Which software firewall for XP/Vista?

esuhl

aliEnRIK wrote: »

May I ask what problems you had with both Comodo and Zonealarm?

ZoneAlarm (which, to be fair, I last used about 3 years ago) caused problems with a particular application and blocked it from the network even when I disabled it! It had to be completely uninstalled before the application would work. I'd also heard of a number of other users who had conflicts with other software. It was a while ago, so I've forgotten most of the details, and it's quite likely that the latest version of ZoneAlarm isn't affected by these problems.

Comodo, when it works, is brilliant. It's just that I didn't find it anything like as easy to configure as ZoneAlarm, and it works on the crazy assumption that any malware on your PC when Comodo is installed should be whitelisted. There's a discussion about this here: https://forums.comodo.com/leak_testingattacksvulnerability_research/v3_doesnt_pass_grc_leaktest_merged_threads-t5795.60.html

D'oh! I've just realised that I forgot to put an "Other" option in the poll above... I guess I can't change it now, though...

aliEnRIK

Sunbelt

espresso wrote: »

No Zone Alarm will turn it off when installed.

I just said that

Or did you mean it WONT turn off windows firewall?

basmic

Comodo v3 (with Defense+)

I would advise using Comodo v3, but with Defense+ turned OFF.

It's what I use, and it seems good enough to me.

aliEnRIK

Sunbelt

basmic wrote: »

I would advise using Comodo v3, but with Defense+ turned OFF.

It's what I use, and it seems good enough to me.

id have voted for that also (I used it with defense ON most of the time mind) except it wont let lexmark printers work

espresso

aliEnRIK wrote: »

I just said that

But you didn't say that!

colin13 wrote: »

do i just turn off windows firwall

aliEnRIK wrote: »

It will turn itself off when you install

Or did you mean it WONT turn off windows firewall?

The windows firewall doesn't turn itself off, ZA turns it off during installation.

aliEnRIK

Sunbelt

espresso wrote: »

The windows firewall doesn't turn itself off, ZA turns it off during installation.

Pedantic much?.............

espresso

aliEnRIK wrote: »

Pedantic much?.............

Factual though!

:rolleyes:

Conor_3

Windows built-in firewall

Windows Firewall if you're on ADSL/Cable and using a router.

Absolutely completely and utterly pointless putting a third party firewall on as Windows Firewall and the NAT on the router prevents inbound connections.

Users on the whole are pretty much completely stupid so will click allow or yes on a firewall prompt for an outbound connection because they have no clue what is wanting to talk to the internet and they got sick of clicking allow every time they fired up their browser. So the whole point of a third party firewall is usually completely negated by the stupidity of the person at the keyboard.

awacko

I'm still pretty new to all this so I am getting a bit lost . I've got Windows Vista operating system, I've AVG (and Mcafee which I've just been told to remove) and also use Windows Defender. I access via a modem on a phone line. Am I right in saying that this is not enough and if so which is the best free option for my set-up - please try and keep it as simple as you can as I find it all a bit confusing to be honest but don't want to have problems later. Thanks

esuhl

Conor wrote: »

Absolutely completely and utterly pointless putting a third party firewall on as Windows Firewall and the NAT on the router prevents inbound connections.

I have a hardware firewall, but really don't like the idea of applictions having carte blanch to establish outbound connections. (Yes I wear a tin foil hat too - you can't be too careful!)

It's a good point that most (i.e. non-technical) users would be sufficiently protected by a hardware firewall, though. I guess there isn't much to worry about, assuming they keep their other security software updated and aren't trying to install every free program the web has to offer...