Performance Test June 2018

This report is an excerpt of the Business Security Test 2018 (March – June). For more details, please click here.

Introduction

The Performance Test evaluates the impact of anti-virus software on system performance, as programs running in background – such as real time protection antivirus software – use some percentage of system resources. Taking these tests as reference, users can evaluate their anti-virus protection in terms of system speed (system performance).

For further details please refer to the methodology documents as well as the information provided on our website.

Please note: We want to make clear that the results in this report are intended only to give an indication of the impact on system performance (mainly by the real-time/on-access components) of the consumer security products in these specific tests. Users are encouraged to try out the software on their own PC’s and see how it performs on their own systems.

Tested Products

The following products for 64-bit systems were evaluated in this test:

• Avast Business Antivirus Pro Plus 18.4
• Bitdefender Endpoint Security Elite 6.6
• CrowdStrike Falcon Endpoint Protection 4.7
• Emsisoft Enterprise Console 2018.5
• Endgame Protection Platform 2.7
• eScan Corporate 360 14.0
• ESET Endpoint Security 6.6
• FireEye Endpoint Security 4.0
• Fortinet Enterprise Management Console 6.0
• Kaspersky Endpoint Security 11.0
• McAfee Endpoint Security 10.5
• Microsoft Windows Defender for Enterprise 4.16
• Panda Endpoint Protection Plus 7.90
• Saint Security MAX Antivirus 1.0
• Trend Micro Office Scan XG 12.0
• VIPRE Endpoint Protection Cloud 10.1

We have tested the product that each manufacturer submits for the protection tests in the Business Main Test Series. Please note that the results in this report apply only to the specific product versions listed above (i.e. to the exact version numbers and to 64-bit systems). Also, keep in mind that different vendors offer different (and differing numbers of) features in their products.

The following activities/tests were performed under an up-to-date Windows 10 RS3 64-Bit system:

• File copying
• Archiving / unarchiving
• Installing / uninstalling applications
• Launching applications
• Downloading files
• Browsing Websites
• PC Mark 10 Professional Testing Suite

Test Procedure

The tests were performed on a Lenovo G50 machine with an Intel Core i3-4005U CPU, 4GB of RAM and HDD hard disks. We consider this machine configuration as “low-end”. The performance tests were done on a clean Windows 10 RS3 64-Bit system (English) and then with the installed business security client software. The tests were done with an active Internet connection to allow for the real-world impact of cloud services/features.

Care was taken to minimize other factors that could influence the measurements and/or comparability of the systems. Optimizing processes/fingerprinting used by the products were also considered – this means that the results represent the impact on a system which has already been operated by the user for a while. The tests were repeated several times (with and without fingerprinting) in order to get mean values and filter out measurement errors. After each run, the workstation was reverted to the previously created system image and rebooted six times. We simulated various file operations that a computer user would execute: copying[1] different types of clean files from one place to another, archiving and unarchiving files, downloading files from the Internet and launching applications (opening documents).

We use around 5GB of data consisting of various file types and sizes (pictures, movies, audio files, MS Office documents, PDF documents, business applications/executables, Windows operating system files, archives, etc.).

Testcases

File copying: Some anti-virus products ignore some types of files by design/default (e.g. based on their file extensions), or use fingerprinting technologies, which may skip already scanned files in order to increase the speed (see comments on page 5). We copied a set of various common file types from one physical hard disk to another physical hard disk.

Archiving and unarchiving:Archives are commonly used for file storage, and the impact of anti-virus software on the time taken to create new archives or to unarchive files from existing archives may be of interest for most users. We archived a set of different file types that are commonly found on home and office workstations. The results already consider the fingerprinting/optimization technologies of the anti-virus products, as most users usually make archives of files they have on their disk.

Installing/uninstalling applications: We installed several common applications with the silent install mode, then uninstalled them and measured how long it took. We did not consider fingerprinting, because usually an application is installed only once.

Launching applications: Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) and PDF documents are very common. We opened and then later closed various documents in Microsoft Office and in Adobe Acrobat Reader. The time taken for the viewer or editor application to launch, and afterwards to close, was measured. Although we list the results for the first opening and the subsequent openings, we consider the subsequent openings more important, as normally this operation is done several times by users, and optimization of the anti-virus products take place, minimizing their impact on the systems.

Downloading files: The content of several common websites is fetched via wget from a local and a public server. 

Browsing Websites: common websites are opened with Google Chrome. The time to completely load and display the website was measured. We only measure the time to navigate to the website when an instance of the browser is already started.

Ranking System

Slow	Mediocre	Fast	Very Fast
The mean value of the products in this cluster builds a clearly slower fourth cluster in the given subcategory	The mean value of the products in this cluster builds a third cluster in the given subcategory	The mean value of the products in this group is higher than the average of all scores in the given subcategory	The mean value of the products in this group is lower than the average of all scores in the given subcategory

Test Results

These specific test results show the impact on system performance that a security product has, compared to the other tested security products. The reported data just gives an indication and is not necessarily applicable in all circumstances, as too many factors can play an additional part. The testers defined the categories Slow, Mediocre, Fast and Very Fast by consulting statistical methods and taking into consideration what would be noticed fromthe user’s perspective, or compared to the impact of the other security products. If some products are faster/slower than others in a single subtest, this is reflected in the results.

Overview of single AV-C performance scores

Vendor	File copying		Archiving / Unarchiving	Installing / Uninstalling Applications	Launching Applications		Downloading Files	Browsing Webites
	First Run	Subsequent Run			First Run	Subsequent Run
Avast
Bitdefender
CrowdStrike
Emsisoft
Endgame
eScan
ESET
FireEye
Fortinet
Kaspersky Lab
McAfee
Microsoft
Panda
Saint Security
Trend Micro
VIPRE

 

Key

Slow

Medicore

Fast

Very fast

 

PC Mark Tests

In order to provide an industry-recognized performance test, we used the PC Mark 10 Professional Edition testing suite. Users using PC Mark 10 benchmark should take care to minimize all external factors that could affect the testing suite, and strictly follow at least the suggestions documented inside the PC Mark manual, to get consistent and valid/useful results. Furthermore, the tests should be repeated several times to verify them. For more information about the various consumer scenarios tests included in PC Mark, please read the whitepaper on their website.

“No security software” is tested on a baseline vsystem without any security software installed, which scores 100 points in the PC Mark 10 benchmark.

Baseline system: Intel Core i3-4005U machine with 4GB RAM and HDD drive

Summarized results

Users should weight the various subtests according to their needs. We applied a scoring system to sum up the various results. Please note that for the File Copying and Launching Applications subtests, we noted separately the results for the first run and for subsequent runs. For the AV-C score, we took the rounded mean values of first and subsequent runs for File Copying, whilst for Launching Applications we considered only the subsequent runs. “Very fast” gets 15 points, “fast” gets 10 points, “mediocre” gets 5 points and “slow” gets 0 points.This leads to the following results: 

		AVC Score	PC Mark Score	Impact Score
1.	ESET	85	98.9	6.1
2.	Avast	85	98.7	6.3
3.	Bitdefender	85	98.6	6.4
4.	Kaspersky	85	98.2	6.8
5.	McAfee	85	97.9	7.1
6.	CrowdStrike	85	96.8	8.2
7.	eScan	85	95.2	9.8
8.	Emsisoft	80	98.0	12.0
9.	VIPRE	75	98.5	16.5
10.	Panda	75	98.0	17.0
11.	Saint Security	78	93.8	18.2
12.	Endgame	75	95.2	19.8
13.	Fortinet	65	97.9	27.1
14.	Microsoft	65	96.3	28.7
15.	Trend Micro	60	93.3	36.7
16.	FireEye	40	92.3	57.7

Copyright and Disclaimer

This publication is Copyright © 2018 by AV-Comparatives ®. Any use of the results, etc. in whole or in part, is ONLY permitted after the explicit written agreement of the management board of AV-Comparatives prior to any publication. AV-Comparatives and its testers cannot be held liable for any damage or loss, which might occur as result of, or in connection with, the use of the information provided in this paper. We take every possible care to ensure the correctness of the basic data, but a liability for the correctness of the test results cannot be taken by any representative of AV-Comparatives. We do not give any guarantee of the correctness, completeness, or suitability for a specific purpose of any of the information/content provided at any given time. No one else involved in creating, producing or delivering test results shall be liable for any indirect, special or consequential damage, or loss of profits, arising out of, or related to, the use or inability to use, the services provided by the website, test documents or any related data.

For more information about AV-Comparatives and the testing methodologies, please visit our website.

AV-Comparatives
(July 2018)