Not happy with Online Armor

[Noob]

As many others have said, it's not OA fault, in fact it's what it was designed to do, detect changes in the system.
You should have set it to install mode before installing a piece of software.

Remember OA is not a regular FW it's a FW + Classical HIPS.

[lordraiden]

Originally Posted by Albinoni

Lat year I decided to renew my Online Armor subscription for another 1 year and to say the least I am not at all happy with this FW at all, infact its one of the worse FW's I have ever used in my entire life and to me it seems the previous verison or when I tried it the first time going back 2 years ago it was not a bad program at all.

What annoys me the most about this program is when ever I install a software the numerous amount of times it pops up asking me eg to Block/Remember etc, this is that small box hat pops up and asks if I want to block or remember, install, run safer etc etc and this tends to get very annoying half the time.

3 weeks ago I bought MS Office and installed it and on a serious note it took me almost 45 mins prob more to install it, was very annoying indeed. Online Armor simply kept popping up every 5 secs asking me if I want to Remember or Block this and that and the list goes on and on, seriously I should of becomed my own firewall if Online Armor cannot think for itself and needs the user to do the thinking for it.

Anyhow once my expiry is up I wont be returning to OA unless OA can prove itself to be good. Infact I am on the verge to uninstall it soon and go for another good or free FW that does the job just as good.

Any reccomendations

Try Comodo Internet Security (free), you can always not install the AV and keep the HIPS+Sandbox+Fw+CloudAV, although you can deactivate the sandbox and will work like OA (HIPS+FIREWALL)

http://www.comodo.com/home/internet-...t-security.php
http://www.techsupportalert.com/cont...o-firewall.htm

[markcc]

Originally Posted by zip

I'm now running OA Free, emisoft has worked the bugs out of OA Free.

I don't miss ZA. OA Free works great.

I liked Outpost Free, but it's full of bugs.

From what I hear, Agnitum isn't interested in fixing the bugs in Outpost Free.

Maybe they are spending most of their time on the paid version. That is how they pay the bills.

[zip]

Originally Posted by paniccom

How are your I/O Read Bytes, zip? (See my post #20 above). I agree OA Free works great, I just never saw such high numbers (later on went to 18 billion+ before I restarted again.)

I use 7 64bit. Things are likely to be different from your XP.

It would be best to compare your XP results to another persons XP with OA Free.

[Escalader]

Originally Posted by zip

I'm now running OA Free, emisoft has worked the bugs out of OA Free.

I don't miss ZA. OA Free works great.

I liked Outpost Free, but it's full of bugs.

From what I hear, Agnitum isn't interested in fixing the bugs in Outpost Free.

The support forum for questions and answers about OP free is at this site:

http://www.outpostfirewall.com/forum...roubleshooting


One moderator recommends the suite so for 64 bit you would need

http://free.agnitum.com/


As it has an AV you would need to remove your current AV.

Otherwise just use the OP FW.

[zip]

Originally Posted by Escalader

The support forum for questions and answers about OP free is at this site:

http://www.outpostfirewall.com/forum...roubleshooting


One moderator recommends the suite so for 64 bit you would need

http://free.agnitum.com/


As it has an AV you would need to remove your current AV.

Otherwise just use the OP FW.

I joined op forums when I started using op fw. I gave up on op because of the bugs.

P.S. You don't need to remove your av, op will exclude it.

[Escalader]

Originally Posted by zip

I joined op forums when I started using op fw. I gave up on op because of the bugs.

P.S. You don't need to remove your av, op will exclude it.

Interesting. Do you mean the OP suite with it's own AV will deactivate/not install their AV in favour of what the user (me) has installed already?
I do know that when OP finds Nod32 it turns off certain OP features that they know or think they know clash with Nod.

My OP tilt would be to use their OP FW alone and install my own AV. I really don't want vendors deciding these things by default.

[IvoShoen]

I would recommend Private Firewall.

[zip]

Originally Posted by Escalader

Interesting. Do you mean the OP suite with it's own AV will deactivate/not install their AV in favour of what the user (me) has installed already?
I do know that when OP finds Nod32 it turns off certain OP features that they know or think they know clash with Nod.

My OP tilt would be to use their OP FW alone and install my own AV. I really don't want vendors deciding these things by default.

You can use any av that you want with Outpost Free Security Suite.

It has been a while, I don't remember how it's done.

I did try avast! and MSE with OSS, but not at the same time.

[travelerRoute80]

Try Comodo Internet Security (free), you can always not install the AV and keep the HIPS+Sandbox+Fw+CloudAV, although you can deactivate the sandbox and will work like OA (HIPS+FIREWALL)

Every time I fired up the Microsoft word defense + annoys the daylight out of me especially create a PDF file.

[worm]

hello!
The problem with action center and EAM + OA i think solved with this:
1. install EAM
2. install OA and before restarting add EAM program files to the exclusions list of OA.
3. Restart. Action center will show now correct information about security in your system!

[twl845]

Originally Posted by Albinoni

Lat year I decided to renew my Online Armor subscription for another 1 year and to say the least I am not at all happy with this FW at all, infact its one of the worse FW's I have ever used in my entire life and to me it seems the previous verison or when I tried it the first time going back 2 years ago it was not a bad program at all.

What annoys me the most about this program is when ever I install a software the numerous amount of times it pops up asking me eg to Block/Remember etc, this is that small box hat pops up and asks if I want to block or remember, install, run safer etc etc and this tends to get very annoying half the time.

3 weeks ago I bought MS Office and installed it and on a serious note it took me almost 45 mins prob more to install it, was very annoying indeed. Online Armor simply kept popping up every 5 secs asking me if I want to Remember or Block this and that and the list goes on and on, seriously I should of becomed my own firewall if Online Armor cannot think for itself and needs the user to do the thinking for it.

Anyhow once my expiry is up I wont be returning to OA unless OA can prove itself to be good. Infact I am on the verge to uninstall it soon and go for another good or free FW that does the job just as good.

Any reccomendations

I used it for a few years before it got sold by it's owner in Australia, and your problem wasn't mine. The problem then was buggy upgrades. If you would like to change to a firewall with a good learning mode, I use Agnitum's Outpost Firewall Pro.

[Baserk]

Originally Posted by Albinoni

Online Armor...its one of the worse FW's I have ever used in my entire life...
the numerous amount of times it pops up asking me eg to Block/Remember etc, this is that small box hat pops up and asks if I want to block or remember, install, run safer etc etc and this tends to get very annoying half the time...
it took me almost 45 mins prob more to install it, was very annoying indeed. Online Armor simply kept popping up every 5 secs asking me if I want to Remember or Block this and that and the list goes on and on, seriously I should of becomed my own firewall if Online Armor cannot think for itself and needs the user to do the thinking for it.

Any reccomendations

Reading the online manual/instructions for some 10-15 minutes, would have saved you tons of wasted hours, frustration and fits.
What you describe, is using OA as a classic HIPS. OA offers an install mode and 'run-as-installer' and checks for known safe programs (among much more options).
10 minutes of reading would have made all the difference.
I'm not sure if recommendations like alternative Comodo/CIS will do you much good, set it to 'Paranoid' like with OA usage and you end up with the same barrage of request popups.
The same goes for PrivateFirewall. It can also offer proper security+decent user experience but also requires some minutes of reading.

[zip]

IMO, OA Free is the best fw.

Comodo is hands down the worst fw ever!!!

[AaLF]

Been there done that. You get addicted with all the hype.

My life is now smoooooooooooth and trouble free. I am now happily joined at the hip with LooknStop, Emsisoft & Sandboxie.

[Mongol]

Originally Posted by AaLF

Been there done that. You get addicted with all the hype.

My life is now smoooooooooooth and trouble free. I am now happily joined at the hip with LooknStop, Emsisoft & Sandboxie.

Look N Stop

[mattbiernat]

yeah I have to say that I've noticed OA not only does slow things a lot but also affects some installations. the other day I was trying to install Cameyo, which is basically an installation capturing and virtualization program. i've selected Install mode with OA and I still had problems. i had to actually disconnect myself from the internet, shut down OA and then install the software. other than installation OA has been quite good compatibility wise with everything else. maybe if I had more powerful laptop I would have kept it on.

[AMIGA500]

Originally Posted by lordraiden

Try Comodo Internet Security (free), you can always not install the AV and keep the HIPS+Sandbox+Fw+CloudAV, although you can deactivate the sandbox and will work like OA (HIPS+FIREWALL)

http://www.comodo.com/home/internet-...t-security.php
http://www.techsupportalert.com/cont...o-firewall.htm

actually i would recommend using the comodo anti virus as well.i know it hasnt been tested properly but ive always found it light and highly effective,
But the comodo firewall is having problems with running alongside avast at the moment and hopefully version 6 will have corrected the problem.

[AMIGA500]

Originally Posted by mattbiernat

yeah I have to say that I've noticed OA not only does slow things a lot but also affects some installations. the other day I was trying to install Cameyo, which is basically an installation capturing and virtualization program. i've selected Install mode with OA and I still had problems. i had to actually disconnect myself from the internet, shut down OA and then install the software. other than installation OA has been quite good compatibility wise with everything else. maybe if I had more powerful laptop I would have kept it on.

you have hit the nail on the head when you say you should have a more powerful laptop.
Often people complain of certain software slowing down a system when in reality it is the very aforesaid system which is at fault and not the software.
Ive used OA myself and it is an excellent program and never slowed the sytem down.

[mattbiernat]

Originally Posted by Beethoven1770

you have hit the nail on the head when you say you should have a more powerful laptop.
Often people complain of certain software slowing down a system when in reality it is the very aforesaid system which is at fault and not the software.
Ive used OA myself and it is an excellent program and never slowed the sytem down.

True, but this is a new laptop that I just got 1 months ago and OA shouldn't be that heavy. There are other FWs like Outpost or Private FW which don't slow downs PCs. So obviously this is 100% OAs fault for making their program so heavy on resources.

[gugarci]

Originally Posted by Barthez

Learning Mode can be enabled by pressing CTRL+ALT+L or by choosing appropriate option from OA tray menu:
http://www.emsisoft.com/en/info/oa/LrnMode.shtml

Also, as others said, selecting Installer mode when installing could reduce number of pop-ups.

What is the installer mode? I used Online Armor Premium and I set to Learning Mode when installing MS updates or installing new trusted programs, or when I update programs and plug-ins.

[zip]

OA Free is light as a feather on my $300 laptop (after rebate).

[zip]

The only thing I'm not happy about OA Free is that it's not 64bit.

MSE is 64bit and it's slick. Just imagine MSE teamed with 64bit OA Free!

Yes, I know there are many that want to live in the stone age.

[Barthez]

Originally Posted by mattbiernat

I have to say that I've noticed OA not only does slow things a lot but also affects some installations. the other day I was trying to install Cameyo, which is basically an installation capturing and virtualization program. i've selected Install mode with OA and I still had problems

Did you considerer registering at Emsisoft forums? You could get some help, or at least inform them about issues you have.

Originally Posted by gugarci

What is the installer mode?

When I said Installer mode I meant Install mode. Sorry
Install Mode is a option that you can check on pop-up or later from Advanced options menu of a given file from Programs Tab.

Quoting Online Armor Help:

Install mode – Selecting this option will indicate that this is an install/setup file. Installers run many programs and perform many actions that may raise pop-ups from Online Armor. Using this option will automatically allow Unknown programs that the installer runs, reducing or eliminating those pop-ups.

Originally Posted by zip

The only thing I'm not happy about OA Free is that it's not 64bit.

Maybe it's time to move to Windows 7 then ? OA runs on 64bit there.


Also, I would like to apologize for late replay, but I was unable to do it earlier.

[zip]

Originally Posted by Barthez

Maybe it's time to move to Windows 7 then ? OA runs on 64bit there.

I have 7 64bit. They don't make a 64bit for OA.

They do make a 32bit that runs on 64bit systems.

If you check my sig. you will see that I'm running OA.