Eset Smart Security review

Smart Security impressed us straight away with its incredibly small footprint: it occupied the least RAM of any package this month, and had the smallest impact on CPU usage and boot time.

We enjoyed setting it up, too: the interface is one of the clearest you'll find, with even "advanced mode" presenting every option in a logical and easy-to-understand way. Double-click on the System Tray icon and the interface leaps up instantly. Many rival packages could learn a lot from Eset.

The firewall continued this theme, bringing up a clear requester asking us to choose between "strict protection" and "allow sharing", along with explanations of our choices in plain English. And it worked well, too: when we probed it with our security scanner, we found just one high-risk vulnerability and three open TCP ports.

We also liked the way Smart Security integrated with Windows Mail. It installed a new Spam toolbar, which perfectly matched the look and feel of existing controls, and created a new folder for infected items. When rogue messages were detected, Smart Security removed the attachment and put the details in the subject line, so we could see at a glance what it had done.

It may sound like Eset has created the perfect suite, but sadly there's a caveat. Smart Security didn't disgrace itself in our malware tests, but its performance was merely average: it scored 87% in our file-based test and managed a hit rate of just 14% against web threats.

Author: Darien Graham-Smith