Deep Freeze, Shadow Defender

Someone please help if can.

What is the difference of Deep Freeze and Shadow Defender. I use Shadow Defender now and it is nice. Very effective.

Where can I get trial of Deep Freeze. Thank you.

 

About the differences between the two programs I hope that will tell you other members because I have only experience with Shadow Defender.

But here is the link where you can get a trial version of Deep Freeze:
http://www.faronics.com/de/DownloadEvaluationEditions.aspx

(They call it "Evaluation Editions" and as far as I have seen, you have to register on their site.)

 

I trialed Deep Freeze and Shadow defender and the differences i noted is:
Shadow defender can Protect more than one partition (Deep Freeze protect only the system partition).
I not remember if Deep freeze can commit files (through right-click) on the fly like Shadow defender.

 

The main differences are: with Shadow Defender you can start a session without reboot, you can commit (write to the real volume) files and folders, you can exclude files and folders (e.g. Antivirus update). DeepFreeze will soon have a dedicated Antivirus (it will update even in frozen mode), a separate unit though. SD and DF both protect multiple partitions or HDs.

If you test DF don't delete the installer as it is the only way to uninstall the program.

 

Hi s23:

I is my understanding that Deep Freeze has no means of committing files over reboot. Right click or file path.

respect, rat

 

Deep Freeze is really designed for always on use in keeping a machine state preserved. There's reasonable feature set overlap, but the target markets and goals are really rather different.

Deep Freeze: freeze a machine state to a defined point in time, recover that state on restart, targeted for institutional/enterprise use (has a centralized management console) although stand alone installations are supported, and there is a separate Data Igloo facility for retention of dynamic content on a frozen system. The thing to appreciate about Deep Freeze is that it defaults to (and is presumed to be) always on with the goal to always return to a predefined machine state. Entering/exiting frozen states via system restart. The focus is on freezing a system state.

Shadow Defender: a more flexible implementation of the same basic scheme. While it can be configured to start with Windows, that's probably not the way most folks use it. In fact, my own use of this type of application is default off (basically the opposite of Deep Freeze) with dynamic entry into a shadow session without a restart. Content can also be committed somewhat more readily. Doesn't have an enterprise level management utility, more targeted to standalone workstations. The focus is dynamic entry into a disposable "shadow" state, which is discarded on a restart.

Each product has their niche. A fair number of similarities. Both work well.

Blue

 

BlueZannetti:

Data Igloo is a download separate from Deep freeze.

Is there a way from within DeepFreeze to save files etc,over reboot?

Right click,file path,etc?

 

Hi ratwing,

I have never tested "Data Igloo" as I used to have a flash drive plugged in my notebook whilst in frozen mode just in case I wanted to save something (same thing can be achieved with another partition or HD as long as it isn't frozen).
A bit time consuming, but like Blue mentioned, the application is meant to operate in static institutional environments.

 

Hmmm,I've never heard of Data Igloo until now After I'm done messing around with Time Freeze,I might have to go back to my favorite Deep Freeze and give this Data Igloo a try

Nice find rat!

 

Thanks everyone. I tested Deep Freeze and it didn't seem to work well and does not have flexible like Shadow Defender. I will stay with Shadow Defender.

 

Well, sort of, in the sense that it's done on a drive basis. On installation, the boot drive is required to be frozen. You then select to freeze any other partition, or leave it in a thawed (i.e. changeable) state. What you can't do is dynamically decide to save files to a frozen partition, you need to thaw before entertaining any changes (restart to a thawed state, do the maintenance (get files and save them/etc.), restart to frozen.

The barriers that Deep Freeze puts in front of changes are basically by design. The objective of this product is to maintain a static machine state, which is in line with the target audience (institutions and businesses with public use PC's), but generally not the target of many home users.

Blue

 

Agree.

If you are the main user of your computer then Shadow Defender is better adapted to that usage.

If you have some careless or inexperienced users who have access to your computer then Deep Freeze (by design) will be much harder for them to kill off and thus open your computer's groin area to infection. In fact, it is well nigh impossible to get around DF and do any permanent damage to a DF-protected computer. That's why all of the DF usages known to me are located in kiosks, and in various classrooms, & in internet cafes.

 

Can Deep Freeze protect the BIOS from modify? How if I put virus on CD and boot from CD. Will Deep Freeze protect?

 

No.

Here's Faronics explicit statement and recommendation on the matter:

Blue

 

Blue, does shadowdefender protect cmos?

 

Exactly how should it protect CMOS when there's no OS running at that time?

Even if it could, see, this is absolutely pointless excercise... How'd you like to protect CMOS against physical access? Pull out the battery, wait a minute, password gone. Pull out the HDD, put it into another computer, all data yours unless encrypted. Take the whole computer away, all data yours again unless encrypted.

 

Because Deep Freeze isn't about protecting the security of data from theft of the hard drive and such. It's about preserving your system as a snapshot in time, a 'perfect' or 'frozen' state. Surfing and pick-up a drive-by? Just reboot and it's gone. The CMOS protection talked about by Faronics (Deep Freeze) is to protect from casual users who would do damage to your physical PC. But physical security is important to the point that if the computer is ever left to be tampered with - game over - Deep Freeze or not.

 

Thanks LockBox.

Thanks to you and others,I understand now the niche of virtualization carved out for DeepFreeze.

Not nessasarily what I want or need,but admirably tailored for those who want or need its features.

respect,
rat.

 

I tend to think of the situation along two distinct dimensions:

• System availability/uptime:
  • Avenues to compromise uptime include hardware failure (generally HDD), OS/program corruption via malicious or conflicting software,
  • Possible solutions include virtualization, backup (always needed for hardware failure), various software lockdown schemes, system recovery options (e.g. FD-ISR, etc.). This is where Deep Freeze/Shadow Defender tend to reside by enforcing various levels of system state locking.
• System data integrity:
  • This is more about keeping your data private than anything else and could cover anything from specific static information on a PC (financial/credit records, correspondance, etc.) to information that is generally considered transient (surfing, temp files, etc.)
  • Products like Deep Freeze/ShadowDefender tend to assure that transient information is transient. They achieve this goal to various levels.
  • These products do not maintain privacy to the extent that they protect static data on a system. They're not designed towards that end. There are a number of ways to accomplish this latter goal spanning rather sensitive triggers in a firewall to access control to file/folder encryption.

Blue

 

Thanks you. I stay with Shadow Defender! Work perfection.
I am learning Sandboxie now. Learn from ssj forum. Very good program also. Any combine with Shadow Defender here?

 

Shadow Defender and Sandboxie work just fine together, I don't know if that much protection is needed but read my sig.

Acadia