txnetcop
Charter Member
This debate comes up every couple of months, and the truth of the matter is there is NO best of breed when it comes to AV and Anti Malware software. I have tried a vast (no pun intended) number of different versions over the years and I really have not found any truly terrible or teriffic apps in the freeware offerings. I have had a couple of subscriptions and my only complaint with those is the headroom they use and they are often quite complex to get set up to operate efficently.
My choice(s) are AVG for my XP systems, and MS Security Essentials for my Win7 and Vista systems - yes I have several systems 8 in total. Both are free versions and all indications they will continue to remain free for personal use.
Ted to your point about MS not giving anything away, I would never second guess what any company will do going forward, but the older MS Defender was always free and Security Essentials seems to be a further evolution of that product. The other simple fact is most of the development for Security Essentials is generated when they are working on Security patches etc. and it is in their best interest to offer a reasonable solution to their OS users - just sayin...
I agree it would be in their best interest. It was only a guess not an educated guess as no one knows what Microsoft will do when they finally get a package that is in demand. I use their Security Essentials.