Panda Cloud AntiVirus (FREE) – A New Era Of Protection?
Panda Cloud AntiVirus is totally different to traditional AntiVirus programs and uses a completely new concept. Is this the start of a new era of AntiVirus protection that will soon render all existing packages obsolete or is it just a new gimmick that won’t perform as promised?
The massive difference between Panda Cloud AntiVirus and current traditional antivirus packages at the time of writing is there’s no central server for downloading signature updates, instead everyone forms part of a massive collective intelligence spread around the Internet, “around the Internet” is the official definition of “the cloud“. So far at the time of writing, the free Beta release software is the only antivirus product of it type and it’s been highly acclaimed by many experts in the field. Even though this software is supposed to be so revolutionary, Panda are still selling versions of their traditional antivirus products at the time of writing as well.
Once Panda’s free cloud antivirus software is installed, you become a small part of “the cloud” which means any threats found on your computer and any immunisation solutions will be shared across the cloud to protect everyone else, in exchange for this you’re protected by the shared information and solutions from millions of PC’s around the world also connected to “the cloud”. The larger ‘the cloud’ becomes, the better protected everyone becomes. At the moment Panda Cloud AntiVirus is currently totally free at the time of writing so as to maximise the amount of new people installing the product. Eventually it’s expected that Panda will release a newer version of the software with additional features and will start charging, they however assure people that have installed the free software that they will always be fully protected against the latest viruses detected by “the cloud” forever.
The precise detailed internal workings of “the cloud” and the collective intelligence are kept secret by Panda as only a fairly brief explanation is given, I suspect this is to slow down competitors copying and bringing out their own ‘cloud’ antivirus software. The software is said to use non intrusive interception techniques on the client. When a new virus is detected on a PC anywhere in the world, the information said to be analysed in “the cloud” and shared across the entire community. According to Panda it take takes on average just 6 minutes for the cloud system to identify and classify new viruses in real time, they go on to say that the system is identifying around 50,000 new samples every day which certainly sounds very impressive. It allegedly takes on average 48 hours for signature updates to be released for a new threat with traditional antivirus software. As more and more virus’s are released at an ever greater rate, traditional centralised antivirus labs are allegedly becoming ever more bogged down, hence the need for this new breed of antivirus software.
Panda Cloud AntiVirus also features anti-spyware, anti-rootkit, heuristic scanning and a goodware cache. It has some local antivirus software, but for it to function fully you must be constantly connected to the Internet to access “the cloud” where it promises to detect more malware than any other software available today. It also uses much less system resources than traditional antivirus products and it uses just 17mb of Ram, but it obviously uses a small amount of Internet bandwidth too.
The minimum system requirements for Panda Cloud AntiVirus are only 64MB of Ram and the Internet with Windows XP SP2 or above or any system that can run Windows Vista. I tried to install the system however on a friend’s dated PC with Windows XP Home Edition, but it unfortunately failed to meet the requirements.
Is This a New Era Of Virus Protection?
Well I strongly suspect the cloud system will take off to some extent in future. Other AntiVirus organisations are bound to also release similar cloud systems eventually. I’m a little sceptical that all future viruses can be detected and dealt with entirely by just a cloud system however. In my opinion some new viruses are bound to eventually beat the system, when that happens a software update will be required meaning it won’t be entirely the end of the centralised lab. I suspect the ultimate future system will combine signature / software updates with the addition of a cloud system to get the best of everything. I’m not however belittling Panda Cloud AntiVirus as in my opinion it’s a significant breakthrough in antivirus protection.
Panda Cloud AntiVirus on Test & Ongoing Review:
I’ve recently installed Panda Cloud AntiVirus on a dual AMD Athlon 2400 processor PC with Window XP Pro SP3 and 1.5GB of memory. So far the system is running very well and it quickly found and immunised some minor threats I knew nothing about. My system appears to be running almost as fast as if I didn’t have an AntiVirus checker running at all and the Internet bandwidth used hasn’t been noticeable so far. The software is very simple and extremely straight forward to use, only time will be the test as to how efficient the system is.
If you are using free antivirus software or if you haven’t got any antivirus software installed at all, I recommend you give Panda Cloud AntiVirus a try now. If you’re using trusted paid anti-virus software, then I recommend you wait to see how Panda Cloud AntiVirus performs in future before changing unless you’re feeling particularly adventurous (I NO LONGER RECOMMEND THIS – PLEASE SEE UPDATE BELOW).
I will continue using and testing the software over the coming months and will report back how it performs, I will even test it with some dodgy downloads.
IMPORTANT: PANDA CLOUD ANTIVIRUS HAS FAILED MISERABLY!!!
Serious virus destroys the windows registry, where was Panda?
(UPDATE 02/05/10 – PLEASE ALSO SEE MY COMMENTS BELOW THIS ARTICLE AS LATER VERSIONS OF PANDA CLOUD HAVE BEEN RELEASED SINCE THIS FAILURE WITH IMPROVEMENTS!)
ORIGINAL POST:
My friend has also been testing Panda Cloud AntiVirus and he wishes he hadn’t. A very serious virus firstly disabled Panda without any problem what-so-ever, but at this point we didn’t know it was caused by a virus, I reloaded as Panda itself recommended to fix the problem. Panda reloaded okay and detected a virus, but it said it was neutralised, but then various windows started opening automatically, the system then shutdown without asking. On reloading Windows XP Professional failed to load even in Safe Mode. I couldn’t even load the recovery console using the XP CD as Windows Set-up thought it was in the middle of an upgrade. The Virus had deleted the Windows Registry completely as I discovered after investigation. It’s just took me hours to fix his PC where I managed to copy a system restore file manually using a bootable utility disk to repair the missing registry file. The average PC user would have had to format and start again as not many people are PC technical support experts.
Panda Cloud AntiVirus in this situation was USELESS! It FAILED and was disabled by the virus easily! While disabled it just sat there with a cross and it wasn’t even noticeable immediately. Also during use on my friends PC and mine, I’ve had various intermittent annoying messages saying there’s a problem with my Internet connection when it’s working perfectly.
MY FRIEND HAS DE-INSTALLED PANDA CLOUD ANTIVIRUS AND BROUGHT NOD ANTI-VIRUS! I’m going to do the same as it’s proved that Panda Cloud AntiVirus just isn’t up to the job it was designed for and can’t be trusted at present.
I now don’t recommend Panda Cloud AntiVirus unless it’s improved significantly in future. I may test it again if and when this happens.
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Comments:
Comment from admin
Time August 8, 2009 at 1:29 pm 
Another problem: My Internet speed browsing started being terrible on a 6Mb/S connection, taking ages to load pages, but speedtests said my connection was fine. Disabled Panda Cloud AntiVirus, everything okay. I’m now forced to deinstall it. A lot more work needs doing on Panda Cloud before it’s fit for use in my opinion and from my personal experience using the product. Collective intellience is a great idea, I hope Panda do rectify the problems as it certainly deserves to work, I will be contacting them and I will hopefully test it again with future updates.
Comment from admin
Time August 8, 2009 at 6:32 pm
LATEST RECOMMENDATION 08/08/09: Don’t install Panda Cloud Antivirus unless you are feeling very adventurous as it’s caused various problems on two different PCs with 2 different users. On one PC it failed to protect against a very serious virus and it didn’t pickup other potential threats on the hard disk even after a full scan.
(UPDATE 02/05/10 – PLEASE ALSO READ FURTHER COMMENTS AS IMPROVED VERSIONS HAVE BEEN RELEASED SINCE THE RECOMMENDATION ABOVE)
Comment from admin
Time March 26, 2010 at 5:31 am
They have released V1.01 of Panda Cloud with some improvements, although until I see a major overhaul, I still don’t recommend it unless you’re feeling extremely adventurous and you don’t have anything major to lose on your PC if you’re infected by a virus.
Comment from admin
Time April 11, 2010 at 2:11 am
Panda Cloud AntiVirus V1.01 on Test:
Since Panda have had time to iron out many of the initial problems with their product and since it’s now at V1.01 which is no longer Beta, I thought it fair to give the software another chance and I’m therefore testing it again. I’m surprised that the software is still free, I suspect this is because it’s not yet popular enough to sell, but this could and probably will change eventually. Remember that Panda Antivirus doesn’t include a firewall and I recommend you install one as Windows Firewall isn’t exactly brilliant.
On installation I already noticed a bug where I was unable to change the default install path, when I clicked to change the path to what I desired, the OK button wouldn’t work, I could only cancel and install in the default location. This is however only a minor annoyance to a few people.
There’s a lot more people using this software now and it is therefore is detecting a lot more viruses, plus various hotfixes and improvements have been made. We will see the software really is much improved since the previous disastrous test with the Beta version. It’s good however to note that the software is officially now Windows 7 certified.
Comment from admin
Time May 2, 2010 at 12:34 am
Panda Cloud V1.1 Beta Now Available + I’m Running It With Comodo Firewall (Also Free)
So far so good during my testing of the latest stable release of Panda Cloud.
I’ve now just installed the new Panda Cloud AntiVirus V1.1 Beta at the time of writing although I recommend that most people continue to use the latest stable release unless they’re advanced PC users and don’t mind potential problems. I’ve noticed that there’s new configuration settings for advanced users and there’s also a PC vaccination feature for both the PC and USB drives on the Beta version. I’m continuing to test, but I have to say that Panda Cloud seems much better after many initial problems, it’s even detected quite a few potential threats well so far.
I’m now running Panda Cloud alongside Comodo Firewall (free) for excellent overall protection from all threats. I’ve installed Comodo Firewall as separate component of Comodo Internet Security which I recommend, this Firewall is very powerful and it’s also free along with excellent extra features including superb proactive defence that monitors changes to important registry entries and files. You can even run applications in a special sandbox mode which is normally defaulted on all new and unknown applications that run until you review them as being no threat. Sandbox mode allows applications to be run in a protected environment where if it was malware, it wouldn’t be-able to easily damage your system. Comodo Firewall is running perfectly hand and hand with Panda Cloud Antivirus. Commodo Firewall is superb for advanced users who want the best free firewall protection available in my opinion, but unfortunately their AntiVirus component isn’t very powerful, hence why I’m running Panda Cloud AntiVirus instead with Comodo Firewall.
Please click here for more details about Comodo Internet Security and to download.
For more information on the latest beta release of Panda Cloud and to download it, please click here.
STILL TESTING…PLEASE WATCH THIS SPACE….
Comment from admin
Time May 4, 2010 at 1:05 am
Panda Crippled My System – De-installed Again
The latest Beta version of Panda Cloud slowed down my system to a crawl at times and it also used excessive amounts of memory intermittently. At times my system would almost grind to a halt and it would take ages before there was any resources left to even disable it, but as soon as Panda Cloud was disabled, my system would go back to normal speed again. I’ve been forced to de-install it again and I’ve installed NOD32 AntiVirus instead which is running alongside Comodo Firewall extremely well indeed – I recommend this as my system is well protected and isn’t noticeably slowed down at all.
The latest stable release of Panda Cloud seemed better than the latest Beta version, although I’m still quite sceptical about the level of protection provided after the initial problem on the first version I installed where my PC became infected and Panda failed miserably to protect me, instead it was disabled easily by the Malware as the infection took control. Similar happened on a friends PC and we were both forced to install NOD to get rid of 2 different infections. It’s starting to look like the way Panda Cloud works across the Internet with all other users being in a cloud isn’t very feasible even though it’s an excellent idea in theory. Incidentally, the recent problems can’t be caused by my Internet connection speed either as I’ve got the faster available in the UK on Virgin Media up to 50Mb/S where I’m actually getting around 45Mb/S during tests, so I’d hate to see how Panda Cloud performs on a slow connection.
I therefore only recommend Panda Cloud for advanced users at present who don’t mind possible problems and I’d install the latest stable version instead of the beta version. Panda Cloud doesn’t include a firewall and the standard Windows firewall is terrible, so I recommend also using something like Comodo alongside which is an extremely powerful free firewall and is in my opinion the best free firewall available at the time of writing.
I hope to test Panda Cloud again in perhaps 6 months or so when I’ll see if they’ve managed to improve the software any further. Unfortunately I suspect that if Panda did manage to make the software work well, they’d eventually start charging for it as Panda has never really been a software company to write freeware. They’re probably really only giving away the free version of Panda Cloud so people can test it for them and to make up a large networked cloud to start with before they hope to released the commercial version to finally make themselves money for their investment.
Comment from admin
Time May 4, 2010 at 11:50 pm
Incidentally, the Panda de-installer didn’t remove the application properly, it left various dead registry entries still pointing to the old directory where Panda was installed, I had to use CCleaner to remove them.
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Comment from admin
Time August 3, 2009 at 3:13 am
Panda has failed to provide adequate protection while testing on 2 PCs and it’s also intermittently nagged about problems with the Internet when it’s always working perfectly, please see title, “IMPORTANT: PANDA CLOUD ANTIVIRUS HAS FAILED MISERABLY” in the main text above for more details.