I initially only installed “Comodo Firewall” but for some reason they also installed a “Comodo Dragon Browser”, which I did not consent to. I always choose the “advanced” installation to uncheck bloatware, but in this case there was none and when you try to uninstall the browser, they force you to participate in their survey otherwise you won’t be able to uninstall the software…
It’s better than most, if not all free options, as long as it stays online, which it doesn’t really require much data and it’s updates are separate from windows updates so you can let defender do its thing while limiting/blocking windows updates.
The online thing is what my issue is. Plus I take my security seriously so I have no issue paying for ESET. I don’t trust any free anti virus.
If you have serious security needs, yeah paying for a proper one makes sense, I’m not denying that. Just for the 99% of people who don’t need beefy security, defender is better than everything else free, and you were already giving your data to microsoft anyway so you might as well get some benefit from it. Defender is actually quite effective, and it has been since W10 at least.