About Avira antivirus and others?

I’ve tried AVG, Avast and Avira in the past. I usually switch between them every few months. However, now I am going to download.com in order to download Avira, but a lot of reviews are complaining of adware and popups and such after downloading it. What’s up with that? Could it be other companies trying to trash it or something? I’m unsure because I always thought that Avira was considered a superb product.

Sure, Avira was declared Anti-Virus of the Year 2008 by http://www.av-comparatives.org – but that’s the pay-for version. As Ricky B says, AntiVir (the free version) doesn’t protect you from spyware (or adware?). You can check that out for yourself: http://www.free-av.com/en/products/1/avira_antivir_personal__free_antivirus.html

Also, AntiVir periodically has problems with false-positives and updating.

The best free anti-spyware programs, SuperAnti-Spyware and Malwarebytes, don’t protect you in real-time against spyware and adware, i.e. they won’t keep it off you pc, although they should find and remove what gets on.

AVG doesn’t protect you against rootkits and also has updating problems.

Avast protects you in real-time against viruses, trojans, spyware, adware and rootkits (etc). Seems pretty problem-free.

Free Antivirus – Avast: Tutorial/Review [HD]