Yes, AVG is still FREE!
June 2, 2008
This is not the first time I’ve said those words. As a matter of fact, I can’t even count the number of times I’ve said those words…but still people keep coming to me wanting to know why they have to pay for AVG.
First of all, AVG Anti-Virus by Grisoft is an excellent product and worth the $34.99 it costs, especially if it keeps your computer virus free. If you’ve ever been infected, you know that it probably costs a lot more than $34.99 to get your computer back in working condition and you may lose some very important data in the process that’s gone forever. I also know that if you’ve been using AVG Free for a long time and it’s been doing the job for you, then why should you pay for it? I could give you all kinds of reasons to upgrade, not the least of which is that people who pay for AVG Anti-Virus are the ones who make it possible for the free version to exist, but free is free and if that’s what you want, then I’m here to tell you how to continue to get it.
If you’ve been using AVG since at least version 6.0, then you recognized the pop-up reminder that your current version of AVG was about to expire and you needed to update to the latest version. That window even has a convenient link to the upgrade page. If you didn’t start using AVG until version 7.0, you don’t recall how the link led you NOT to an upgrade of the FREE version, but to the latest PAID version. This is the part where you have to pay attention! My personal recommendation is that you close the upgrade window and go directly to the AVG Free Anti-Virus site at http://free.grisoft.com.
Once you’ve arrived at the AVG Free Anti-Virus site, you have a choice between getting the free basic version and the complete internet security version:
Click the “Get it Now” button at the bottom of the basic version description. The next page you see will be a comparison of the three different versions: AVG Anti-Virus Free, AVG Anti-Virus, and AVG Internet Security. Do yourself a favor and read the comparison chart. You might actually discover that one of the paid versions fits your needs better than the free version.
If you still want the free version, click the TEXT link at the bottom of the AVG Anti-Virus Free column (you’ll have to scroll down) that says “Continue to AVG free download” and get ready for yet another page that lists the limitations of the free version. Under licensing, click the “Continue to AVG free download” button on the right of the screen (This time, the text link takes you to the purchase page for AVG Internet Security).
FINALLY, you have arrived at the download page for the free version of AVG 8.0. You can choose to download AVG free from Download.com by clicking on the button to “Download AVG Free 8.0″ or you can choose to download right from the AVG servers from the text link below. WARNING! I downloaded the latest free version for my mom’s computer last week from the text link and it took an extremely long time for the software to download. I’m assuming that the AVG servers were being hammered by folks trying to get the download before their current version expired. As a matter of fact, I tried it today (June 2) and wasn’t able to access the AVG servers at all, so I recommend that you use the button link to Download.com. Once you arrive at the Download.com page, you have finally arrived at the page where you can download the latest version.
Now, after having said all that, you could always just go to Download.com in the first place, type “avg free” into the search box at the top of the page, and go directly to the download…
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