Ashampoo Anti-Virus is a full-featured antivirus tool which uses engines from Bitdefender and Emsisoft to keep your PC safe from harm.

There's no shortage of functionality here. Real-time protection detects and blocks malware as it arrives; behavioural monitoring uncovers even brand new threats, and browsing protection stops you accessing malicious websites. You can get involved and run scans whenever and wherever you like, but the program is also smart enough to handle most decisions on its own. And if you're running some full-screen application then the Ashampoo Anti-Virus Game Mode means you need never see any alerts at all.

You also get plenty of bonus features. File Wiper is a capable tool for securely wiping files, folders, drive free space and more; Startup Tuner displays your startup programs, IE plugins and more, and helps you remove any you don't need; ADS Scanner checks NTFS drives for suspect alternate data streams; LSP Viewer displays Winsock layers, though can't remove them; Internet Cleaner wipes your web histories in various browsers (IE, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, Safari); and Hosts File Checker works just as you'd expect, scanning your HOSTS file for the signs of malware, and restoring the default HOSTS file if necessary.

All of this is presented in a clean and straightforward interface. Large buttons give easy access to the main Ashampoo Anti-Virus features, and you can be launching a scan, or running one of the many bonus utilities in a couple of clicks.

Performance didn't seem exceptional, at least on our very first tests. Even the Quick Scan seemed to take a while, and there were a few false positives.

Still, these are early days, and it's no surprise that some tuning might be required. Any issues seem minimal, though, and on balance Ashampoo Anti-Virus 2014 seems to already be a very capable tool.