A Drawback to Bundles

In the main article, I look at three standalone antispyware products targeted at midsized-to-large businesses. Many other vendors bundle antispyware with other features in a single product. For example, in addition to spyware detection capabilities, LANDesk Security Suite includes tools to prevent unprotected computers from connecting to your network, vulnerability scanning and analysis capabilities, and robust patch management features. Top-rated F-Secure Anti-Virus Client Security bundles a client firewall, antivirus software, and intrusion detection features with antispyware to provide comprehensive protection.

One common drawback to bundles, however, is that you often can't pick and choose among the bundled features. For example, if you've already deployed a standalone antivirus solution from one vendor, you might not be able to use only the antispyware feature in another vendor's bundled antivirus-antispyware client unless you uninstall your existing antivirus product.