NOD32 Antivirus - part II

by Andrew Cooper

Features and Settings

NOD32 has all the features that have become standard for modern antiviruses: on-the-fly file access monitoring, infected file quarantine, etc. However, there are two features I'd like to point out-the NOD32 task scheduler and Internet Monitor. I really appreciated eSet team's efforts in including the task scheduler in their software because keeping a system free from viruses includes a lot of routine tasks to be performed periodically and I often forget to either update the virus lists or perform system scans. Moreover, actions like a system scan take a lot of time and are better run at night when you don't use your computer. The problem with me is that when I'm not using my computer, I don't think to start the scan. The solution, of course, is NOD32's scheduler. You can select the action to be done and the time it is to be done and then forget about running routine jobs.



Of all the antivirus software I've seen NOD32 is the first one that monitors system network traffic. Its Internet Monitor is a sort of personal firewall, but it acts on a higher level (application-layer) than firewalls generally. Its primary goal is to monitor email, but it can monitor all other network traffic as well. I think it may not be sufficient to protect against all modern network threats like hacker attacks or Denial of Service, but probably well enough against worms and other malware.



As you can see from the screenshots, there are not many buttons and other interface elements in the main Control Center window. That's great because nothing distracts you from what you're doing. However, when you need to adjust a module's settings, you only have to click the Setup button, which displays the module's configuration settings dialog box.



All module configuration dialogs look like the above example. These contain a wealth of settings and are surprisingly self-descriptive. I didn't even have to refer to the help system to configure NOD32 the way I needed it to operate. Also, I want to say that I liked the silent mode feature that turns off all notification messages except for those that require your intervention. This makes the software operate silently and smoothly and the email notification feature lets you receive alerts via email so that you're aware of what's going on in your system no matter where you are.

Continue to Part III
Back to Part I