Errr...I wonder if I agree with this witch-hunting...
I don't think it is ill-intended if too careless. Let's go to the topic of the blog update of vlk.
avast! 5 is coming… soon!The product will be offered in three flavors: a free AV (that will supersede avast! 4.8 Home Edition), a paid AV (successor of avast! Professional Edition) and a full Internet Security suite.
Then, the firewall is only for the full suite. I guess it's fair and even the free version will offer more than 4.8 Home (according to vlk, "a couple of new extras").
The performance optimizations were not confined to the AV engine only; the program now uses various tricks to feel as light as possible and to not interfere with your work in any way. For example, we have radically improved the time it takes the computer to boot, making the slowdown imposed by avast! almost unnoticeable.
It is going to be kept light-weight.
detection of Potentially Unwanted Programs (PUPs) has been added. Additionally, version 5 includes a new code emulator (or in fact, a dynamic translation module, to be technically correct) that will be of great help e.g. when unpacking malware samples packed/protected by unknown packers (as is the case pretty often).
More fortified for unknown threats. We knew even the current versions have the heuristic scan feature although it is not taken well in some third party tests.
All three products also feature a new user interface which has been completely redesigned for this new version. We’re abandoning the dual (simple vs. enhanced) UI model and replacing it with a single comfortable console, designed for both novice and experienced users.
So, RejZoR's criticism about the labyrinthine interface was addressed. Also, it seems to have graphical interfaces to show what each function is doing.
Things seems to be promising as
RejZoR reported.
