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McAfee VirusScan 2006

With McAfee's VirusScan 2006, you get enhanced protection features, especially against spyware, so much so that it detects and warns you even before spyware is installed.

Installing McAfee VirusScan 2006 is rather easy, be it courtesy the boxed product or the Web. An icon is positioned in the system tray, which lets you access the program easily either by right-clicking or double-clicking. You can run a scan by loading the McAfee VirusScan icon.

But to configure a virus scan, you need to take assistance of the McAfee Security Center. Here’s where the user-friendliness of the product is reduced as the Security Center acts more like a promotional venture, displaying features of other products like McAfee SpamKiller and McAfee Personal Firewall.

To battle malware, McAfee VirusScan 2006 scans all incoming and outgoing e-mails. However, this feature can be quite irritating as you keep getting too many e-mail alerts whenever you send messages with alike subjects.

The previous version of McAfee VirusScan guarded you against spyware only during on-demand system scans. However, McAfee VirusScan 2006 provides you with on-access protection, constantly blocking the PUPs (potentially unwanted programs) and stopping spyware before installation. Unlike Norton AntiVirus 2006, though, McAfee doesn’t specify details of the PUP, which makes it hard to decide whether to keep the program or do away with it.

Moreover, the McAfee VirusScan 2006 full system scans takes an elongated duration to perform the tasks.

Similar to Norton AntiVirus 2006, even McAfee offers a new subscription scheme as per which, you are eligible to receive software upgrades throughout your subscription period. Along with a one-year subscription, you get access even to version updates and not only the virus definitions, which means you will be eligible to receive the 2007 version as long as your subscription is intact.

Customer support features of McAfee comprise chat, e-mail, and online forums.

The disorderly user interface and exceedingly slow full system scans are likely to put off many. Still, serious VirusScan users might well consider this as a useful upgrade.