Customer Reviews

BitDefender Antivirus 2010 - 1-PC/1-Year [OLD VERSION]

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

I am using the 2009 version (with two years updates) which I understand is essentially the same. I would not purchase again for a couple of reason:

1. We are a small office with about 10 users. I have had to refomat 2 computers due to infections. Yes, the users should have been more careful but that is why you purchase an antivirus product. Bitdefender did not stop the infections and could not clean the computers. Have used Norton in the past and unfortunately it blocked some software we use and slowed down machines.

2. On 3 computers the antivirus software stopped working. After hours searching on their website I found fixes. Why weren't these fixes downloaded automatically? Why don't they make it easy to find?

On the plus side the product appears to have small footprint. Computers don't appear to slow down when it is installed. Even scans don't seem to slow down the computer.

I purchased this software to replace kaspersky just after getting a windows 7 laptop. At the time kaspersky was not windows 7 ready and Bitdefender was. All lab reports on Bitdefenders were good and it seemed to have a very good feature set. AV lab tests also showed that it was in the top 5 results at the time.

I wish I would have gone another route.

This was a 'license' for 3 PCs. As such I installed it on 2 windows 7 laptops and a Windows XP Media Center 2005 desktop.

It does seem to have a good feature set but it is not reliable. The software when it's working seems good but it keeps shutting down or crashing. The icon in the notification tray will turn grey at random, will give an error that it is not responding forcing the PC needs to be rebooted to get it back up and running. This happens constantly on one of my windows 7 laptops and on the xp machine. Also getting this error constantly "vsserv.exe has caused an error and needs to shut down".

I have opened over 5 tickets with Bitdefender support which has been way below standard. The first ticket was closed by them after providing a solution of "run the update"? I was not impressed as another ticket I opened was that the AV definition files would not update. The update would fail to contact the server and the PC would have to be rebooted to make a connection, despite my having a working high speed connection. It would usually be days after before I would notice that it hadn't updated. So for several days my PC would be running out of date Anti Virus definitions.

This added with the constant crashes left my computer vulnerable. If the AV isn't running, or it isn't up to date, how can you trust that your PC is secure?

This was happening on all 3 machines. I'm assuming that there is another piece of software on these machines that may be in conflict with Bitdefender. Unknown at this point as their tech support was unable to resolve. Complete uninstall and reinstall of Bitdefender did not resolve the issue. Unsure if the install bits I have are corrupt or not. The install provided by Bitdefender was over an internet connection. They did not provide me with a hard copy (DVD) of the install bits and the downloaded version of the new install file from Bitdefender had the same result.

Working with their support was a lost cause and after a few months of this nonsense I asked them for a refund.

Their response was "NO". Even though you don't purchase software you license it (2 yr license in my case). Their reply was that after 30 days of purchase no refunds. So I'm paying for a 2 year license I'm not able to use.

After several emails to their customer service in regards to the issue. Advising I know longer trusted this application to protect my pc they still refused to give a refund. I received (2) phone calls from their tech support wanting to troubleshoot further. Was bad enough that it had been months into this at this point, and the software wasn't working, but the tech support who was calling had English so bad I had difficulty understanding them.

Their final solution given was to have me format my (3) three computers so as to get their software to work. This was not an option.

I have been working in IT for several years and hold over 15 industry certifications in the field. In all my experience in dealing with buggy software this has to be the absolute worse in terms of dealing with the software and its customer service.

I would not recommend this software to anyone. Not just because of my technical issue but because of how their customer service and tech support were unwilling to refund my money when they failed to resolve the issue. Reformatting one of the PCs may have been a viable troubleshooting step to try and narrow down what was causing the issue, but a customer should be able to say no at this point if they choose to and get a refund. There has to be a deciding line as to when enough is enough, and how much one should have to work to get something to function as it should. Their are certain expectations every customer has when they make a purchase from a software vendor. Not only to the quality the software, but the support expected from its vendor as well.

If there was a minus star I would have given one. Seems to be a good program when it's running but its not reliable. Tech support and customer service way below standard.

I've since installed another AV/Firewall solution and low and behold. It does not crash. Go figure.

I've still received no refund or further correspondences from BitDefender

Avoid this product like the plague. It will not install properly on an XP operating system. Support is practically nonexistent. They will answer your email but after 2 attempts at correcting the problem they will give up. Amazon will not offer refunds for digital downloads. Take my advice and get Microsoft Security Essentials. It's free and works better than most virus software.

From the ad it appeared to be a one year antivirus, but it is only a trial version, who do I contact? Very annoying. I made the mistake by picking a choice to try the program and not install. Be careful and read your choices. Amazon was great in helping me resolve this problem.

this antivirus doesnt even deserve one star. it was horrible.. due to it i had to wipe out my hard drive not once but TWICE!! this antivirus doesnt protect you at all, it GIVES you virus' and their support team sucks to the extreme because they hardly speak english and they are useless because they dont even know about their own product.. what a joke for an antivirus and what morons for the support...

Even with this software, my computer has many problems.
Their service is non-existent. Once service is over, I am looking for other options.

I bought this software based upon review posted on one site. It looks like it was paid site.
I won't rely on reviews unless from reputed firms like pcmag or cnet.

I have been using Bit Defender for a number of weeks under 64 bit Windows 7. Every few days the normally red icon on the lower toolbar of the screen goes grey and if you look at the tool tip for the icon it recommends rebooting the computer to restart the program. Clearly this is entirely unsatisfactory. You do not know when the AV program failed and whether you have been unprotected for any period of time, and who wants to keep rebooting the computer to fix a problem? In fact you can manually restart the vsserv process which appears to fix the problem, but this is not a satisfactory situation.

This program in its current form under Windows 7 is in my opinion unreliable and should not be purchased.

I purchased this software to replace kaspersky just after getting a windows 7 laptop. At the time kaspersky was not windows 7 ready and Bitdefender was. All lab reports on Bitdefenders were good and it seemed to have a very good feature set. AV lab tests also showed that it was in the top 5 results at the time.

I wish I would have gone another route.

This was a 'license' for 3 PCs. As such I installed it on 2 windows 7 laptops and a Windows XP Media Center 2005 desktop.

It does seem to have a good feature set but it is not reliable. The software when it's working seems good but it keeps shutting down or crashing. The icon in the notification tray will turn grey at random, will give an error that it is not responding forcing the PC to need to be rebooted to get it back up and running. This happens constantly on one of my windows 7 laptops and on the xp machine. Also getting this error constantly "vsserv.exe has caused an error and needs to shut down".

I have opened over 5 tickets with Bitdefender support which has been way below standard. The first ticket was closed by them after providing a solution of "run the update"? I was not impressed as another ticket I opened was that the AV definition files would not update. The update would fail to contact the server and the PC would have to be rebooted to make a connection, despite my having a working high speed connection. It would usually be days after before I would notice that it hadn't updated. So for several days my PC would be running out of date Anti Virus definitions.

This added with the constant crashes left my computer vulnerable. If the AV isn't running, or it isn't up to date, how can you trust that your PC is secure?

This was happening on all 3 machines. I'm assuming that there is another piece of software on these machines that may be in conflict with Bitdefender. Unknown at this point as their tech support was unable to resolve. Complete uninstall and reinstall of Bitdefender did not resolve the issue. Unsure if the install bits I have are corrupt or not. The install provided by Bitdefender was over an internet connection. They did not provide me with a hard copy (DVD) of the install bits and the downloaded version of the new install file from Bitdefender had the same result.

Working with their support was a lost cause and after a few months of this nonsense I asked them for a refund.

Their response was "NO". Even though you don't purchase software you license it (2 yr license in my case). Their reply was that after 30 days of purchase no refunds. So I'm paying for a 2 year license I'm not able to use.

After several emails to their customer service in regards to the issue. Advising I know longer trusted this application to protect my pc they still refused to give a refund. I received (2) phone calls from their tech support wanting to troubleshoot further. Was bad enough that it had been months into this at this point, and the software wasn't working, but the tech support who was calling had English so bad I had difficulty understanding them.

Their final solution given was to have me format my (3) three computers so as to get their software to work. This was not an option.

I have been working in IT for several years and hold over 15 industry certifications in the field. In all my experience in dealing with buggy software this has to be the absolute worse in terms of dealing with the software and its customer service.

I would not recommend this software to anyone. Not just because of my technical issue but because of how their customer service and tech support were unwilling to refund my money when they failed to resolve the issue. Reformatting one of the PCs may have been a viable troubleshooting step to try and narrow down what was causing the issue, but a customer should be able to say no at this point if they choose to and get a refund. There has to be a deciding line as to when enough is enough, and how much one should have to work to get something to function as it should. Their are certain expectations every customer has when they make a purchase from a software vendor. Not only to the quality the software, but the support expected from its vendor as well.

If there was a minus star I would have given one. Seems to be a good program when it's running but its not reliable. Tech support and customer service way below standard.

I've since installed another AV/Firewall solution and low and behold. It does not crash. Go figure.

I've still received no refund or further correspondences from BitDefender

BitDefender AV 2010 has operational problems as do their other products. When they get all the issues ironed out it will probably be a good product. But at this moment I have about had enough of it. They are trying to fix numerous problems but it is slow.

When it honestly does come to computers, we honestly need a very strong anti-virus and anti-spyware computer program to help us while we do our jobs and work in our everyday needs with our computers. For BitDefender, they are definitely one of the more stronger and well-dedicated anti-virus computer software protection programs that actually does work very strongly, and well with your computer. It does handle extremely well with your P.C. or Netbook. It works very well, and takes about a few hours during scanning to surf your hard drive, without slowing down your other needs on your computer. There is only one major flaw, it doesn't handle very well if you have a older version of Windows XP. It definitely works better, if you've just recently purchased a computer with Windows 7, or if you have one that runs on Windows Vista like I absolutely do. Honestly, it isn't just affordable in price, it handles well in quality. I absolutely recommend BitDefender to handle all your computer Anti-Virus protection.

Price: B+

Quality: B

Compatabilty: B 1/2-

Overall: B 1/2+