Delivering you with an idea of what is the worst anti-virus solution for Windows Vista is a tad of an unorthodox approach, I'll give you that much. Generally speaking, the rankings are constructed the other way around, outlining the best solutions to offer you protection. Well, this article will present you with an alternative view. But the term alternative does not invalidate the perspective. Just think about it, you will know what security product to avoid next time you are out shopping for Windows Vista protection.

Well, without further ado... the absolute worst anti-virus for Windows Vista is Microsoft's own Windows Live OneCare. Launched at the end of January 2007, concomitantly with the release of Vista, OneCare has delivered nothing short of a disappointing performance. In the past, it has managed to miss malware samples during the VB100 tests for Vista and to score one of the lowest possible scores in a top compiled by AV-Comparatives.

Microsoft has taken note of OneCare's failures, but as a newcomer to the security industry, the company can afford to grow. Still, Microsoft has emphasized that OneCare is certified by both the International Computer Security Association (ICSA) Labs and West Coast Labs, two independent certification authorities for security products. But neither ICSA nor WCL certification can do anything to help boost OneCare's performances.

According to AV-Test.org, an independent testing group at the Otto-von-Guericke-University (Magdeburg, Germany), Windows Live OneCare did not come in dead last from a platoon of 29 anti-malware solutions in general, but as far as Windows Vista support is concerned, OneCare is last and least.

"We tested all scanners against a set of malware, including 68,864 backdoors, 47,891 bots (zombies), 407,487 Trojan Horses as well as 82,659 worms, so the total number of malware we tested against was 606,901 files. The best product detected 99.83% of our collection while the worst one was only able to identify 62.12% of the samples. The average product detected 86.95% of the malware files used, with a median of 90.97%. For our testing, we only used current malware -- this means, malware which was not older than 12 months or which have been seen at least once during the last 12 months," revealed AV-Test via SunBelt.

AV-Test tested Windows Live OneCare and the Forefront Client Protection and gave Microsoft a total score of 80.56%. The security solutions provided by the Redmond Company detected only 488,942 instances of malicious code out of a total of 606,901.
OneCare was bested by #4 F-Secure 594,333 - 97.93%, #5 Symantec 593,355 - 97.77%, #6 Kaspersky 592,606 - 97.64%, #8 Avast! 584,574 - 96.32%, #9 AVG 583,541 - 96.15%, #11 BitDefender - 580,700 95.68%, #16 Nod32 536,043 - 88.32%, #17 McAfee 529,680 - 87.28%, and #21 Sophos 496,135 - 81.75%. But just take a look at the adjacent graphic to get an overall idea.