You could think that ClamXav sports a clean interface, but unfortunately there’s not much more to see.
ClamXav is a graphic user interface for OS X based on Clam, a popular and powerful open-source and cross-platform antivirus. Until a few months ago you could download it for free, but now you have to buy it from the developer’ site.
ClamXav also installs a Service that lets you scan a file or folder at any time. Simply right click on the file or folder you want to scan, pull down to Services, and choose Scan with ClamXav.The application will run and show you the results of the scan. ClamAV antivirus was initially designed as an email scanning gateway for Unix, but has since evolved into a robust free security solution for cross-platform devices like Windows and Mac. To this day, it remains one of the best antiviruses for Linux systems. By default, this tool doesn’t come prepackaged within the CentOS/RHEL repository. If your computer still has Mac OS X 10.6.8 to 10.9.5, you can use ClamXAV 2. Step 1 Find ClamXAV3.1.28690Installer.pkg in your Downloads Folder and double click it and follow the on-screen prompts to perform the installation. When asked for your admin name and password, these are the ones you use to log into your computer.
ClamXav has two main features: a thorough scan of your hard disk, and a real-time warden called CalmXav Sentry. Unfortunately, the antivirus and Sentry don’t talk one another, so if Sentry catches up any unusual activity from a file on your HD, you have to launch a full scan before you can point out the malicious file, which is disheartening. Furthermore, there’s no obvious method to eliminate any threat: ClamXav trusts you to use the contextual menu. The software doesn’t offer any firewall feature either.
A nice touch is that you can use whatever antivirus engine you like, you just have to tell ClamXav to use it. Although it’s a classy move from its developer, we don’t think a typical user can take advantage of this feature.
Clamav Permission Denied
If you have any previous version, when ClamXav was free, you can still use it (for its database will be updated anyway), but if you’re in the market for an antivirus for your Mac, you’d better keep searching.
Conclusion
Although ClamXav is a popular solution, it can’t compete with other free options.
ACCU-RATE:| Usability: 6/10 | Speed: 6/10 | Features: 6/10 | Support: 7/10 | Pricing: 6/10 |
ClamXav can be downloaded directly or through the Mac App Store. The Mac App Store version does not contain the Sentry tool that allows constant scanning for changes by folder, so this tutorial is for the download version which you can get at http://www.clamxav.com/.
Note: ClamXav used to be free but as of June 2015 is a commercial product. I think it’s well worth the $30 and by paying for it I’m helping to ensure the development of the product continues.
How Good Is Clamav
After installation, log out of your Mac and back in.
Starting
When you first launch ClamXav it’s a good idea to update the Virus Definitions. Next let’s set some preferences.
General Preferences
- You can set these as you desire, especially the audible alerts
- Believe it or not, UNcheck scanning your email for malware. Your spam filter will catch most of this and put it in a spam bucket but ClamXav will stil find it and give you CONSTANT popups about it. I also don’t update virus definitions on launch because we’ll put it on a schedule in a later step. I DO however allow the application to check for updates on launch like any other program. It might seem odd also to UNcheck update virus definitions on launch, but we’re going to do that on a schedule instead in a later step.
- Click on the Sentry tab next.
Sentry
Sentry keeps an eye on any folder you choose. We’re going to set it to watch your Downloads folder, because that’s where new stuff shows up that we want scanned. This is the feature you only get if you buy directly from ClamXav.com and is not available in the Mac App Store version.
Drag Home Folder Into the Window
Drag your Downloads folder into the window. Alternatively you can push the plus button and navigate to your Downloads folder.
Your Downloads Folder Will Now be Monitored
- Verify – you should see simply ~/Downloads in the folders being watched.
- Click on the Schedule tab next.
Schedule
It’s a good idea to allow virus definitions to be updated daily so set the pulldown to a time you’re sure your machine will be on. Now simply let ClamXav run and hope you never hear back from it!
Run a Full Scan
Clamav Windows Download
Run a full scan of your home folder. This took about 3 hours for my very large home folder. It found 450 .emix files, where are all Mail files that are probably in my spam and junk mail folders. Once the scan is done, you can right click on the files and show where they are in the finder, or you can simply choose delete from that menu, or select them all and hit command-delete.
Now that your machine is clean, you can rely on Sentry to watch for changes and to scan only those changes.
Scan On Demand
Clamav Mac Download
ClamXav also installs a Service that lets you scan a file or folder at any time. Simply right click on the file or folder you want to scan, pull down to Services, and choose Scan with ClamXav. The application will run and show you the results of the scan.
Clamav Windows
Log out and back into your account for the contextual menus to be available under Services.