Kaspersky Anti-Virus 7

Last year's CNET Editors' Choice award winner Kaspersky returns with another winner. Kaspersky Anti-Virus 7 features a new interface and new protection. But, unlike last year, the competition for Editors' Choice in this space was fierce with several worthy contenders all bunching toward the top of the scale. For example, BitDefender Antivirus 2008 is perhaps the most improved product of the year, nipping at the heals of Kaspersky. What makes Kaspersky Anti-Virus continue to outshine its competition is its ease of use combined with thorough antivirus protection. No firewall, no gimmicks, just straight AV protection. Kaspersky also makes an Internet security suite, yet Kaspersky Anti-Virus 7 feels complete as a standalone product and not, like Norton Antivirus 2008, a cog in larger family of products. That said, there is no firewall protection within Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2008, leaving you to choose your own firewall protection. Once again, Kaspersky requires considerably less disk space than Norton. The only real negative here is the list price, which can be $10 to $20 more than the competition, depending where you purchase it. Still, Kaspersky Anti-Virus 7 provides the most complete antivirus production on the market today and deserves our Editors' Choice for best antivirus product for 2008. For a look inside, see our slide show.

Kaspersky Anti-Virus Personal

Kaspersky Anti-Virus Personal is a complicated program that resembles nothing we've seen before. In terms of raw features, it appears to do just about everything you'd want an antivirus program to do. Unfortunately, finding and using its many features are difficult tasks. Worse still, the program's audible alarms sound like animals being tortured.

Kaspersky Internet Security 6

Quick-think of three antivirus programs. Are they all from American companies? If so, you may want to broaden your horizons. This full-scale security suite from Moscow adds spyware protection, a spam filter, and a powerful firewall to the well-respected Kaspersky Anti-Virus (KAV)-a household name in Russia and Europe but less well known in the U.S.

Kaspersky Personal Security Suite 1.0

The Kaspersky Personal Security Suite includes Kaspersky's well-regarded antivirus, the Kaspersky Anti-Hacker firewall, and Kaspersky Anti-Spam Personal. Unlike the leading suites, the three modules aren't integrated with each other; in fact, the antivirus and firewall even have separate icons in the system tray. Kaspersky Antivirus is the star of the suite, but we found the firewall and antispam modules only average.