Microsoft has now opened beta testing for its new Microsoft Security Essentials Beta.
I wrote about it last week at ZDNet and continue to be favorably impressed. It works on Windows XP (SP2 or later), Windows Vista, and Windows 7. You must be in the United States, Israel, or Brazil to sign up.
If you try it, leave a comment and let me know what you like/don’t like.
Update: Well, that was fast. Roughly 24 hours later, all 75,000 slots in the beta group are filled. Of course, if you can get your hands on a copy of the software you can still install and use it.
Somehow, I was under the impression that Windows Update had to be in Auto update mode for Security Essentials to get new definitions. (a couple of articles)
I am able, however to manually call for an update right out of the program off the notification area.
That’s better for me because I am a little choosy about what Update wants to send my way.
Hi Ed, et al.
Thanks for all the great content and dialog. As a 10 year Microsoft veteran, I’m happy to see Microsoft take another positive step on the security front, and a brilliant one at that. I’ve long loathed the monolithic security suites that claim to be end all be all security solutions. In fact, the comments here alone pretty much confirm they do more harm than good. I can’t tell you how many I’ve removed from family, friends and customers machines, and replaced with free solutions. Looks like MSE may well be one of the primary solutions in the not too distant future.
At first glance, things I like include:
- Simplicity. Speaking of which, Microsoft would do themselves well to continue down the simple is better path for all their products. Much like they’ve done with Windows 7. After all, simplicity is one of the primary reasons Microsoft is where they’re at today (think back to the Novell days).
Room for improvement:
- Provide the ability to pause/disable for 10 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours from the notification area icon. Much like Carbonite.com.
- Speed. Admittedly I need to do additional testing here, but MSE appears to be a little slower in the scan department than some of the competition (e.g., Malwarebytes).
- For goodness sake Microsoft, open the beta up to everyone. Not doing so is silly.
happy MSEing.
bob.
Thanks for the Softpedia link Ed.
To me, the interface is simple and to-the-point. The product runs smoothly on my four and five-year old systems. It’s just what I need.
I have been frustrated with all my previous security suites. Most of them are a rip-off. I’ve been using Windows Defender for about half-a-year. (I know that’s not an anti-virus measure.)
Last several years I’ve been in a mode where I’d do virus scans on a reactive basis when something bad happens. I would try a different free package every time. I’d solve my problem, and then become dissatisfied with the CPU-suck. Finally, I would uninstall the package and feel guilty/stupid about ‘leaving my system unprotected’. Of course, I’d continue to use prophylactic measures like spywareblaster et cetera.
I’ll leave this software installed if it continues to behave so respectfully. Yay!
I tried to download it and couldn’t. My Connect account says I’m part of the beta, and gives me a download link, but nothing after that link.
One thing I’m highly concerned about is the direction Microsoft takes with it’s software now in making it “too easy”. So easy that they remove or hide features that would be highly beneficial. Like one personal already posted here, the ability to temporarily disable the services seems to be missing or hidden. Or, what if you do get a virus, how does it work after that? I currently use AVG, and dislike how it placates the virus detection. Often warning, but ultimately doing NOTHING to the virus, making you jump through pages of hoops just to 1. figure out what virus, 2. remove it , 3. take any other action you might want to take.
All actions need to be plain and visible. I hope they don’t over-simplify the interface to a point where it’s unusable.
Update:
I was able to download it now (thanks for the link Ed) and installed it so far on an XP machine. I was impressed with the usability, it’s not nearly as bad as I had imagined it could be. Very flexible and easy to use.
I’ll have to agree with the icon dislikes. The icon is UGLY! The castle idea is OK, but they outa remove the white background.
Quick, clean and to the point. I too would like to see an email plugin for at least outlook and windows live mail, even though the future appears to be web-based mail and no local clients.
One thing I did notice, (and not sure if other scanners do this since it’s been awhile since i watched a full scan) is that it parsed through every single .iso file I had, scanning each file in the image.
I do think that a few things need to be changed for the end target user, but will save that for a connect feedback.
2nd Update: after using it for a few days now I have to say I’m very impressed. If MS does release this for free, I’m moving all my systems and any system I support outside of my business to it asap. That is, if they change the ugly icon
I installed the beta on my Vista laptop. I had been using Avast.
All seemed to go well during the install and initial quick scan until the Malicious Software tool tried to access the Internet. At that point, my laptop just froze. Nothing worked; although, the CPU must have been maxed out because the cooling fan was screaming. I waited for about 5 minutes to see if it would start responding — with my cooling fan protesting on high the whole time — but it remained frozen. The only way I could shut it down was by holding the power button for 10 seconds.
When I rebooted, it would not reboot normally. It would start Windows, get past the login screen, start to finish loading…and then freeze up. Every time. Fortunately, I had a restore point from the night before, so I was able to rollback prior to the install.
I tried re-installing it again, and the exact same thing happened. I finally gave up on it and went back to Avast (But not before a fairly major two-day detour experimenting with Win 7 RC instead of Vista — but even Win 7 had its issues and crashed my laptop, once with a BSOD. Ugh!).
I have no idea what might have caused this problem. Can’t find any other similar complaints, yet.
Has anyone else had any problems with MSE on Vista?
Following up on my previous post about MSE freezing my laptop, preliminary indications are that MSE has a problem with Zone Alarm firewall. Stay tuned.