These are our main tests released every three months. They are usually split into "on demand" and "retrospective/proactive" detection rate tests. Malware detection rate is still one of the most important and reliable factors in determining the effectiveness of an anti-virus engine which works without asking for user interaction, decision or opinion. The February and August tests show the detection rates of products over an actual and full malware test set from the previous months. The May and November retrospective tests evaluate the same products against new and unknown malware to measure the proactive detection capabilities (e.g. through heuristics, generic signatures, etc.). Both tests also take into consideration the false positive rate.
DavidR you hit the nail on the head. My AIS subscription runs until 2/14/12. So I’m wondering if they will do anything till June or July. And the Feb. tests are already out.