BullGuard Internet Security 12 includes a spam filter, a firewall and parental control software. There’s a tune-up tool and a backup facility, plus standard anti-malware features. The program flags potential threats in a clear and reassuring way. There’s a useful website, a quick response to email queries and a real-time online chat feature. The integrated backup solution lets you save files to a local or networked hard drive or CD/DVD drive. It also offers 5GB of online storage; enough to store a few key documents. The parental control was impressively easy to set up. The tune-up feature removes unnecessary temporary files. The anti-spam feature worked well.

AVG offers an excellent firewall and solid anti-malware protection. The program struck the right balance between not pestering the user and leaving them uninformed. However, the content of the messages was, at times, a bit too technical and some of the dialogues that appear when you’re removing a threat displayed big warnings that this action may make the system unstable. Two of the features are short-term free trials; after that, you’ll have to pay if you want to keep them. The first is a tune-up feature, which finds and fixes a range of problems. The second is a backup tool for keeping your data safe. Parental controls are also a pay-for extra.

Microsoft Windows has lots of useful features, including a firewall. The program quickly spotted and removed threats, and in general, the software sits quietly in the background until it detects a problem. The warning messages that pop up are well considered. However, the online support falls short of that offered by some of its rivals: there’s no online malware encyclopaedia, for example. There’s no option to apply Microsoft Security Essentials over multiple networked PCs, but you can use Windows’ accounts settings to manage parental controls. We recommend you leave Windows built-in firewall switched on. In general, it worked well, though the default settings allowed all outbound internet connections.

Security software has to strike the right balance to avoid pestering you constantly, or leaving you uninformed as to what’s happening, and in general AVG got this about right – expect to be warned only when a threat has been discovered. However, the content of the messages is at times a bit too technical. And sometimes the information in a popup window disagrees with the main status window, which will only cause confusion. You’ll have to upgrade to a paid-for version if you want to use certain features, such as parental controls or backup – though you do get a 30-day trial of this. A mail-scanning tool is included – this worked quietly in the background, and though it seemed a little slow at times it did prove effective at stopping incoming malware.

ESET’s Mac version concentrates on doing the basics right. It focuses resolutely on fighting malware, but there’s no firewall (you can use Apple’s own), networking or backup features. Despite a few niggles, it’s effective. ESET immediately intercepted web malware, even though it was hidden inside a zip file. We liked the way it automatically scanned and cleaned a USB memory stick; not many packages do this. But when copying infected files across a network, ESET did not clean them well, despite detecting a threat. The software was a bit noisy when communicating with the user, with windows popping up unnecessarily.