Sygate or ZoneAlarm?

I have beein using Sygate free for a long time, (the first firewall I ever tried was ZoneAlarm, I didn't like the version I tried, though, I cannot remember which version it was.) - However, I noticed Sygate takes between 8.5MB's RAM to 9MB's of RAM or so on my system (Win2k Pro, SP4), I installed the latest version of ZoneAlarm on my other Computers, and there are 2 ZoneAlarm processes running, both taking 2.5-3MB's of RAM or so, also, it seems my internet connection is a bit faster with ZoneAlarm, so I am wondering which one is better? I am starting to kind of like ZoneAlarm, however, I heard it goes deep into your systems registry, and adds alot of un-needed junk to the PC, is this true?

 

I have also been using free Sygate for quite awhile and ZA could of been my first FW too! Free Sygate started a disappearing act on me a short time ago as I explained in another post but it has led me to start trying other FW's out. I'm interested in trying ZA again maybe after my trial of KAH runs out and would like any input (Pros/Cons) too...thanks!

 

Fellow Creatures,
I got a personal message in my Zone Labs Forum mail. See below:

For years I was a Zone Alarm expert & advised thousands in these forums. I must admit the product & support is now broken. Nearly half a year & no fixes. I'm tired of it. I complained & got fired! I don't want to leave you empty handed, so here it comes. Sorry I waited so long.

FREE for personal use, Sygate Personal Firewall 5.x provides best of breed security in a user friendly interface, protecting your PC from hackers, trojans and DoS attacks. New features include full-ICS support, protocol driver level protection, enhanced logging, and more. Sygate Personal Firewall is the first FREE personal firewall to offer protection from malicious code intrusions, keeping the information on your PC safe and private.
http://smb.sygate.com/products/spf_standard.htm

He was a long time "Guru". I am very sad at what is happening, to my first firewall one of my machines has never known anything but ZA. I am sticking with 4.5 ZAP unless I see evidence that 5.5 is good. The key will expire. hope this helps others.

 

Thanks for your input. It seems there are drawbacks to the latest version of ZA. Unfortunately, free Sygate isn't one of my choices anymore. I'm looking now at others and prefer something more lighter weight without the bells and whistles that some now want to give.

 

Hi all,

I have to agree with mercurie. I am a long time paid subscriber of ZoneAlarm and I am most unhappy with the customer service and technical support ever since they were purchased by Center Point. Frequently when I company is purchased, the new management comes in with new policies that affect customer and technical support in order to increase the "bottom line". I am afraid this is what appears to be happening at ZoneAlarm.

I will take my time and find a replacement for ZoneAlarm. There are many firewalls out there. For all I know, Center Point does not view home users as strategic anymore so I will look for a company, like DiamondCS, that really cares about home users and has the customer and technical support in place to properly service these customers. Times change - and so do I.

Rich

 

Steverio, next go round, me too. I did not mean to sound like endorsement for Sygate.

richrf, I will take my time as well, no need for me to hurry. I'll just keep my stable ZAP 4.5 until I find what I want, key expires in 15 days, even that version has a couple of extra items (bells and whistles) it seemed after every update (started with 4.0x) another thing was added that I really do not need or want.

 

Please keep in mind that zone alarm has never in its entire existence been customer friendly. Does this mean that because of this zone alarm is less a firewall ?
Many, many years ago I used zone alarm....warnings that it could be cracked sent to the company went ignorred..(this was years ago)....warning that it leaked went ignorred (long before the first leaktest was ever made).....eventually the "cracking issue" was privately patched......the only person here that may remember that would be paul wilders.....
eventually zone alarm got around to repairing their product....in their sweet time...but nonetheless, it was repaired.......perhaps the latest version will be also............
I am not a fan of ZA...but wont bash it......its been considered a firewall for newbees.........the pro version may be considered somewhat more.......
Are there better firewalls.....well I don't use ZA.......which answers my own question.........but what I use may not be to the liking of someone else........firewalls tend to fire-up the emotions........an my suggestion would be to use a firewall that you are comfortable with...that is known to provide protection......an there are several....an don't waste your time on debate because where firewalls are concerned....debates flare up....firewalls users just love their firewall.....

 

Say whats with these possible censorship notices..I just received my second one tonight after my last post.......whats going on??

 

Hi SnowGuy,

My own preference is to support companies that support me. If I am going to pay for products, I would prefer it if the dollars went to companies and people who are there when I need them and live up to their contractural agreements. I think technology is a two-way street. If they are there for me, I am there for them. If not .... well I'll try to find a company that is. For me this makes sense.

Rich

 

At the risk of appearing overly pedantic, I did feel that I should point out that the parent company is "Check Point Software Technologies", not "Center Point". CheckPoint is a leading provider of firewall code and technology in the large enterprise and service provider market (with licensing partnerships with Nokia, Sun, IBM, etc.). Arguably, the top 3 enterprise-class firewall vendors are Cisco, CheckPoint, and Juniper/NetScreen (not necessarily in that order so let's not go down that rhetorical path). You are likely quite correct that CheckPoint does not see the home market as strategic, rather they see the need to provide an "endpoint" solution for large enterprises so that they can maintain security behind the large corporate firewalls and in the face of migratory wireless laptops, VPN tunnels from telecommuters, etc. Similarly, Juniper/NetScreen has a licensing agreement with Sygate to bundle Sygate's personal firewall technology with it's remote VPN client software. The large enterprise firewall vendors are just trying to promote the sensible idea of "layered security".

In light of the above, I take a somewhat different viewpoint than perhaps a few others. I actually prefer ZoneAlarm for the functionality I primarily use it for, namely simple outbound program control rather than complex inbound/outbound firewall policy construction. For firewalling, I use a separate stateful hardware firewall. I would even recommend a simple and cheap NAT router device to most home users. Ideally, you shouldn't really see any threats appear in your software firewall logs at all. It's a belts and suspenders attitude and, for me, I find that ZA actually fits in with that mentality slightly better than a lot of the alternatives. Nevertheless, in many ways it really does boil down to personal tastes and preferences.

I will agree, though, that the latest versions of ZA (5.x series) have definitely had their share of issues. I'm also slightly worried about code/functionality creep as ZA tries to become the be-all-and-end-all of client security software utilities. Still, I'm now using the ZA 5.5.012 beta, and I haven't really experienced any distinct issues. It's actually working quite well for me. For reference purposes, vsmon.exe (the service component) appears to have an average working set of around 5.7mb and zlclient.exe (the client UI component) has an average working set of around 2.2mb.

 

Hi Alex,

Thanks for the correction to my comments (I wasn't really paying attention to the name - my bad), and your additional comments. I hope a vendor can fill in the "home market" that ZoneAlarm (unforatunately) seems to be leaving (neglecting?).

Rich

 

This is EXACTLY what I do. I use a NAT router as my first layer of defense and ZA 4.5 free edition only to catch the "outgoing". When I installed the NAT router all of the ZA incoming logs fell completely silent, works perfectly.

Acadia

 

Me too. I had ZAP 4.5 already loaded when the nat router arrived when I went to wireless connections. ISP set it up and incoming attacks fell silent as you put it. Not a bad set up.

Hey, Alec I only knew about half of that corporate stuff. Thanks for filling the gaps in my knowledge. Just shows how some are pairing up to try to fill gaps in their offerings rather then build product themselves.

 

LowWaterMark

Appreciate that you took a moment to reply.....yes I knew it was a re-dir just didn't know the why............V-B has some nice patches but alittle much for most websites......many just slow the servers..


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Rich

Can only fully agree that if a person pays for a product the vendor should be there for the customer....anything less is simply not acceptable.....no excuses are acceptable either.....

 

i now have the latest beta ver of ZA and find it works well, mostly more compatable with sp2, looks the same, runs alot smoother.
but i have used sygate and i found that very good aswell.

 

Which is the easiest of the two on resources? Thanks.

 

I found ZA to be easier on resources. Sygate was rather resource intensive on my machine (win2k). It used more CPU% than any other firewall I've tried...

 

I hear everything you guys are saying and wow!... I guess it boils down to intents and purposes. I used to have Sygate but switched over to ZA for two reasons: ZA integrates seamlessly with a personal IDS, Visual Zone 5.7, that provides me with all the bells & whistles I'll ever need and Slap! 1.2.2.0, a cute app that allows me to send pop up messages to any intruder detected by ZA.

All the other features not in my ZA, I download...

 

I prefer sygate to za, i find sygate easier and better to use.

 

What's an NAT router, how do I get it, how do I install it and how do I use it? I've got a forest fire to put out!

 

I too have been totally dismayed by the performance of Zonealarm Pro 5.x and have stayed with version 4.5 which was, and still is, the best software firewall on the market, IMHO.

I run a D-Link 604 NAT Router, and have never had any problems with inbound attacks on my computer. For outbound checking, Zonealarm Pro 4.5 is the best.

When I check my Zonealarm Logs, the Blocked Intrusions is 0, and has remained so, since I installed a hardware router on my machine. There is no doubt in my mind that a NAT Router, combined with Zonealarm Pro 4.5, is the very best combination at present, for the majority of users.

Until such time as I read in the forums, that Checkpoint has resolved all of it's issues, I will continue to run version 4.5 and I would strongly recommend that all users do the same. There are just too many bugs in version 5.x for users to gain confidence and trust in this software.

 

You can find links to some basic info in the Other Firewalls Sticky Posts.

Regards,

CrazyM