#6 - Panda Antivirus Review 2013
Pros
Includes personal firewall
Global threat identification network
Panda SafeCD boot disk
Includes Secure Browser
Home Network Manager
Vulnerability Check
Cons
Didn’t completely remove some malware
Briefing
Panda Antivirus Pro 2013 is one of the most complete packages of Internet security available for home use. It includes many features normally only found in a full-fledged security suite, such as personal firewall, Safe Browsing (sandboxing, see full review), and even a virtual keyboard can help prevent keyloggers from obtaining your passwords.
Effectiveness
Panda Antivirus Pro doesn’t just rely on the usual set of virus definitions to prevent infection. It protects against unknown threats by constantly monitoring your applications to determine if any are exhibiting suspicious behavior. Its cloud-based Collective Intelligence leverages the community of Panda Antivirus users to instantly provide protection against new threats as soon as they are found, and without waiting for a virus signature update. It even includes an optional Safe Browser which is a separate browser that is isolated from the rest of the operating system, preventing infection even if you visit a malicious site, and protecting your logins and passwords for sensitive transactions such as banking.
Panda even includes a fully functional Firewall in their core antivirus product, something most vendors only include with their more expensive suites. Additionally, Panda automatically vaccinates USB drives, another common source of infection.
In our testing, Panda Antivirus Pro successfully prevented infection from a variety of viruses, trojans, and worms. Panda’s URL security blocked Internet Explorer and Firefox browsers from accessing dangerous drive-by exploit websites before the web pages would even load. Even when we clicked past multiple warnings, Panda prevented malicious files from downloading and delivering their payloads. We did find that Panda was not always the best program for removing preexisting malware infections and we would recommend using another program such as Malwarebytes to assist Panda in cleaning up your system if it is already infected.
Panda’s behavioral analysis prevented infection attempts by scareware, rogue security programs, and the fake antivirus scams which have become so prevalent these days. These are not viruses, they are programs which gain access to secure parts of Windows and use this against you to prevent you from using your computer until you give them a credit card. Panda performed excellently at detecting and preventing these attacks.
Hackers are constantly discovering new security holes in popular applications such as Adobe Flash. Panda Antivirus includes a Vulnerability check which determines if you have the latest, up-to-date versions of these applications. This can prevent nasty remote code executions which can install malicious software on your machine without displaying any dialog box which lets you know this is happening.
Ease of Use
Installation is a breeze, takes less than a minute on many systems, and doesn’t even require a reboot of the system. Selecting “Typical Installation” is best, unless you want the flexibility of changing where you’d like to install Panda, or if you would prefer not to install some of the optional services.
We appreciate Panda’s sleek, high-tech interface. If there are any problems with your system, the Status tab will display a big red X and “Danger”, along with what the problem is. This will be accompanied by a big “Solve” button which will either fix the problem automatically or take you to a wizard which will walk you through whatever needs to be done. Updates are automatic and frequent.
The Scan tab lets you perform a quick, full, or custom scan, schedule a scan, or access advanced settings such as which type of files to scan. There are also tabs for Reports, Quarantined items, and Services, which offers a wide range of support options, virus bulletins, and cleanup tools, such as the Panda Rescue Disk.
You can configure advanced settings by clicking Preferences in the bottom right corner. Here you can set up an Internet proxy, configure email settings, customize the type of warnings you receive, and even password protect your installation so that other users cannot change your settings.
Speed/Performance
Panda Antivirus Pro 2013 is one of the fastest Internet Security programs on the market today. It installs very quickly, and uses very little processor or memory to run its background operations. You can even enable CPU Load Management in the preferences to balance processor operations while full system scans are running in order to minimize their impact on your work. Panda gets a very high AVWARS grade for minimal impact on computer performance.
Price/Value
Panda Antivirus Pro 2013
$40.99 1 PC 1 Year
$50.99 3 PC 1 Year
$89.99 3 PC 3 Year
Panda Internet Security 2013
$60.99 1 PC 1 Year
$81.99 3PC 1 Year
$180.99 3PC 3 Year
Panda Global Protection 2013
$71.99 1 PC 1 Year
$91.99 3 PC 1 Year
$202.99 3 PC 3 Year
Panda Antivirus Pro includes the core antivirus protection, behavioral analysis, a personal firewall, application vulnerability scanner, USB drive vaccine, and sandboxing among other features, an extremely good value. Buying a license for multiple PCs offers an even greater value.
Step up to the Internet Security Suite to add parental controls, identity protection, 2Gb of online backup, and anti-spam. Panda’s flagship Global Protection Suite additionally offers PC optimization tools, remote access, file encryption and secure file deletion.
Support
The Services tab contains links to the most commonly accessed support options
Knowledge Base of articles
FAQs
Online Support Ticket
User Forums -
YouTube tutorial videos
The forums are our preferred method of obtaining support for Panda Security products, there is a large and helpful community of users. There is no phone support for Panda products.
Conclusion
Panda Antivirus Pro 2013 ranks high in AVWARS Top Ten because of its excellent performance at preventing infections from viruses, trojans, and malicious websites. Impact on system speed is minimal, and the interface is designed to help you find the tools and settings you need. The inclusion of features not normally found in antivirus software, such as sandboxing and a personal firewall, makes Panda an outstanding value.
