Kaspersky Lab's Anti-Virus 5.0 for Windows Workstations provides effective protection for individual machines running Windows operating system. It's also a fast and non-intrusive software solution that's easy to use, but also offers advanced settings for those who like to take control of exactly what the software should protect and scan. Specifically developed to protect personal computers, it has a clean and simple interface, offers an accessible central management system, and operates automatically - constantly running in the background, standing guard against threats to your computer and valuable data. Overall, Kaspersky Anti-Virus 5.0 is highly recommended if you are Windows user already running a separate firewall application.

Pros: Supports SMTP/POP3 mail; disinfects files in compressed archives
Cons: Windows only; no firewall or anti-spam tools


Protecting your system from viruses and malicious code is essential if you want to keep your data private and your computer running properly. Kaspersky Anti-Virus 5.0 for Windows Workstations is an excellent software tool that offers real-time protection to file systems against malicious code whilst working effortlessly in the background to intercept and analyse attempts to access your computer file system and network directories. It also disinfects or deletes infected objects, or even isolates suspicious objects for further analysis, which is always interesting to read.

Kaspersky Lab's latest anti-virus solutions are available for Windows Workstations (reviewed here) and Windows File Servers. There's also a version of the software called Kaspersky Administration Kit 5.0, which is a centralised administration and management tool for protecting up to 1000 networked computers. Kaspersky Anti-Virus 5.0 for Windows Workstations significantly outperforms version 4.5 in all areas. It offers a brand new anti-virus engine and new proprietary iChecker and iStream technologies, which help to ensure that the amount of RAM necessary to run the program has been halved. Scanning is around three times faster, but performing a full system scan can still take hours on larger hard disks when your perform a deep scan.

The software extends beyond the desktop too, scanning e-mails that are both sent and received. The anti-virus protection prevents e-mail messages containing malicious code from entering your mailbox, and stops you from sending suspicious or infected objects. The application scans incoming and outgoing Outlook (including Outlook Express) e-mail messages, and it also scans all incoming and outgoing e-mail messages of any mail clients that use SMTP and POP3 protocols. You're also protected from office applications that use VBA macros because the software analyses macro commands prior to their execution. The same applies to VBScript and JavaScript scripts, as well as to archive formats such as ZIP, ARJ, CAB and RAR, restricting the execution of suspicious code by the operating script processing engine and Web browser.

Similar to other decent anti-virus solutions, you can store suspicious objects in a quarantine directory and send them to Kaspersky Lab for further research. Copies of potentially infected files can be backed up prior to their disinfection or removal, just in case you need to restore a file if it contains valuable data. Finally, but most importantly, regular updates of the software's anti-virus database can be scheduled, so the software remains constantly up to date. There's also the latest generation of KeepUp2Date, a technology which supports mobile users to help ensure that the software is properly installed - even if other manufacturers' anti-virus programs are installed on the system.

The new, clean interface makes using the software a snap - even for non-experienced anti-virus users. From the software's home page you can access all of the product's features, such as adjust the parameters of anti-virus protection, create and manage the anti-virus protection tasks, download updates for the anti-virus database and application modules, work with files that have been quarantined or copied to the backup storage, as well as view report logs.

There are three main sections of the software, each of which are accessed from the tabbed interface. The Protection tab, for instance, lets you run tasks which provide for full system scanning as well as for scanning of individual disks, folders or files. From here you can also launch update downloads for the anti-virus database and view reports on the tasks launched. You can also review the current status of real-time protection, full system scanning, and anti-virus databases. General information about the number of scanned objects and viruses detected is also presented.

The Settings section lets you estimate the status of application settings without actually reviewing each setting, create and manage custom tasks, define and edit the main parameters for the application's operation, or enter your own additional custom settings. You can view current settings for real-time protection, full system scanning, and automatic updates for the anti-virus database, with detailed comments and advice for editing the settings. For example, if the anti-virus database has previously been manually updated, the application will prompt you to automate the updating process by scheduling the launch of this task. You can also set up parameters of the quarantine and the backup storage as well as additional settings, in addition to creating custom tasks and scheduling scans.

The final section, Support, provides information about the technical support service which you should contact in case of problems pertaining to Kaspersky Anti-Virus's operation or situations requiring expert support. Information about the application, your license key, and your computer's operating system is also displayed. From here you can easily send an e-mail to the company's technical support centre, send a file for analysis, as well as extend your user licence or add a backup key. There's also a comprehensive online help system, a how-to section to help you better understand the processes needed to resolve an issue, as well as a Web link to an online virus encyclopaedia that contains descriptions of all currently existing malware.

By default, Kaspersky Anti-Virus is set to offer real-time protection. This means that is analyses files open for reading, writing and execution. In particular, it scans files on hard disks and removable drives, boot sectors, files on network disks, packed files, OLE objects, and alternate NTFS streams. If an infected object is detected, the software will attempt to disinfect it and delete the object if disinfection fails, creating a copy of it in the backup storage. If a suspicious object is detected, it is quarantined. The application also scans incoming messages sent using the POP3 protocol, as well as outgoing mail sent using SMTP.

If you like to get your hand dirty, on-demand scanning lets you schedule full system scans that can run when you're away from your desk. An on-demand scan files on hard disks and boot sectors, files in RAM, objects launched automatically during operating system loading (startup objects) and alternate NTFS streams, packed files, archives, self-extracting archives, and OLE objects. E-mail databases aren't scanned however, and neither are files in e-mail text formats. You can also create a custom task, whereby you can select object items that should be scanned when the task is started, such as just system memory or removable drives.

Kaspersky Anti-Virus creates a report while performing a full computer scan or updating the anti-virus database. In real-time protection mode, it attaches information about scanned objects and results of their processing, and general statistics to the report. From the Task Log you can view the status of each task, together with the date and time of its completion. You can review the settings, statistics and a report on detected objects for any task, and clicking a dedicated button opens a window containing a detailed report about task performance, such as the date and time of task start and its completion, the total number of scanned files, and the number of infected, disinfected, and quarantined objects. Reports can be exported in plain text format, which could prove useful in networked environments.

BIOS, Nov 04, 04 | Print | Send | Comments (0) | Posted In Security