Webroot®

Avantages

The set-up for Webroot is extremely simple. You download the software, enter your product key and it does the rest. It has excellent explanations that tell you what each function does and how it works. For instance, it has a good explanation of how its firewall function manages connections to your machines that make sense to a non-technical person such as me. I love that it runs in the background without seeming to affect my computer and only gives pop-up messages when something needs attention.

I love that the vendor offers discounts for multiple installations at a relatively small breakpoint. As a small business owner, it certainly makes the product more affordable.

Inconvénients

The Webroot Filtering Extension is not always reliable. For example, it lists my company website as a potentially dangerous page when I know that there is nothing wrong with my page. It has also listed some of the websites of my clients as potentially dangerous pages. I have to admit that I don't know exactly how it decides which pages are malicious and which are not, but whatever method it uses seems a little off.

There are also some challenges with the dashboard. I had a laptop crash and needed to re-install Windows. When I did, I wanted to release the license formerly assigned to the crashed laptop and re-assign it so that I would my number of licenses restriction. It was extremely difficult to do so. I ended up having to contact Support for help. And they were very helpful, but it just seems like something one ought to be able to do through the dashboard.

Avantages

Very easy to use and deploy, administrative console allows excellent granular controls of client privileges, scope of protection, and endpoint groups. Integrates with Windows server products for deployment (though I use Samba instead, so this was not an option), and provides a centralized point for administrator notification and action when compromised/infected systems are detected. Client seems relatively fast and works on multiple platforms, though see below re. OS X.

Inconvénients

In my experience, Webroot, though the exposed end is fast and well-designed, does not reliably block or detect common threats. This is obviously a Big Deal in a product billed as enterprise-grade antivirus/antimalware. One employee at the affected client's office was able to download three separate third-party software installers containing malware payloads on a Saturday, install them, and work for a full weekend before I arrived back on Monday to complaints that her machine was being "slow and weird". I discovered that Webroot, though fully deployed and set to monitor downloads, warn on browsing, and scan the affected directories, simply had not alerted on anything. At that point, it doesn't matter how beautiful the interface may be: antimalware software which lets common malware through is essentially useless.

Also, while there is an OS X client, it's buggy and slow. It causes problems with network browsing and network virtualization with both VirtualBox and VMware Fusion, and it results, for some reason, in systemwide UI slowdowns, which suggest to me that there may be some elemental problems with the codebase: use of deprecated APIs, memory leaks, etc.—not usable.

Avantages

I have been working with Webroot for more than 2 years and has covered part of our needs. Your database is kept up to date for any threat, the management of the console is attractive and the documentation is very helpful. The control of policies is worth highlighting because if you have a large organization you can set parameters for different sectors and with different configurations that are very useful, even the notifications via email for the followers of the console serves as support.

Inconvénients

Webroot has many nice things in its projection as antivirus, but has some things to adjust, for example the generation of report endpoints without updating after a certain time.

In mobile devices I have had little experience but it has happened that the update must be done manually. I think they should improve it.

Avantages

Webroot does an amazing job of removing and detecting threats to computers. We also found it very simple to install with a very light footprint on the computer. Users never complained about computer slow downs due to virus scans when we had Webroot deployed.

Inconvénients

We faced two issues with Webroot. Their technology is impressive, but complicated. We never were able to really wrap our heads around how their technology worked compared to other antivirus / antispyware solutions, but it did work, and was quite successful at it. The other concern with Webroot was its price. It is the best software out there we have found for computer protection but it is among the most costly.

Avantages

The footprint is tiny. It is very fast and efficient. It does not slow down systems when it is working. Support is pretty good. I would say this is good software for a MSP or a smaller Org. We might find a replacement if they can't fix their problems.

Inconvénients

It needs to talk to Amazon Cloud to check in with the portal. We don't allow access out to the internet without a proxy. WebRoot IP's are changing because they are on AWS. So we can't put IP based rules in our firewalls to allow access. And we are not going to allow all AWS IP's. I really wish WR would get a range of fixed IP's so the client can attach. When they can't attach, they get disconnected. They have a proxy option while installing, but it seems kind of intermittent. Works sometimes, and sometimes not.