Imediat dupa lansarea noului produs Avast! 5 Antivirus au inceput sa apara si primele review-uri pe blogurile din Romania. Unul din ele mai jos:

Asa cum am zis intr-un articol, Avast! “Home Edition” este cel mai bun antivirus gratuit, acum odata Avast 5, Avast a redenumite versiunea “Home Edition”, un titlu care nu striga lumii ca este gratuit (unii potentiali clienti erau indepartati din necunostinta), cu titlul de Avast Free Antivirus, cuvantul “FREE” este cunoscut de majoritatea consumatorilor care au avut experienta sa navigheze pe internet si sa caute programe, indeferent de limba pe care o cunosc.

Pe langa protectia pe care ultima versiune (Avast Home Edition 4.8) o avea, in Avast Free Antivirus 5 veti gasi un imbunatatit motor (engine) de antivirus si spyware pentru protectie in timp real, un emulator de cod care este folosit de izoleze programele cu virusi intr-un mediu isolat, un motor Heuritic, care detecteaza proactiv programele malitioase care deobicei nu sunt detectate de definitiile normale, motorul Heuristic acopera atat fisierele binare (executabile) cat si scipturile malitioase. In plus acum avast include si Inteligent Scanner, care reduce numarul de fisiere scanate (fisierele identificate ca sunt “sanatoase” nu vor mai fi scanate doar daca re schimba) si implicit timpul de scanare cu 80%, si un scut de comportament care foloseste un numar de senzori si reporteaza sau blockeaza comportamentul suspicios.

Mai mult pe blogul lui Allex Radu.

Supported operating systems for avast! Free Antivirus 5.0, avast! Pro Antivirus 5.0 and avast! Internet Security 5.0 are Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional, Microsoft Windows XP (any Edition, 32-bit or 64-bit), Microsoft Windows Vista (any Edition, 32-bit or 64-bit) or Microsoft Windows 7 (any Edition, 32-bit or 64-bit).

Note:
It means, that avast! 5.0 isn’t supported (isn’t compatible, couldn’t be installed and won’t run) on DOS, Microsoft Windows 3.x, Microsoft Windows NT 3.x, Microsoft Windows NT 4.0, Microsoft Windows 95, Microsoft Windows 98, Microsoft Windows ME, Microsoft Windows Server operating systems or others which aren’t specified as supported.

Yes, but there isn’t necessary any user interaction to uninstall avast! 4.x, because installer of avast! 5.0 is able to detect previous instance of avast! 4.x and uninstall it automatically.

Open the avast! Free Antivirus 5.0 interface and click on the ‘Maintenance‘ tab. Next click on ‘Registration‘ and then on ‘Register now‘. A new window with registration form will open. Into the form fields fill the required data and then click on ‘Register for free license‘.

avast! Free Antivirus 5.0 can now continue to be used for 12 months and you will continue to receive automatic updates to both the program and your virus definitions. At the end of that time, it will be necessary simply to register for a new free license.

Licenses for avast! Pro Antivirus 5.0 and avast! Internet Security 5.0 can be purchased via our website, www.avast.com.

After receiving your license file, you just need to double-click to open it and your license will be inserted into your program automatically.

Alternatively, save the license file on your computer, open the avast! Pro Antivirus 5.0 or avast! Internet Security 5.0 interface and click on the ‘Maintenance‘ tab. Next click on ‘Subscription‘ and then on ‘Insert license file‘. A dialog window will open where you can browse your computer to locate your license file. Once you have located it, double click on it and it will be automatically inserted into the program.

avast! Pro Antivirus 5.0 or avast! Internet Security 5.0 can now continue to be used for 12, 24, or 36 months, depending on the purchased license, and you will continue to receive automatic updates to both the program and your virus definitions. At the end of that time, it will be necessary simply to purchase and insert a new license key.

avast! 5.0 comes with a number of pre-defined scans installed by default (‘Quick scan‘, ‘Full System Scan‘, ‘Removable Media Scan‘, ‘Select folder to scan‘) and also you can create your own custom defined scans. All these scans can be performed simultaneously. But, if you execute too many pre-defined and/or custom defined scans at the same time, depending on your computer configuration you can observe some system performance degradation.

At various times while your computer is running, messages may be displayed on your screen e.g. when the virus definitions have been updated, when an incoming email is being scanned etc. This can result in full-screen applications (e.g. games) being interrupted as Windows switches from full-screen mode to normal mode when the message appears. You can specify that messages will never be displayed, or will not be displayed if a full-screen application is running.

This is a completely new feature in avast! Pro Antivirus 5.0 and avast! Internet Security 5.0 which allows you to browse the web or run another application in a completely safe environment. This is especially useful when visiting high-risk web sites, whether accidentally or deliberately, as the browser will be completely contained within the avast! Sandbox, preventing any damage to your computer.

The avast! Sandbox can also be used to run any other applications which you think may be suspect – you can run the program inside the avast! Sandbox to determine whether or not it is safe while remaining completely protected against any malicious actions that it may try to carry out.

To run an application or to browse the web using the avast! Sandbox, just browse the files on your computer to find the required application e.g. Internet Explorer. The browser or other application will then open in a special window with a red border, indicating that it is being run inside the avast! Sandbox.

Also you can further define applications that should always be run in virtualized mode, and trusted applications that should never be virtualized.

avast! Internet Security 5.0 includes a fully integrated avast! Antispam module to detect unwanted email.

Spam delivered to your mailbox can result in your mailbox quickly becoming full, as a result which, legitimate emails may not be received. It can also unnecessarily increase the load on the email server, internet connection, local networks etc.

The avast! Antispam module analyses all incoming email based on various criteria to determine whether it is legitimate. This analysis is based partly on a ‘Blacklist‘ containing the addresses of senders from whom emails should always be marked as spam, and a ‘Whitelist‘ which contains the addresses of known and trusted senders. These lists can be found in the antispam settings. For emails from senders that are not on either list, a content analysis is also carried out based on the specified scan sensitivity to identify email that should be treated as spam.

In the avast! Antispam settings you can also specify how spam emails should be marked. This can then be used to create a new rule in your email client, for example to automatically move the marked emails to another folder. The avast! Antispam module is effective for messages delivered to email accounts installed on your computer such as Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express etc. but not for web based email accounts such as Yahoo, Gmail etc. which usually have their own antispam options.

Web based email services such as Yahoo, Gmail etc. usually have their own security options, because e-mails are received and stored on the remote mail server and users access their email accounts remotely via web browser. In other words, the web based email services acts like any other website, and if you try to save, download or run some suspicious data from the web based email account, avast! 5.0 is able to protect your computer.

If you haven’t any information about security solution used by appropriate web based e-mail service provider, you can alternatively control your web based email account via browser launched within the avast! Sandbox to be completely secured.

This situation may be resolved by reducing the heuristic sensitivity. In the avast! Antispam settings is possible to set the scan sensitivity as ‘Low‘, ‘Medium‘ or ‘High‘. avast! will perform a heuristic analysis of all incoming mail to identify potential spam – the heuristic analysis comprises a large number of tests based on typical spam content or behavior and the sensitivity level will determine how many tests would have to be failed for a message to be considered spam. The higher the sensitivity, the higher the “pass mark”, therefore the higher the number of emails that will fail the heuristic test and will be treated as spam.

Yes, combination of avast! Antispam and integrated URL blocking feature in avast! Internet Security 5.0 provides sufficient anti-phishing protection.

avast! Internet Security 5.0 includes a fully integrated avast! Firewall which can be controlled directly from the avast! Internet Security 5.0 user interface.

The avast! Firewall monitors all communication between your computer and the outside world and blocks unauthorized communication based on a number of ‘Allow‘ and ‘Deny‘ rules. In this way, the avast! Firewall can prevent sensitive data from leaving your computer and can also block attempted intrusions by external hackers.

You should select an option ‘Airport/High Risk Zone‘ which is suitable when using your computer to connect to a public network and where you want to ensure the maximum level of security. This is the most secure setting and if selected, no incoming communication will be allowed, effectively making your computer completely invisible to others.

Today is the big day—the day we (and many of you) have been waiting for—we are starting the release of the Version 5.0 products today. This is a pretty complicated roll-out so we are staging it. Today we will be releasing the new products (and the new website) in English and French. Over the next 10 days or so, we will be releasing the products and website in 12 additional languages (German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Russian, Polish, Chinese, Korean, and Japanese). Other languages will then be added as we have them available.

Three products (Free Antivirus, Pro Antivirus, and Internet Security) and a new website are being released today. Even though we have expanded our product portfolio, our philosophy of having and promoting a top-notch free antivirus is paramount. This philosophy has enabled us to achieve 100 million users and we are continuing it. As you read through our new website and launch information, you will see that not only is the new free product easier to use and more visually appealing than the old product, it provides even more security protection. And it is still free and free from annoying pop-ups and requests for money.

These products are not minor updates from the existing products. They are all new. Some of the changes—such as the new user interface—are obvious. Some are not obvious at all (such as the new scanning engine). All-in-all we think they are a vast improvement from the current products—modern, light, fast, and very effective. For details, see the product detail pages on the new website.

1. Avast! Free Antivirus. This is our new flagship product and replaces Avast Home Edition (we changed the name to emphasize the product is free). We focus this product on users that use the internet for web browsing and email. If that is what you do on the internet, this is the product you need. We are very proud of this product and we stack it up against anyone else’s paid antivirus—in fact, we have recently started submitting this product in lieu of our paid products to all of the industry standard tests. Virus Bulletin, one of the most respected journals, recently called this product “….nothing short of a miracle” (see separate blog post). Google selected this product for incorporation in many of their Google Packs.
2. Avast! Internet Security. This is our brand-new product and is focused on users that do on-line banking or shopping or that have sensitive data on their computer. We believe that these users need some extra layers of protection and developed this product to provide three more layers. This product takes the free antivirus and adds a 2-way silent firewall, a sandbox, and anti-spam. The firewall ensures that only trusted applications are able to receive or send data across the internet. The sandbox provides a means of executing your browser (or any other application) in a protected environment—thus even if you get infected, the infection does not leave the sandbox and does not harm your computer. And the anti-spam helps you get rid of all that irritating email you receive every day. And, we have made this product attractive to consumer users—a single license can be used on 3 computers in your household.
3. Avast! Pro Antivirus. This is the update to the old Professional Edition. We focus this product on individuals that want to customize their security and on businesses. It is the same as Internet Security but without the firewall or anti-spam. This allows world-class security using your own personal choice of firewall and anti-spam.

To support these products, there is also a brand new website. Today the website will only be available in English and French. But, as the other languages roll out, the language-specific websites will also.

If you are using a 4.8 product (home or professional editions), the update is pretty painless.  Sometime in the near future, the 4.8 product will tell you version 5.0 is available.  You will have the choice of a free upgrade or a special existing-user offer for the new Internet Security. All you have to do is click which option you want, and you will be upgraded. As we have about 100 million users, these messages will take a month or two to get to all users. If you don’t want to wait for this automated message, you can manually upgrade and get the same special offers by clicking on the homepage banner that asks if you are already a 4.8 user.

As you can imagine, it was a massive effort to release three new products and a new website at the same time. All of our teams have done a great job in making this happen. Development of course developed the new products. But many other teams were also involved—virus lab and research, localization and translation, website development, on-line store, and marketing.

If you are reading this at launch time, we will think of you as we celebrate with the Czech national drink……

From: http://blog.avast.com/2010/01/19/avast-version-5-0-is-here/