Improvements have been developed so they all converge to improved performance. As such, it is expected that the new edition puts less stress on the CPU while scan speeds increase. Also, usability of the application sees some progress since now you can add exclusions based on the extension of the file as well.
Getting the application on the system should not be too much trouble, although we were not able to complete the procedure with the web installer; the reason for the refusal to even get the task started was that Internet Explorer (6 or above) had not been detected on the system. However, working with the offline installer we were able to finish the installation quite quickly and without any snags.
Panda has not deviated too much from the Cloud Antivirus’ interface has not changed much since the first final release. The same minimalist application window is present in this version, featuring three main buttons (Scan, Report and Recycle Bin) and a real-time graph showing the current number of files scanned per minute.
For advanced configuration simply flip it over and you’ll get the screen where you can disable autorun on the system and on USB drives. Granular control over scan sessions, warnings and reports or exclusions can also be easily shaped up.
As far as scanning is concerned, the free version of Cloud Antivirus does not feature behavioral analysis, but it can detect potentially unwanted programs (PUPs) and comes with behavioral blocking; this means that the actions of all applications on the system is monitored and dangerous programs are blocked.
You can configure the application to automatically clear the action history and eliminate detected items with a specific frequency or create a database of locations (files and folders) as well as extensions that should be avoided during scans.
The new version of Cloud Antivirus advertises improved performance not only with regards to picking up threats on your computer but also to the stress on the system. The progress made by the developer in this sense is noticeable, since our Dual Core CPU 2GHz CPU would carry out other jobs with no problems during scans. In our case the CPU spiked at 50% and maintained a stress average of about 38%. Average RAM usage was a negligible 25MB.
The Good
Free protection against malware, fast access to Collective Intelligence and simplicity all-around are among the main pluses in Cloud Antivirus. But this version also comes with improved performance on all fronts: scan speed, system resources usage as well as malware detection rate.
The Bad
It managed to detect more than it could neutralize. We were left with plenty of threats on the test system despite them being flagged as known malware. Also, in some cases it may block a program without giving you a heads up on the action.
There is no action menu to allow you to instruct the application what to do with the items it detected as threats but did not manage to neutralize them.
The Truth
Panda Cloud Antivirus is indeed easy to use, very light on system resources and manages to offer protection against all sorts of malware. Despite being a free product it manages to provide a lot more than just basic protection. If you are running it on a clean system it will do a very good job keeping threats at bay. Since it relies on intelligence from the cloud no updates are required and the collective pool of information about threats will be shared with your system in a snap.
Click here to Download Panda Cloud Antivirus 1.5