PC World has the goods on the best antivirus apps out there.

To quote PC World on their picks:

After the dust finally settled, BitDefender 9 Standard emerged as our Best Buy. It ranked in the top four on every performance measure, and it costs only $30. The $40 McAfee VirusScan 2006–with its relatively good heuristics performance and intuitive interface–came in second.

Trend Micro’s PC-cillin Internet Security Suite 2006, a descendant of our Best Buy in June 2004, finished ninth among the ten products. It performed poorly in the zoo and heuristics tests and is relatively expensive because it’s available only as a full security suite. On the bright side, it had snappy outbreak-response times and offers a stellar user interface.

The three free programs came up short, too: AntiVir placed seventh, Avast ranked eighth, and AVG brought up the rear in tenth. Of course, for people who have no budget for antivirus software, any one of these products provides far more protection than simply forgoing an antivirus utility.

Too bad Trend Micro fared poorly this time; it had stellar reviews before, but it seems it has lagged behind. It really needs better heuristics, contrary to the reason it gave. McAfee is the industry leader in heuristics. PC-Cillin has the best UI, that I agree with; it also has good pattern update schedules and response time is solid.

Take note that only home products are reviewed. I bet that when enterprise products are reviewed, Trend Micro will emerge as the best. It has the best support for enterprise customers, and it has products for all business concerns.