Just about every IT Tech on the planet has an opinion on what the best AV is. For a pay suite I would go with Kaspersky. However, in this day and age the free AV suites are very, very good. I have used AVG, M/Soft Security, Avira, Macafee and Norton. So far the best free program, by far is Avast. It is non intrusive, doesnt annoy me with non stop popups about upgrades, it has stopped a lot of bad scripts and malware, so far I have used it for 18 months now and never had 1 problem.
The key to keeping the system safe is not just using AV. You really need to follow that up with additional tools. Keep your updates current and your Firewall current.
I run scans once a week. On Sunday I update my AV, Firewall, M/Soft Updates etc.. I then run cleaner programs. Its best to have multiple cleaner programs. I run 3 programs on top of my AV scans. I run Malware Bytes, Spybot SD and Advanced System Care which comes w/ a bundled toolbox of all the IObit tools. Its always good to have various scan tools because one program will find and remove an infection that another wont remove. Just dont run them at the same time.
If your familiar with Network security, you can run a network monitor and see if anyone is on your system. Its not even necessary to get someones PC infected to steal info. I can go online and download some very powerful tools and get into just about every wireless network around me. Especially if its running WEP encryption. For additional security try and use WPA-PSK or WPA2, Just go into the setup screen on your router and you should be able to change it. WPA is a lot harder to crack, compared to WEP. The older routers w/ WEP used a 64bit encryption key compared to WPA2 which is an AES 256 bit encryption.
If you just follow a plan like I listed, or something different to suite your needs, you will keep your system secure. If a hacker really wants in to your system, he will get in. For the most part if your system is even a little bit challenging hackers will just ignore you and look for something less secure.
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