Reviewed by: Seth Rosenblatt on September 13, 2011

The bottom line: Back from the nearly dead, or at least the un-updated, ESET returns with high-level security that's light on your system. But for a top-tier suite, it's also light on features. Good thing it's priced lower, too.

Review:

The last time ESET updated its two security suites--the antivirus and anti-malware-only NOD32 and the more feature-heavy alternative Smart Security--it was a different computer security world. It was March 2009: Anonymous barely existed, Stuxnet hadn't gone public, and ransomware was the stuff of science fiction.

Version 5 of ESET Smart Security is a solid, creative attempt to create a suite that adapts to a rapidly changing threatscape, with an emphasis on generic detections and the now-commonplace reliance on both cloud and locally stored detections. It left us wanting in one area that many don't consider "core" security, and so its lower price and good benchmarks might win over people unhappy with other suites.