It is a harsh truth that there are people out there who are trying to cause damage to our computers or simply use them for their own purposes without our knowledge. Because of such people, it has become necessary to arm ourselves with a variety of programs to protect our computers from viruses, spyware, and whatever else may be created. While there are certainly many good commercial programs to choose from, it can get rather expensive once you get roped in to the yearly license fees and product upgrades that software companies use to remain profitable.

Fortunately, some companies and individuals have created freeware versions of many programs that, although are not as robust, certainly get the job for the typical user. Here are my Microsoft Windows-based recommendations.

Antivirus Recommendation

The oldest of malicious software to plague our computers, viruses, aim to destroy data and spread to as many computers as possible. Fortunately, there are a couple of options to help us all deal with computer viruses. First up is Grisoft with their free antivirus program available for non-commercial use. It even integrates with Outlook to check e-mails automatically. This is my choice for everyday use as it not only does full scans of your computer, but it will, in real-time, scan files as they are opened.

Second in line is a very good free web-based anti-virus tool available from Trend Micro. When first released, this tool only worked with Internet Explorer, but support for Firefox has recently been added. Although I've had problems getting this program to work on one or two machines, it did detect up a few things that Grisoft's AVG did not. The biggest drawback is that it is web-based so if you leave your computer unattended for too long after the scan is complete, you run the risk of losing the connection with Trend Micro making it necessary to re-scan your computer. In my case, a scan takes 2+ hours so this is somewhat of an annoyance. Also, the web-based nature of this program means that it won't be able to check files in real-time like Grisoft's solution. Despite these short-comings, this is another piece of freeware worth using.

Prior to using Grisoft's anti-virus program, I used Norton Anti-virus. For a couple of years this program was the best in my opinion. But then new bells and whistles were added such that it seemed to slow down my computer. I'm guessing Symantec fell victim to software bloat which afflicts many commercial software programs. I truly believe that the antivirus freeware solutions are better choices for the home user.