- Quick specs
- Price: Free
- Operating system: Windows XP/Vista/7
- Date added: April 12, 2010
- Total Downloads: 897,814
- Downloads last week: 14,318
- Product Ranking: #11 in Antivirus Software
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- CNET editors' rating: stars
- Average user rating: stars out of 228 votes
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CNET editors' review
Reviewed by: Seth Rosenblatt on November 09, 2009
Panda Cloud Antivirus is notable as a free security solution for two reasons: Panda is a reputable security vendor making its first foray into the realm of freeware security, and the program's goal of freeing up system resources by putting much of the program's heavy lifting in the cloud is definitely attained.
When you open Cloud Antivirus, the main window lets you know whether you're safe or not with a big red or green icon. Cloud Antivirus works as other antivirus solutions do, offering a Quick Scan and a Custom scan for specific folder, files, and drives, but its ancillary features are exceptionally light. You can opt out of contributing anonymous data to the cloud, but that also opts you out of automatic threat management. There's a network connection proxy option should you need it, and a reporting feature that will show you what kind of threats have been detected and removed from your computer. You can filter the report by All, Last 24 hours, Last Week, or Last Month, and there's a Recycle Bin pane from which you can recover a false positive, should you need it. Unfortunately, the Recycle Bin is hidden behind an obnoxious "flipping" screen that cheesily rotates when you need to access it.
Despite lacking some of the customization heft that even other free antivirus solutions have, most glaringly a scheduler, the program is not necessarily a bad choice for a stripped-down antivirus. It runs at less than 10MB of RAM when idle, and around 60MB when scanning, which should appeal to resource-conscious Netbook users. Keeping in mind its limited feature set, and that we don't have efficacy numbers at the time of reviewing, Panda Cloud Antivirus makes a decent, reasonable security choice.
Publisher's description
From Panda Security :Download Panda Cloud Antivirus, the first free cloud-based antivirus thin-client. It consists of a lightweight antivirus agent that is connected in real-time to PandaLabs' online Collective Intelligence servers to protect faster against the newest malware variants while barely impacting PC performance. Thanks to Panda Security's Collective Intelligence malware and goodware online database, Panda Cloud Antivirus detects more malware than traditional signature-based solutions which take longer to detect the most recent, and therefore most dangerous, variants. Panda Cloud Antivirus protects you while you browse, play or work and you won't even notice it. It is extremely light as all the work is done online in the cloud. Panda Cloud Antivirus provides you with the fastest protection against the newest viruses thanks to its cloud-scanning from PandaLabs' servers. Panda Cloud Antivirus is truly install and forget. Don't worry about updates, configuration or complicated decisions ever again. With Panda Cloud Antivirus, Panda Security is introducing a new protection model that utilizes a thin-client agent and server architecture which processes and blocks malware more efficiently than locally installed signature-based products. Traditional antivirus products for PCs rely on multiple locally installed technologies which intercept each file at different layers (entry vector, file system and execution) and scan them using various techniques (antivirus, heuristics, intrusion prevention, behavioral analysis, etc.). This process results in heavy usage of local PC memory and CPU resources, negatively impacting performance Panda Cloud Antivirus includes local and remote antivirus, anti-spyware, anti-rootkit, heuristics and goodware cache, while only consuming an average of 22 MB of RAM and 50 percent of the PC performance impact as compared to the industry average.
What's new in this version:
Version 1.0.01 may include unspecified updates, enhancements, or bug fixes.
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User reviews
- All versions: 3.9 starsout of 228 votes
- 5 stars
- 4 stars
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- 1 stars
- Current version: 4.0 starsout of 24 votes
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- My rating: 0 stars Write review
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5 stars
6 out of 7 people found this review helpful
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"The Best..!!"
Pros: This is the best solution for PC performance conscious users. It is very light. Quick scanning is very very fast. In short, if you are looking for free AV, then Panda Cloud AV is what you need. It is much better than AVG, Avast (Free Versions).
Cons: Not experienced any.
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5 stars
5 out of 6 people found this review helpful
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"VERY VERY GOOD ANTIVIRUS"
Pros: panda cloud does not waste a lot of CPU on computer and is very very light.It is very easy to use and has a quick scan it is very good on detecting malware and i recommend it to everybody especialy for slow computers.HAS NO BAD THINGS
Cons: HAS NO BAD THINGS
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5 stars
4 out of 5 people found this review helpful
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"an antivirus 4 free, easy to install and use"
Pros: very discreet, won't affect any downloads you got, especially large files, easy to use
Cons: I can't see what to do with infected files, no option to see more, or delete it yourself
Summary: works great with trojans, worms, doesn't slow down downloads, u have no option 4 deep scan, detailed scan, it works very well though
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5 stars
4 out of 5 people found this review helpful
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"awesome product"
Pros: installed easy when i went to a site it blocked it said it was a threat, tocool
Cons: no problems
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5 stars
3 out of 4 people found this review helpful
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"Pretty much awesome.."
Pros: +Very Low RAM usage (even when scanning)
+Very attractive appearance
+Faster at detecting threats then the rest of your AntiVirus software optionsCons: +Other Free AntiViruses have more options, even though these options are there most of the time you don't need them so Panda Cloud has the essential tools to maintaining viruses
Summary: Although other AV software packages have some more features that might be useful to you the cloud anti virus is fast and efficient and is a little more up to date as terms of the 2010
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1 stars
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"REMOVE FROM DOWNLOAD.COM"
Pros: None at all. Panda is one of the worst AVs out there.
Cons: Everything Panda
Summary: Try it for a few weeks, then run Malwarebytes and AVG free. You will find that Panda is just as bad as Windows live one care, norton, mcafee and pretty much anything else. Im a tech with Computer Troubleshooters. I see what a mess these AVs can make on machines, not to mention slowing them down to a crawl. (and for vista users, dont use windows vista, its terrible. get to windows xp or 7)
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1 stars
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"DO NOT DOWNLOAD!!"
Pros: There are no pros.
Cons: does not seem to work in Vista. Worse- cannot uninstall. When I try repeatedly to install I receive and error message in Spanish.
Summary: An Antivrus program that behaves like a virus so insidiously that it is impossible to unistall.
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4 stars
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"doesn't slow down my older computer as much as McAfee"
Pros: Runs relatively lightly on my old laptop and netbook
Cons: Doesn't run scans automatically
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3 stars
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"if it works, it is very good"
Pros: in working position, it is the best
Cons: in actual, it does not work almost upto 90 %
Summary: if it works, than it is best but upto 90 % it never worked
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1 stars
Version: Panda Cloud Antivirus Free Edition 1.0.01
"IT'S CAPABILITIES WERE NOT APPARENT ON MY VISTA"
Pros: NO PROS AT ALL
Cons: WHAT WAS THIS PROGRAM SUPPOSED TO DO AGAIN? I NEVER SAW ANY INDICATION THAT IT EVER DID ANYTHING EXCEPT CRASH VISTA.
Summary: DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME WITH THIS TURKEY!
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