There are no major visible changes this time around, despite the jump in version number. But lurking just beneath the surface are some very worthwhile benefits.
Top of the list is a new network inspection system, which monitors network traffic to check for signs suspect behaviour. This can help block some known exploits, even if they’re been carried out by malware that Microsoft Security Essentials 2.0 has never encountered before.
There’s also a new and improved antivirus engine, which Microsoft claims “offers enhanced detection and cleanup capabilities with better performance”. It will take time and lengthy testing to confirm that, but if true then Security Essentials 2.0 will be a very impressive product. Independent testers AV-Labs found that version 1.0 of the engine detected 97.6% of test samples in their last , and any significant improvement from this will see Security Essentials 2.0 up with the very best of the competition.
A relatively minor (though still welcome) tweak sees the Security Essentials 2.0 installer offer to turn on the Windows firewall, if you don’t have it (or anything better) running already.
And it’s worth remembering that, thanks to a licence tweak a few months ago, Security Essentials may now be installed and run on up to ten devices in any small business.
Read more, and grab your own copy from this page. Note there are separate versions for Windows XP [32-bit] and Windows Vista/7 [32-bit or 64-bit].
This article originally appeared at softwarecrew.co.uk