"Starting originally with Norton Internet Security I've been through recent versions of just about every popular programs out there: McCafee, System Works (with some other thing added to it), Bitdefender, Trend Micro PcCillin. The complaints from me are always the same: Too intrusive! These people just don't understand that my business and life don't revolve around maintaining my computer. They hang up the system at inconvenient times. They pop up annoyingly when I'm in the middle of something. The auto update has to be totally turned off because it is constantly taking over computer resources. Everything runs slow as molasses while the security program is loaded. System start up takes forever.

Reading reviews, I discovered that the NEW Norton Internet Security had been redesigned and was no longer the memory hog I had experienced earlier. But there were other reasons why I hated Norton IS: First, it would only protect 1 computer and I have 3, whereas other companies are reasonable about the fact that one owner should not have to pay full license fee for both desktop and laptops (I think Norton may now have met the competition on this). Second, instead of giving you a reduced price for an upgrade, Norton has this scam where you pay full price and then have to spend an hour filling in rebate forms, copying the bars on the side and the receipt. To top it off, Norton denied my last rebate after giving me very little time to turn it in and I missed their deadline by a few days (Believe me, I was more irate over the time lost than the money and they lost themselves a customer!) Lastly, I went to Norton's website to see if the SPAM protection was compatible with Thunderbird (one of the most common email programs), and could find no technical information whatsoever -- just sales fluff (I had already been burned on Trend Micro because they claimed to support Thunderbird, but did not support it for SPAM protection -- in fact, with Trend Micro you get no SPAM protection whatsoever unless you use Outlook).

Enter Kaspersky Internet 2009. The first thing I found is that it took almost as little memory as the new Norton IS. It certainly takes less than any of the other IS programs I had used. The second was that their website was quite informative and told me clearly that I would get the Kaspersky toolbar in Thunderbird as well as Outlook (To be sure I downloaded a free trial version and yes, SPAM filtering worked fine in Thunderbird.) Third, it protects three computers for a very reasonble price (and at Best Buy there was a terrific sale which required no time consuming rebate nonsense).

Now, I'm running it like a breath of fresh air. The hourly auto updates are not too intrusive, but if they bother you, it's easy to schedule exactly when you want them (mine are for 2am daily). There seems to be little hesitation when the system loads and no intrusion into my daily work. If it detects an intrusion or virus it lets you know, otherwise the only thing you see is when you first start a new program: a small screen briefly comes up in the left lower corner to let you know that a program is starting and how they classified it. Another reviewer mentioned the "white list" and "black list". These are accessed easily (at least in Thunderbird) by clicking on the Kaspersky icon which is installed in the TBird interface. The console screen which controls Kaspersky is very well organized and easy to understand. They provide a full scan and a quick scan. Both scans seem to get it over with much quicker than other IS programs. I appreciate the fact that, unlike other programs, Kaspersky doesn't scream and yell and pop up warnings because you don't run the full scan whenever it thinks you should, as some programs do (Don't they understand that I'm looking up information for a client on the phone and the last thing I want to do is make them wait a half hour for my IS program to do some thing that can wait til later?)

I highly recommend Kaspersky Internet Security 2009 7-User. "

    "As background, I've used quite a few internet security suites: ZoneAlarm, Norton, McAfee, OneCare, and previous Kaspersky products. With Kaspersky, I've come to expect a product that is top-tier for protection, but requires some technical understanding to configure. Its actually why I stopped using the previous version - While I have a technical background, I really don't want to spend my time on a computer configuring the security software, I want to use the PC.

Kaspersky Internet Security 2009 is a complete change, and even manages to improve the protection in the process. First, the Automatic Mode (where Kaspersky takes care of new applications, internet connections, etc.) is now worth using in my opinion. This takes a lot of the "manual" work out of the picture.

Kaspersky licensed technology from Bit9 in this release for whitelisting. Whitelisting is using a list of "known good" applications that can be trusted to go to the internet. For example, Microsoft's Internet Explorer is a known piece of software, so it can be trusted. For applications not on the whitelist, the software determines from its actions if it may be malicious, and categorizes them as such (and therefore, pays more attention to them). What does this mean for you? Less overhead using applications it knows it can trust - Faster browsing, using your PC, etc.

Finally, the last addition that I think is perfect is the security analysis it performs during full scans. Besides checking for viruses, malware, etc., it also checks your applications to see if there are known, patchable vulnerabilities. One of the most prevalent ways bad stuff gets on your PC these days is through unpatched "holes" in software. Kaspersky will alert you to these holes, so you can patch them before someone can get to your computer. An ounce of prevention being better than a pound of cure, so to speak (although with Kaspersky, you get both).

I have no noticeable slowdown on my machine, Kaspersky Internet Security 2009 7-User is using less than 25MB of RAM presently, and I know I have one of the best security products protecting my data. I highly recommend this product! "

    "This is the first time I purchased Kaspersky Internet Security. I previously only used Norton (Symantec) Internet Security products. I did some research this year and decided to go with Kaspersky. I am very pleased with this product. It is the most secure product that I have used. It found spyware and other malicious items that I did not know existed on my PC. My only complaint is that it affects your computer processing speed during a system scan. If you do purchase Kaspersky Internet Security 2009 7-User I would advise you to schedule system scans at an hour when you do not need to use your PC. Other than the minor performance impact, I would definitely recommend this product if you desire strong system security. "

    "Kaspersky Internet Security 2009 7-User is easy to install and use. It offers some customization, and does not require that you be an expert to use it. I would have prefered more customization options, especially for the spam filter, but this is a minor disappointment. One especially nice feature is that it tells you when trusted programs may cause security risks because they lack updates, etc. It also responds quickly to malware trying to attach itself to your computer. All 3 of my computers were free of malware when I put this on, so I'm not sure how good it is at detecting and cleaning problems that are already there (although I did use the online free scan on my friend's infected computer and it did locate the malware). So far, it seems to be excellent at safeguarding my computers from unwanted pests. I have already recommended it to my friends. "

    "I installed Kaspersky Internet Security 2009 7-User on Windows Vista Home Basic and had no problems. It's a shame that others are having issues, I wish it really wasn't the case.

The first thing I noticed was that the user interface was changed. It just doesn't feel the same. I prefer the old one, but I guess it isn't all that bad. The Settings section still looks the same and that is more important. But this is why it lost a star. It took something that worked well and changed it for no good reason.

Once again, I have to give kudos to Kaspersky for allowing us the configurability to be configurable. In a sense, you can just set it and forget it and it will never bother you unless you get a virus, or you can do some hardcore configuring and get the most security protection possible provided you're willing to be bothered. That's a great choice to have, even if I do the automatic method.

Of course, most of the protection happens behind the scenes so I can't rate that, but hopefully everything is as great as in previous editions."