After being one of the lucky beta testers a few months ago, I’m glad to hear that MSE has finally reached release status. You can easily grab it from http://www.microsoft.com/Security_essentials/ . For beta testers, your beta version of MSE should prompt you to upgrade to the full version of MSE. My upgrade was painless and it just seemed like any other normal update. As for those who’s doing a clean installation, the size of the installation file is just approximately 8MB file, which is small compared to other free AV installers. The only hurdle in the installation would be the WGA process, which shouldn’t be a problem if you’re using a genuine version of Windows.
Some of my findings from the beta testing was MSE was really good in terms of scanning speed. A complete system scan (130GB filled with roughly 360,000 files) took only about 30 minutes. I read reviews from other online sources that if your system is infested with malware, it would take longer. That could be a sign that there are viruses lurking somewhere in your system if it takes unusually long.
I recommend MSE for Windows users who are looking for standalone ad-free antivirus solutions. MSE was included in the recent AVTest's tests at http://www.virusbtn.com/news/2008/09_02
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