McAfee VirusScan 2004 offers focused antivirus protection coupled with an intuitive interface and streamlined update process. Unfortunately, much of their interface is cluttered with advertising for other products in the McAfee family and configuration options for VirusScan are extremely limited. However, McAfee has played catch-up this year and the 2004 version now offers the same level of POP3/SMTP email protection offered by other vendors.
Installation
McAfee offers no configurable options during installation, other than requesting whether to participate in their virus tracking program. This makes it less than ideal for experienced users who might wish to control certain aspects of the program upfront. However, lack of install options can benefit the novice user who might be confused by multiple choices.System Requirements
Pentium 133Mhz processor or betterMicrosoft Windows XP, 2000, ME, or 98
32 MB RAM
35 MB hard disk space
Internet Explorer 5.5 or higher.
What's New
- WormStopper - alerts if too many recipients are sent email all at once, or if there are too many messages in a given time frame.
- Instant Message Scanning - protection for AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, and Windows Messenger.
- Email scanning - scans inbound POP3 and outgoing SMTP email. This is a catch-up feature for McAfee.
- MS Outlook Scanning - ability to initiate on-demand scans of email and folders in Outlook.
- AVERT File Submission - directly submit suspicious files for analysis.
Summary
For an experienced user, McAfee VirusScan 2004 provides little opportunity for customization. However, this makes it ideal for novice users who wish to have true set and forget protection. Historically a robust and effective virus scanner, McAfee's protective qualities will suit all categories of users.Recommendation
If you're looking for solid, focused antivirus protection without the bells, whistles, and overhead of an Internet Suite, McAfee VirusScan 2004 does an admirable job of keeping your system free of viruses, worms, Trojans, spyware, adware, and a host of other Internet parasites. It's ease of installation and default features are particularly well-suited for the novice user.
