AVG Anti-Virus is offered for free to users of non-commercial computers. Millions of people have already downloaded and installed the software making AVG Anti-Virus one of the more popular free antivirus applications. However, if you require more protection than a basic antivirus program, you will need to purchase a more complete package offered by AVG. The free version is lacking in many areas such as technical support, anti-spyware, anti-spam, a firewall and multiple languages.

GRISOFT, which is the developer and distributor of AVG Anti-Virus has also recently made free anti-spyware and anti-rootkit programs available for home users if they are in need of these protections. For a computer user that is in need of a complete security suite, they also have release AVG Internet Security Home Edition, a complete protection package that can be used on up to three computers in your home. Of course, this comes at a cost to the user.

Once you have installed AVG Anti-Virus or another antivirus program, do not forget about the threat of malware. Unfortunately most free antivirus programs will not protect you from receiving these threats through email attachments, which is the most common way that they are spread. For this reason it is a good idea to be careful when receiving emails from people you know. If you did not expect to receive an attachment from them, then you should refrain from opening it until you can verify from that person that they did in fact send it to you. The reason for this is that many times when a computer is infected with a virus it will automatically send emails to everyone in your contact list with a copy of itself attached. If you receive an attachment from someone that you do not know, do not open it under any circumstance! A good rule of thumb is to use your common sense and do not open any attachments that are unsolicited.

An antivirus program is only as good as the virus definition file that is installed with it. For this reason, you are also going to want to be sure that your antivirus program is updating frequently. Even if you have the automatic updates feature of your antivirus program enabled, it is a good idea to check to see when the last update actually occurred. This way if your program is having problems connecting to the developers update server due to firewall issues or other problems, you can correct these issues in a timely manner so that your computer is not exposed to threats for a long period of time.

AVG Anti-Virus only uses one search engine for all of the antivirus program’s components which is much different from many other antivirus programs that are used today. This helps to speed up the antivirus program and allows the use of only one database rather than several.

Once you open the program, you are presented with a screen that can be used to navigate to many different areas of the AVG Anti-Virus program. For example, the info button will give you a window that has access to all of AVG’s information such as the user license, contact information and various bits of information about your computer. The test results tab will give you a summary of past scans that were performed on your computer and whether or not viruses were detected during these scans. The scheduler tab, which is very important, will let you set what time you would like the scan to be performed at. It is a good to make sure that the Enable scheduled tests button is selected and a time in the evening when you are not generally using your computer is set.

On the left side of the main window, there is also a list of the various AVG functions and whether or not there are currently active. The main window also includes buttons to do a full scan of your computer, or a scan of removable media. The settings for a complete scan can be modified, telling the AVG Anti-Virus program what areas of your computer you want checked.

The AVG Control Center is an area where some of the major settings are made for the antivirus program. This is where the computer user can select whether or not they want the program to check for boot viruses when the computer is started. If this option is enabled, there will also be a check for executable and macro viruses each time the computer is started. Using the Update Manager tab will also display a window in which you can set when to check for updated virus signatures automatically. This is an extremely important section to fill out as an outdated virus signature file literally means that your antivirus program can do nothing to protect you from new viruses that have been discovered by the developer.