Lightest outbound control application out there?

Hi
I would like to know what's the lightest (and stable) application to control any program from accessing the network around? I'm currently using a linksys wrt54gl with dd-wrt as a firewall/router so a software firewall is probably a bit redundant for my needs.
Hence my main concern is the outbound control.

My computer is a medium-low end one, and lightness on resources is a priority for my needs.

So far i've tried look'n'stop, zonealarm and sygate. Looknstop seems like the lightest but it continuously accesses the disk/registry for some reason (used process monitor to check the activity)

Any suggesstions? thanks in advance.

 

I have never tried it, but AppDefend from Ghost Security is small in size and I think it is resource friendly. A few of the posters here have used it.
Kerio 2.1.5 is considered a very light firewall, but requires a lot of rules making in order to be effective. http://www.oldversion.com/download.php?idlong=f27b19d7af2c6bc6cdaf9597874ad8ca

BTW, welcome.

 

Is teh continuous disk/registry access by LnS a problem?

Anyways, AppDefend can do what you want.

 

Thanks for the input.
as far as i can remember, looknstop's activity was barely noticeable in real world useage, but still the registry activity never ceased, and there were some spikes in the disk monitor once in awhile (i tested all of this in an idle computer state)

I used to use Kerio 2.1.5, but i dumped it because it provoked BSOD's while using it with another program (don't remember wich one trough)

Right now i'm using comodo firewall, not for long because it's pretty heavy on the resources trough.

 

You could try Jetico. When I used version 1 it felt very light on resources.

Another light firewall favourite is the classic Sygate firewall. I have it on one of my low-end pcs and its a beautiful piece of software esp if you have the pro version. Features like "Stealth Browsing" really make your day!

 

Have you tried the Comodo 3.0 beta? It is supposed to be much lighter than Comodo 2.4. Also, as demenace suggested Jetico is very light on resources. There are lots of pop-ups but after a week or so they will settle down.

I am not sure how heavy some of the other HIPS are but DSA runs about 16 MB of RAM.

 

If you're really worried about outbound traffic, any of the HIPS apps will do fine I think, SSM, ProSecurity, DSA, AppDefend, there are others I'm sure, but they all will catch something phoning out if that's what you want. They are usually fairly light too, lighter than an actual software firewall..

 

Appdefend and prosecurity both have free versions which can control outbound connections and both are light on resources. You can also configure both to only monitor outbound connections if you want to keep things simple and reduce pop ups.

 

Thanks for all the responses

I've extensively tested the applications listed: while free, Sygate actually uses more resources than look'n'stop.. i've tried jetico in the past and i has some stability problems with it so i'm skipping it for now.. i've not installed Appdefend and Comodo 3.0 beta, sorry. Stability and reliability are very important to me so i prefer not to use Beta software.
Of all the HIPS listed, the sleekest is by far DSA. System Safety has too much options i don't use and it doesnt even have outbound control on the free version and Prosecurity slowed the system down (also locked me out of my system after the first reboot but solved that later)

I'm using DSA right now. The feature i was looking for is the "application security" module, but im having some problems with it: as far as i see that module controls both network AND windows API access. it also has only an "allow" and "quarantine" tab.
So let's say i want an application to use the windows api to display the interface or whatever, but i don't want it to call home - It seems not possible because once i permit to use the api it automatically has permission to access the network also.. Does anybody know if there's a way to handle this issue? for now only that module is active by the way..

Any other suggestions are appreciated. Thanks.

 

x-Wall from Sphinx seemed to be an outbound control only application, and very lightweight. I'm not sure if it's still available in that version, or how newer versions compare.

You could take a look here:
http://www.sphinx-soft.com/

Their website was always written poorly and didn't make much sense.

 

You could also try PC Tools Personal Firewall Plus and disable all its inbound rules. It offers pretty decent outbound firewall control.

 

I've been looking for outbound only control too (also behind a nat/firewall and ghostwall for software fw, with PG) could I run Appdefend/Prosecurity free alongside PG/ghostwall lightly?

 

You could replace processguard with either appdefend or prosecurity, both can do what PG does and more.

On my ultra light setup i only run appdefend combined with my hardware fw.

 

Maybe that is why it is called Sphinx firewall (in other words, it is all a mystery)?