We’ll be blunt: when it comes to protecting your Mac from a virus, there is one name we trust, Intego. Why would we trust Intego over the industry heavyweights like Mcafee and Norton? Because we are talking about Macs and when it comes to Apple, Intego is simply the best. Intego only handles Apple products and therefore not only does the software function better, but it just makes more sense. Would you take your iMac to Best Buy or would you take it to the folks at the Genius Bar? We think the latter and if you need to find the best anti-virus (and everything else nasty for your computer) software, sit back and enjoy the ride.

A History of the Castle and the Moon

Intego was founded in 1997 out of Austin, TX. (Yay Texas) The idea: a company that creates products to help protect (only) your Mac. To this day, Intego is the only one dedicated to solely protecting Apple hardware and it pays off. Many know Intego because of the Mac Security Blog that Intego launched in 2007, which provides constant updates to the threats to Apple’s products.

What doesn’t X6 do?

Well, it doesn’t protect your PC, although Intego offers protection for your virtual PC. VirusBarrier X6 does offer antivirus, anti-spyware, two-way firewall and anti-phising – and oh yeah, the most comprehensive renditions of all those offerings you are going to find. Hidden within VirusBarrier is some of the best looking (and functioning) monitoring tools we have found.

Why Our Computer Looks Like a Submarine

The UI. It’s simply one of the cleanest looking apps we have seen. Cool icons and an easy to use interface make this one of our favorite apps, even if we still can’t find a virus. By far the coolest interface is the traffic monitoring tool which reminds us of our dreams of driving an F1 car. Despite the ultra cool UI, this is by far the least resource-hungry anti-virus tool on the market.

In Comparison to the Others

And that resource hungriness is only one of the reasons why we prefer Intego over the industry heavy-hitters. We mentioned before that they specialize in Apple and that extends all throughout the design and execution of the application. Intego was the first to allow scanning of the iPhone, iPod touch and the iPad. But being first isn’t the reason we prefer VirusBarrier X6. Ever used Mcafee or Norton? Not only is slow and resource hungry, but we are reminded too much of Windows. It’s clear that neither were designed for OS X and they function like it.

Why Do I Need This?

That’s the toughest question. Are there viruses for OS X? Essentially no. Could there be? That’s definitely not a “no.” It’s been rumored for a while, but the general belief at the beginning of every year is that OS X becomes less safe. Few in the tech industry refer to OS X as iron clad, but so far there haven’t been many capable of exposing its flaws. Still, Intego has been around for over a decade and it’s not because they were selling something people don’t need. If you work in an environment that features PCs, this is a probably a good thing to invest in. Some universities and corporate require all computers (Mac/PC) to have an anti-virus software. If you run Windows on your Mac, this is a logical investment. Our opinion on the state of viruses: they aren’t here yet – but it would be a shame when they do come because it’s going to happen. The timetable isn’t something we feel comfortable predicting, but we’re pretty confident it will happen.

In The End

There is no alternative as far as we are concerned. Intego is the name we trust and the only name we are willing to trust. That’s all. We didn’t have the opportunity to download a virus (we oddly couldn’t find one) – but we have no reason to believe that Intego is going to fail. We had X5 and were able to successfully test that version of VirusBarrier and it worked wonderfully. Each license of VirusBarrier runs on two Macs, Intego offers a more comprehensive Internet Security Barrier X6 which adds antispam, parental controls and back-up for $30 or $40 more. If you’d like the Dual Protect version of either it’s $10 more. Perhaps you should just click the link, but VirusBarrier X6 starts at $49.95 directly from Intego.