avast! 7.0 public beta

is the behavior blocker activated in this beta as i tested it against a few malwares which avast didn't have signatures for and avast did not bark at all.

 

I know by the real time stats scrolling, on my 64 bit it is very active compared to the last version of Avast. It really is a nice product.

 

Although I normally don't bother testing beta software, I must admit that I was curious as to the effectiveness of the new Avast 7 product. Normally I would test the product over a minimum of 7 days, but in this case I didn't see the point. The test was as follows:

Materials and Methods-
1). I installed Avast Pro Beta in a dedicated Malware box (no VM) running Win XP Pro. Avast was left at default settings.

2). Files were collected at random from the Honeypots that we use. For this first day of testing all samples must not be newer than 24hrs, nor be older than 72hrs. All selected files were checked against our Malware database to insure that none of the malware files to be included in the test were older files making a reappearance. All the files were first run in an unprotected machine to verify that malware behavior was exhibited by all.

3). 200 files met the above criteria and were run.

Results-

1). Avast Pro (fully updated) detected 149/200 samples.
2). Out of the remaining 51 samples Avast gave a sandbox alert for 8.
3). Among the infections that resulted from running the undetected 51 were two unique Zbots, Backdoor bots, Panda stealers, 2 Banker trojans, a few trojan downloaders, VBdownloader, and miscellaneous doppers, gaftors and Frauds. Also seen were the rogues PCMedic, RevKnowledge, Speedtools, and SMSpay.

Conclusion- I saw no need at this point to continue any farther in testing. Although none of the malware tested were even close to zero day the computer was thoroughly infected. The 75% signature detection rate for malware that has been around for a number of days combined with ineffective heuristics and the lack of any effective sandboxing make this a very poor beta.

Not that I mean to be harsh, but one would be better off without any antimalware protection installed; at least then there would be no illusion of being protected.

 

cruelsister, nice honest summation, thanks

 

Thanks cruelsister, good investigation. IMO any AV will fail under those circumstances, although some will do better than others. For such a test HIPS or SRP are needed IMO.

Does the FileRep service only work through the browser, or for all files accessed on the system?

 

I would like to quote a user in avast forum :

Maybe someone should verify that?

Source : http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=92820.msg739927#msg739927

 

im tempted to try this beta. It was only the other day that I tried avast free 6 on one of my main machines and I was impressed with it.

 

Are there limitations with the program components with 64 bit systems?

 

lodore, I like it. I am still concerned about their detection yet, but this is a beta.

 

Is it me or is a 75 percent detection rate of 200 samples of malware less then 3 days old,not pretty good. To me, I am totally ok with that. And some was zero day.

 

It is recommended to use High heuristics. They intentionally leave some out for Normal mode but from my internal tests it never generated any false positives.

Also remember, this is a beta and many cloud features aren't operating at full speed just yet and sandboxing isn't just yet working as it should. If you don't mind testing i'd suggest to test it with each new beta build. I'm guessing it will progressively improve. Though i admit i'd like to see more "love" from Behavior Shield. I'll have to see that as well during beta.

 

Installed over the top this morning of my pro version. So far so good. Thanks.

 

I really don't expect detection rates for a first beta to be great. I am sure the emphasis for early betas is the get new features working and the updated interface in order and up to the minute definition updates would probably slow that process down considerably. They are probably happy when it doesn't crash. Detection will be a more fair criticism when it is in late beta/RC stages of testing. If detection sucks when it is finished then no sale.

 

will there be anything different in the sandbox in the free version? i see its set to auto and not ask like version 6 or am i wrong

 

Is avast 7 same annoying slow as avast 6? (including system start)

 

avast! 6 slow? From my experience it's the fastest AV i've used in all time. avast! 7 beta however had some issues with speed and even though it was supposedly fixed i'm still checking it.

 

I've used Avast Free 6 and now the Avast 7 Free beta in an XP VM. Neither seems to have caused a slow startup in that environment. What setup were you using at the time?

 

I haven't noticed that both for 6 and 7.

 

cruelsister should test AVG and Panda Cloud AV as well

 

What is slow about Avast? No isssus here.

 

I like Avast but, their dang GUI is like surfing through War and Peace.

The trend to me at least, is for products to have a fairly simple user friendly, easy to understand GUI. I feel Eset, Panda, Trend Micro, F-Secure, Bitdefender and a few others have done this. If you want people to not feel like they are reading a newspaper, then you have to simplify. I like Coranti, but theirs is the frigging worst. It has to open full page just for all the scans.


Avast is way overdue getting rid of the multi-shield concept. It is a great product but for it to really be elite, they have got to cut the crap out of the hot dog.

 

Why? Why do you need one big button and a massive full screen green checkmark and that's it? avast! is designed to work out of the box. If you don't understand things, you basically install it and forget about it. But if you like to fiddle with it, you open the interface.

Where other programs apparently have to use some oversimplified interface with hidden settings. And i can tell you that doing so is completely unnecessary from my own experience. I fiddle a lot with it for obvious reasons. However my sister just has avast! installed and i don't think she has ever opened avast! till now. And it has been like 5 years since i bought her a laptop. avast! just does the job in the background silently.
So, why do you need some oversimplified interface if there is no need for it?

 

thats the whole frigging point, if its there, folks are going to only want to make it, better, or stronger. If you dangle a beefsteak in front of them, they will bite.

Let me try this, a average user will see all these different things and think, Why are they needed if the out of the box is the best. It is human nature.

I was at my sisters 2 weeks ago and noticed they had Avast 6 installed. I asked how they liked it. She said she didnt know but was sick of hearing it talk all the time, especially when they sleep. Told her I can fix that for you, no problem. She was grateful. I just uninstalled it and installed one of my licences for Eset and havent heard a peep out of her, or her computer.

Come on RejZor, if i were to use a free product, it would be Avast. Actually, it would be very close to my first choice period. But there really is way to much crap in it, there really is.

 

are avast scans in the cloud too?

 

Crap? Define "crap"... avast! has no more "crap" than any other AV. And saying you solved the fact she didn't like the voice notifications by replacing it with ESET is just the lamest excuse i've ever heard. It's like replacing a car engine with a brand new one because you're sick of replacing the oil. It makes absolutely no sense. There is a clearly marked sounds setting inside the Settings. You just uncheck one checkmark and all the sounds are gone. How hard is that? Don't tell me uninstalling avast! and installing ESET is easier coz it's not.