AVG Internet Security 8.0 review

All this streamlining makes AVG an appealing choice if you want a suite that "just works", but there's plenty of customisability on offer if you want it. Under advanced settings you'll find options to tweak a huge range of behaviours, ranging from the task priority of manually-initiated scans to when the program should start deleting quarantined files.

The spam filters in particular are hugely flexible: you can manually train and adjust the Bayesian filter, manage RBL servers, filter mail by language, origin or character set, compile your own black and whitelists and more. You can even run multiple scanning servers at once, using either POP or IMAP.

It's obvious that a lot of thought has gone into AVG 8.0's usability, but our experience was marred by occasional communication issues. Sometimes the option to delete an infected item was missing, with no explanation given. There was a tick-box for "remove as power user", the purpose of which is unclear. And it wasn't immediately obvious what the firewall wanted when it gave us the option to allow a connection "for safe." These may be minor niggles, but they diminish AVG's suitability for less technical users.

Our biggest complaint, though, is the fact that AVG appears to have started promoting Yahoo! search. On installation it asks to change your default search provider to Yahoo! Then, the AVG toolbar includes a Yahoo! search field which can't be hidden without sacrificing easy access to the web protection controls it integrates into your browser. We're sad to see a popular security company using its own product as something of a Trojan horse.

Overall, though, AVG 8.0 is a real rebirth and the company's most usable product to date. At £40 for one PC it's not cheap, but it's a free upgrade for existing users, and you can go up to three PCs for just an extra tenner. A slightly lacklustre virus detection score and some shilling for Yahoo! hold us back from a wholehearted recommendation - but on the whole it's a likeable, well-conceived package that finally puts interface criticisms to rest.

Author: Darien Graham-Smith