAM than some other solutions, but who cares about that.

Grand Master

Brandon H Supervisor

Posted
  • Supervisor
Posted

I was going to say no MSE but I guess all of you guys convinced me to use it again! Thanks!

yeah MSE has really improved since it's 1.0 days

I've personally been using it since the 2.0 connect beta

Grand Master

Brandon H Supervisor

Posted
  • Supervisor
Posted

Ahh thanks. Any opinions of how it is please?

not really much to say, I hardly notice it's there most of the time, the only time it bugs me is when it notices an infected file (which is to be expected)

it keeps itself up-to-date and it runs an auto quick-scan weekly in the background

Grand Master

TEX4S

Posted
Posted

You want to know what is the best damned one out there ? Webroot Secure Anywhere 2012 - its cloud based so its tiny. Only a tiny 1 MB file running ! I corrected that after re-verifying

I had a buddy from Cisco tell me about it as Cisco and webroot worked together on the remote mgmt. side of it - Since I first started messing around with it - I have told about 10 different people to drop what they are using regardless of contract & get a copy. All of them have & are happy with listening to me. I purchased 3 copies - 1 for my ThinkPad (120GB SSD does a full scan in 20 seconds!) and one for my desktop (wasnt even using an A/V for 6 months) & 1 for my desktop @ work. I used the home version as a template when recommending our parent company to consider buying 5000 copies of the enterprise version for the company - I like it that much.

The GUI is thin and light, but the most impressive I think is the features and security.

It has a sandbox feature to run something if you're not sure of it - or the app will run something in sandbox-mode if it isnt sure about something due to heuristics.

2 of the most impressive features: You can actually run it with other security software without issue, and the removal ability beat out malwarebytes. A/V software is supposed to keep stuff out, they arent good at removing once it is in - so I was totally impressed when it caught a toolkit that malwarebytes missed. (it does a full scan when installed)

I have used it up @ work for 4 of our more "dangerous" employees who seem to have a nack for getting infected. Since using webroot - all of them have been trouble-free.

Here is a remote admin feature if you have more than 1 license under your command:

post-74610-0-44200300-1328076587_thumb.j

and here is the detail view:

post-74610-0-85135700-1328076702_thumb.j

This is a friend who frequents torrents & /b/ and a lot of pr0n - so he is ALWAYS getting bugs, now they are all blocked upon entry

______________________

You can get a 30-day trial

There are other decent ones out there (norton, KAV, not MSE) but I havent been impressed by an A/V pkg before. PC Mag gave it the highest rating ever for an A/V software - MaximumPC gave it a 9 & Kick Ass rating

nuff said

Dont listen to anyone recommending MSE - not as bad as McAfee, but far from the best ;)

Grand Master

devHead

Posted
Posted

Dont listen to anyone recommending MSE - not as bad as McAfee, but far from the best ;)

Anyone? I use MSE and have never had viruses. So, what is so bad about it exactly? You make a statement like the above, you should give reasons.

Lil Wayne, go with MSE, don't listen to people who make remarks like those who think simply because it's a Microsoft product, it must be garbage.

Grand Master

TEX4S

Posted
Posted

Anyone? I use MSE and have never had viruses. So, what is so bad about it exactly? You make a statement like the above, you should give reasons.

Lil Wayne, go with MSE, don't listen to people who make remarks like those who think simply because it's a Microsoft product, it must be garbage.

never said anything about it being from MS as the problem (you have me confused with an mac user or nix user I think) BTW where did you come up with that anyway ?

- and you have no idea if the reason you have never been infected has to do with your browsing habits or your use of a freebie A/V

The worst thing about it is people who say its the best because someone told them it is & thats all they know about it... OR its because they do nothing but go from youtube, twitter, to facebook & remain uninfected & think its because of that great A/V software.

There have been so many threads about this crap - look em up - its a solution for those who want a free one, thats it. Tell me in your experience what makes MSE the best ? Because it didnt let the trojan army come through ? Because it didnt blow up your computer upon installation ?

When people say "oh its great " that is hardly conclusive. or " i have never been infected" - Think it might have something to do with your browsing habits ? I gave examples of how good the new webroot Secure Anywhere is.

I didnt say it was bad - I said it was far from the best, and not to listen to anyone stating it. was. the. best.

I didnt even use A/V for 6 months - never had the slightest infection - you see why I think your arguments lacks ? But Im sorry if it ticked you off - but I have a lot of reasons why its not the best - and I dont want someone who is asking for help to get bad advice. If it works for you - then awesome ! If you were a little more adventurous in your browsing - you might not be saying its the best ? See my point ?

This topic is now closed to further replies.
 Share
Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.

  • Posts

    • Microsoft Edge gets tons of security features, including AI model that can see your screen

      By Snake Doc · Posted

      Ummmm that is what is it supposed to do. Just turn if off in settings if you do not want it analyzing your open tabs. Chrome does the same thing with Gemini. Sarfari will do the samething after Apple's AI and even more so with the release of their 27 versions that is now powered by Googles LLM/ML models. Understanding why it is doing it and how it can help you vs jumping to some conspiracy theroy is a much better approach. As long as it can be turned off, all is good. Yes the default should be off but the a lot of people would never discover these features.
    • Microsoft Edge gets tons of security features, including AI model that can see your screen

      By WaltC · Posted

      Just another reason (aside from many others) not to use Edge. Firefox 153.0b5 DEx64 has a similar feature added recently in prior builds that I will turn off at some point when I get around to it. It's the new "Something looks suspicious" page that pops up here and there. It cleverly hides itself between web pages that I've actually visited; as a result, you know, of selecting a web page and telling the browser where to go. The interesting thing is that it does not produce these warnings from pages that I, as the only intelligent user of the browser in my system, have ever directed the browser to open! What seems to be happening is that the browser looks at all the goofy ad links on a web page I do actually open and selects one that "looks suspicious" and then creates the "something looks suspicious" web page, which is neatly inserted, as mentioned, between web pages my RB ("real brain") has directed the browser to load in a session. The thing is, I usually look at links I am considering to follow before I ask the browser to load them, and in cases I have noticed where the link does indeed look suspicious, most of the time I will choose to not follow the link at all. Doesn't everyone do this or something similar? I am picky about what I voluntarily load... (I don't like links that start off fine, with a site designaiton that seems normal enough but then is followed by indecipherable alphanumeric strings many, many lines long, etc. I tend to reject those because they look suspicious. They may not be, but I don't care... I'll stay with Firefox, of course, if for no other reason than they usually let you turn off the junk you don't like. And because it isn't Edge... But at some point Microsoft will come to realize that putting your bookmarks on the left side is a Good Thing for a lot of people, just as Microsoft discovered when it had the bright idea of nailing the Windows taskbar to the bottom of the screen, when for decades Microsoft browsers had left that placement up to the user. They have finally reversed the obscenity of that decision. Finally.
    • Google's new hand-wave reCAPTCHA can be bypassed with a stock photo

      By Ccl Ncc · Posted

      Google was using the old CATPCHAs data to train their LLMs. What is the say they won't use this camera data of users to train their LLM? these companies need some strict regulations!
    • How do you future-proof a home or small office network?

      By Mindovermaster · Posted

      Depends on what you need. Might be a bit clearer on what you plan to do with it. Sort of a waste if you get the newest and greatest, but don't know how to use it.
    • NTLite 2026.06.11200

      By Copernic · Posted

      NTLite 2026.06.11200 by Razvan Serea NTLite is a Windows configuration tool that allows you to modify your existing Windows install or an image yet to be deployed, remove Windows components, configure and integrate, speed up the Windows deployment process. Reduce Windows footprint on your RAM and storage drive memory. Remove components of your choice, guarded by compatibility safety mechanisms, which speed up finding that sweet spot. Windows Unattended feature support, providing many commonly used options on a single page for easy setup. Easily integrate a single or multiple drivers, update or language packages. Package integration features smart sorting, enabling you to seamlessly add packages for integration and the tool will apply them in the appropriate order, keeping hotfix compatibility in check. One of the important new features of NTLite (compared to its predecessors) is the ability to modify an already installed the operating system, by removing unnecessary components. Supports Windows 11, 10, 8.1 and 7, x86 and x64, live and image. Server editions of the same versions, excluding support for component removals and feature configuration. ARM64 image support in the alpha stage. Does not support Checked/Debug, Embedded, IoT editions, nor Vista or XP. NTLite 2026.06.11200 changelog: New Secure Boot Migration support: Verification, certificate staging, and boot-manager/sector update across the Image, Updates, Apply, and Create-ISO pages (2023 CA migration, optional 2011 revocation, Anti-rollback, Boot sector choice etc) Secure Boot Host Readiness: Live host Secure Boot migration monitor and Servicing-task control Option under Image page - C:\Windows row, or load the host as the target - Updates - Secure Boot Image: 'Sort mounted images first' option for the image list in Menu-Settings UI: Hover description card for Components and Unattended pages, selectable text and quick access to Compatibility options Command line: Relay commands into the already-running instance Enables controlling already running NTLite via ntlite.exe Use /NewInstance to launch an additional instance using CLI operations (premium) UI: 'New instance' option via main menu instead of a secondary ntlite.exe prompt Apply: Hide individual Apply-page notes with a per-note dismiss (X), critical excluded Settings: 'Unsigned RDP file launch warnings' tweak (RDP client), bypassing the April 2026 security-update prompt on RDP connections Upgrade Image: Live OS and deployed image editing now unlocked on free/test licenses, same licensing as images Image: 'Recompress' option in manual dialog Remove Editions to shrink the WIM in one session Image: SWM part size set inline on the Apply page and image dialogs, split-size popup retired Image: Relative 'Last change' dates; editions grouped by build time to reduce noise Image: 'Forget - Missing' on the Edit-cache menu to mass drop entries whose folder is gone Components: Root groups reorganized - user-facing groups first, system/critical last Components: Show filter options to view components by Template or App-type, since Apps are now merged into groups Presets: Delete confirmation now lists the multi-selected preset names UI: Design update propagated to the rest of the tool UI: Filter and search match words in any order and partially, better results filtering Components Unattended: Input-locale language derives from the user locale, with an independent keyboard picker, enables combinations previously unavailable Unattended: Input-locale now allows for a user value override Unattended: Localization OOBE WinPE now can be copied with the new WinPE Copy OOBE localization toggle, enter locale settings once for both stages Updates: Downloader greys and locks updates the image already carries (hotfix and MSIX) Updates: Resume interrupted update downloads Command line: Many upgrades, see /?, now prints help to the console or redirected output UI-Translation: Finnish language added, also thanks for Chinese Traditional (Matt), French (tistou77), Italian (clarensio), Russian (RDS), Swedish (1FF), Vietnamese (Vu Anh Vu) Fix Components: Containers removal breaking Apps deployment Components: Microsoft Account had leftovers when Easy Migrate is kept Image: Export to an existing WIM improvements, Append renamed to Merge Image: Improved 26H1 live removal support Image: No more 'X:\ not accessible' popup for certain drives during image scan Presets: Manual image refresh picks up presets added/removed outside the app Tweaks: Disabled visual-effect animations no longer return after first logon on a new profile Tweaks: Live Visual Effects toggles (animations, drag full windows, font smoothing) now apply correctly Download: NTLite 2026.06.11200 | 20.5 MB (Free, paid upgrade available) Link: NTLite Home Page | NTLite Features | Screenshot Get alerted to all of our Software updates on Twitter at @NeowinSoftware

  • Recent Achievements

    • One Year In
      BA the Curmudgeon earned a badge
      One Year In
    • Conversation Starter
      rosiecharles earned a badge
      Conversation Starter
    • First Post
      KMilenkoski1202 earned a badge
      First Post
    • First Post
      carols23 earned a badge
      First Post
    • One Month Later
      Tom Willson earned a badge
      One Month Later

  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      510
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      258
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      151
    4. 4
      Steven P.
      94
    5. 5
      macoman
      66
    Show More

  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!