Review by Arthur Digbee

Installation. If you have Vista, the CD requires that you download the software; for other platforms, you can choose installation by CD or download. I have installed it to XP computers using the download version. I would welcome full CD-based installation for all platforms since that’s what I would do for a computer that I suspected was infected.

After the full download, the installer checks for incompatible programs, which you must uninstall before continuing. Most of these, such as rival virus software, will require rebooting in the middle of the McAfee installation. This worked but it seems inefficient to me: why not run a software check before downloading the full program?nnOperation. Boot time with this software is quicker than the rival program I had been using. This differs from the experience of some other users who have reviewed the product.

I’ve been using it for about a month, and I have no evidence of viruses or spyware, so it seems to work. I didn’t test it by trying to infect it. I use Firefox as my browser and web-based email through a university with a very good spam filter built in, so my exposure is different than, say, a Hotmail+Internet Explorer user.