Norman Virus Control is a very unobtrusive anti-virus program that sits in your system tray and performs much like Norton AntiVirus from Symantec. It scans all incoming emails, new files, removable media and downloaded files from the internet as a matter of course without any user interaction.


In a similar vein to Kapersky Antivirus, there are several individual programs that perform the various functions of Norman Virus Control including the usual task scheduler, utilities, update tools and scanning tools, all which are accessible by right clicking the unobtrusive icon that sits in your system tray.


However, using the applications is a little more complicated and while it doesn’t strictly require an intermediate level of computing experience, the novice will be fairly lost when faced with the options available to them. That is not really surprising considering NVC is designed more for the business operator than the home operator.


Despite that, the configuration editor is reasonably easy to use and uses a combination button/tabs/check box layout, all of which is easy to follow and fairly logically laid out.
The utilities tool, however, is a lot more complicated and without reference to a manual or the help file, even the intermediate user may find it difficult.


The major problem is that it isn’t immediately obvious which action you should take to do what you want to and it involves a lot of trial and error or constant reference to the manual or help file. Norman has a good reputation as a business-grade anti-virus solution but home users are likely to find it too high end for their requirements.


It also only picked up 70 percent of the test files, which indicates that there are a few gaps in Norman’s virus definition patterns.