My suggestion is to do the research. Here are some independent security organizations that both manufacturers and publications, such as PC Mag has referenced in evaluations of AV software.
The following is the most recent test data for Real-World Malware Protection using Windows 7.
From
AV-TEST.org:
From
AV-Comparatives.com:
From AV-Comparatives data, Vipre apparently wasn't much better in real-world protection than the free out of the box solutions from Microsoft. Rating second to the bottom, scoring only higher than Lavasoft.