Almost Adequate, Panda Antivirus Pro Is Not All It Could Be

The Good: Easy to install, Easy to use, Inexpensive, Good customer service
The Bad: Does not find all the viruses one’s computer has.
The Basics: Panda Antivirus Pro seemed to work for me, until I tried a different anti-virus program and discovered how many of the viruses the program missed!


Last year, one of the big gifts for my birthday was Panda Antivirus Pro. I was in desperate need of antiviral software for the laptop computer my wife had purchased for me and after reading several reviews, we found Panda Antivirus Pro to be an affordable, efficient computer software program. Unfortunately, my experience with the software made it seem quite a bit worse than the reviews I read indicated.

My experience with Panda Antivirus Pro 2012. I used the program for a year and when I replaced it last week, I ran one last sweep with it. After declaring my computer virus and threat free, I uninstalled Panda Antivirus Pro. After I installed Norton 360, immediately thereafter, that antivirus sweep found 111 viruses on my laptop! That Panda Antivirus Pro could completely miss that many viruses made it worth far, far less than it would have been had I not discovered the glaring gaps in the program.

Panda Antivirus Pro is very easy to install. Our disc allowed us to install Panda Antivirus Pro on three computers and we had no issues with any of our Windows XP and Windows 7-based computers. Simply putting the disc in and imputing the license code allowed for the simple installation of Panda Antivirus Pro. This is a cloud-based program, which means that one needs to have an internet connection for it to work properly.

Outside the constant need for an internet connection to perform virus sweeps with all the latest updates, Panda Antivirus Pro is very easy to use. Panda Antivirus Pro installs an icon to the Start bar on Windows-based programs. The program is accessed easily by clicking there and opening the program. Clicking quick scan scans the relevant drive (usually taking five minutes or less) and a full scan option provides deeper scanning that takes about an hour and a half (I have a 10 GB hard drive). The only quirk with the operation of Panda Antivirus Pro was that throughout the year, notices would come up that my license was out of date (despite it being a one-year license!) and I would have to click “Renew license” which made the program work again. I’ve no idea why that would happen, but it was an odd problem with a very easy fix.

Why, if it does not catch every virus on my computer, did I rate Panda Antivirus Pro so high? Quite simply, the affordability of Panda Antivirus Pro would be undone by its lack of efficiency were it not for the amazing customer support Panda provides. After moving to Michigan, we picked up a bad Trojan that cut me off from my finances. I contacted Panda and they were exceptionally friendly and hooked me up to deeper Panda scans that found the problem and solved it.

The amazing customer service makes me think higher of Panda, but that Panda Labs has deeper programs that find what Panda Antivirus Pro does not makes me wonder why they would create a program that was not their best work.

For a good, basic antivirus program, Panda Antivirus Pro works, but for those serious about defending their computers, it leaves much to be desired.

For other software reviews, check out my takes on:
Star Trek Omnipedia
Star Trek Font Pack
Ebay.com

4/10

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© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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