Exactly how does MSE perform alongside the other paid AV suites?

Question

Exactly how well does MSE perform alongside the other paid AV suites?

I've noticed that Norton and Kaspersky had jacked up their prices - previously I had purchased KIS 2010 3 years for ~$110, but now the prices have gone through the roof. I've tested out MSE on a laptop before removing Windows on it, but I'm planning to build a Windows-based desktop, so I would need to use MSE.

Answer 1

Purely anecdotal answer, but I've had trojans get through MSE that got stopped by McAfee. It's entirely possible that AVG or Avira (free solutions) would have stopped them as well, but MSE just doesn't cut it and I would never depend on it.

Answer 2

Pretty well from what I've seen, slightly slower with the real-time protection but still fast. You can see a bunch of AV comparisons on this site: AV Comparatives

EDIT:

Also just from looking at the tests I linked to it looks like KIS has no particular benifit over MSE, McAffe, or AVG.

Personally I user avast! and really like it, lots of options and is pretty good performance wise.