Are antivirus companies about to get Netscaped? Microsoft’s new, free antivirus program (known as ‘Microsoft Security Essentials’) is now available to download having successfully completed a three-month beta test. As a minor aside, it should embarass Google that a relative dinosaur like Microsoft knows the correct meaning of the term and they [Google] don’t. OK, Google perma-beta griping over, back to the AV. According to most of the mini-reviews MSSE is very light on system resources and has a pleasing UI:

It should be noted that MSE is very small; the installer sizes range from just over 4MB to under 9MB. The installation is also very quick and the program’s folder takes up only about 13MB. MSE sports a single tray icon (hidden by default in Windows 7) that indicates it is running. The software doesn’t add any browser toolbars, desktop gadgets, or additional bloatware during installation. (Emil Protalinski, ArsTechnica)

Of course, using few resources and looking nice aren’t the only basis on which to evaluate an antivirus suite: after all, not having any antivirus at all would use even fewer system resources and would look nicer through not putting another icon in the system tray! What will really decide if MSSE is a good option or not is its actual performance in detecting viruses – something its predecessor (Windows Live OneCare) didn’t do terribly well. I’m afraid I’ll be waiting a few weeks for the technical reports before I swap out my current AV – especially given the initial reports of false positives.