I just picked up a new laptop yesterday after the keyboard and touch pad went south on my last one and was wondering what kind of virus protection to use. I have used a few things over the years, settling for a while on Avast until about a year or so ago when I started reading really good things about Microsoft Security Essentials. I've been using it for over a year now with fine results and it doesn't seem to slow the machine down like some of the commercial products I've used in the past and is more invisible than Avast.

However, the laptop I picked up came with a free 2 year subscription for Trend Micro's anti virus protection. I am wondering if there is any point to use it for a couple years and then switch back to a free option or not? If it is substantially better, I'd think about installing it. But if I'm not really gaining anything, I'd rather not go through the installing it and using it and then getting god knows how many alert messages when it starts to expire and having to uninstall to go back to a free option later on.

Anyhow, my instinct is, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. And I've had fine luck with the free Microsoft Security Essentials thus far. (Not a Microsoft hater here, I used to think their stuff was crap, but Windows XP and Windows 7 have been my last 2 operating systems and they have been rock solid.) But am I missing any benefits not installing the Trend Micro stuff? Just seems like leaving money on the table to not use the free subscription, but if I'm not gaining anything I'm OK with that.

Any opinions?

I use Avast which is free (at least for a year) and is very customizable.

We have a contract with Symantec to install Endpoint Protection on any computer that needs an AV, yet we all just install MSE anyway. It's truly the best. Lightweight, gets pretty much everything and also doesn't just totally fuck itself up like many others (Norton and McAfee) do. I'd uninstall Trend Micro and go with MSE.

I've used Trend Micro for years and been happy with it. I think its better and much less of a memory hog than Norton/Symantec. I also find it to be better than the free system AVG which I've used before. I'm not sure about MSE. I'd hardly claim to be any expert. Bottom line for me is I've been happy with Trend Micro and haven't been motivated enough to save whatever the nominal annual subscription cost is to spend much time researching it.

Trend Micro has some good free programs that are great at (potentially) infected systems, but for resident protection I've had MSE on my home desktop for a while now with no complaints.

Thanks all. I think I'll just keep using MSE as I keep reading it is comparable to all the other commercial stuff in effectiveness and the other commercial products I have used in the past have all drained lots more system resources. Avast was actually less invasive than the pay ones I tried, Norton and McAfee. MSE is easier to just install online than installing the Trend Micro disc and now I won't have to worry about getting it totally uninstalled someday when the subscription runs out.