Antivirus Protection
Buy Now...
As the third prong of its eTrust protection service, CA (Computer Associates) has released the latest version of its anti-virus product. Appropriately entitled ezAntivirus, this product comes with the promise to "stop viruses from even thinking about attacking your PC". I'm not sure how you could possibly justify this claim unless CA knows a way of interrogating viruses in the wild about their intentions but other claims, such as ease-of-use and updating ability, made for this software are within the scope of this review.
The installation routine that is rather slow in getting started. You will need to enter a 20-character license key. The installation procedure will attempt to go online in order to check for any updated files plus carry out an automatic scan of your system for infected files. This scan can be a little time consuming. In the case of the test machine, 1.5GHz system running Windows XP, it took the best part of 25 minutes to complete the scan. At the conclusion of the installation, you will need to reboot your computer in order for the antivirus protection to be activated.
In order to ensure you get the best possible protection, CA is rather persistent in its efforts to ensure you register the product. At various times you will be redirected to the eTrust web site so that a form can be completed. The only way to stop this happened is to complete the form and then you will be entitled to 24/7 web support and updates for a period of twelve months.
ezAntivirus adds itself to your Windows start-up procedure and places its icon in the system tray. Right clicking on this icon can reveal options which include the program's tabbed interface. By default this interface opens on the Virus Scanning tab. This contains options to instigate an immediate scan; create a schedule for future scans; select specific files for scanning; and configure scanning actions and any possible exclusions you wish to include. Among the settings that can be customised are those for email scanning and the use of quarantine for infected files.
The Update tab, as you might expect, lets you connect to the Internet to download the latest updates and configure a schedule for automatic updates. The user has the option to set a start time and the repeat interval in days and hours between scans. There is also an option to configure, if required, the appropriate settings for those who work through a proxy server.
The third tab, entitled Tools, gives access to quarantined items that can be restored or removed; view a log of all scanning and updating records; plus create a report of your computer to be sent to the eTrust antivirus technical support team. Switching to the final tab brings up a variety of help options including an online virus encyclopaedia.
Sometimes, when installing an application, especially when there is a need for critical files to be checked, you are advised to turn off your antivirus protection. In order to provide the user will an easy-to-use method of achieving this disabling of antivirus protection, ezAntivirus has a snooze option that can be accessed from the system tray icon. The user can designate the number of minutes (from 1 to 999) during which the antivirus software will be deactivated. The snooze feature can then be allowed to run its course or be immediately turned off from the system tray icon.
ezAntivirus is easy to use and update. The product will cost £19.95 when purchased online or £29.95 for a retail boxed copy. The software will run on any Windows 98SE or later system with a300MHZ processor, 128MB of RAM and 10MB of hard disk space.
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