2 ZoneAlarm Pro questions...

I am currently trying out ZoneAlarm Pro (the latest version) without any problem. I recieved this link from a person in the Forum after sending them a PM. The link is: http://www.zonealarmpro.bravehost.com/basic.htm . I went to the page on that site: http://www.zonealarmpro.bravehost.com/prexamp.htm and I am just wondering if following the way the person shows how to configure all those programs in ZA if it should be done or if anyone can recommend a better way of configuring the programs. I am just curious because I took the time to configure all the programs the way it said on that link.

My second question is, I have a Linksys Range Extender for my other computers on my home network can get the Internet at a good speed, and so forth. I am curious if ZoneAlarm Pro would cause a problem with the range extender. It is only installed on one PC and it is not the PC that is directly connected to the cable modem either. If its possible, do I add some sort of IP address maybe or something for ZA to be ok and still let the Linksys Range Extender work ok?

Hope I can recieve some help.. thanks as always

- Rob

 

The rules described at the link above are pretty good, taking away server rights is a good idea and that goes for any firewalls, sadly in Zone Alarm unlike Sygate and others, setting port specific access permissions is a royal pain, seperate rules have to be created and rule creation is a veritable can of worms in Zone Alarm.

 

Hi Arup! Thanks soo much for the reply. I posted earlier today and was giving up on anyone ever replying because it had been so long. Anyway... I uninstalled ZoneAlarm Pro and I was going to ask you.... do you know of a way or a guide to properly configure Sygate? I like Sygate and always have (except I feel its interface could use improvment) but I heard it does not block all leak tests nor is it easy to properly configure... so, that is why I quit using it awhile back.

Thanks!

 

here is one site for you guardian, it may help. king's site

 

Hi Guardianofnight,

Check out the link above posted by Intoxsicated, Sygate is stable but quirky althouth the pro does have some features that ZA does not have including upgradable IDS signatures. Leak tests truly don't indicate a firewall's attributes, if you enable DLL control as well as anti application hijacking, you are protected quite well, also take away explorer.exe internet access rights in application rules and you should be set. The newer ZA is quite good although Sygate still is better in packet filtering compared to ZA.

 

ZA far exceeds Sygate, Sygate can't filter a proxy properly so those using Proxo or other proxies, should look elsewhere, It also does not handle requests from the localhost(ie. loopback) properly and is easily spoofed, most browsers use loopback packets to diminish download times this is known as a cache, it also is known to allow packets to be received even though rules were created that would block such traffic. Sygate's default policy is to grant server rights along with client rights which is a very poor practice not to mention insecure for those who are unaware. My question is why do they call it a firewall at all. Sygate's support also seems to be lagging as they updated their free version to version 5.6 back in Aug and said an updated Pro was to follow shortly. I guess 8 months is shortly to Sygate as they haven't released it yet. My suggestion between the two would ZA without a doubt.

 

They both have their problems.. although given a choice, generally speaking I think I would choose ZA.

The new ZA Pro just released has a nasty memory leak on my system. I tested it, amoung other programs, and found that I lost 20-25 megs of free ram after browsing for just one hour. Continued for another hour and lost another 20 megs. Yet the vsmon service and the GUI look like they're ok in task manager or other programs. So ZA is using up ram and not freeing it up properly to the system. So I won't use the new version anymore.

Sygate, on the other hand, on my system, appears to allow packets in to listening ports without asking. Smc.Exe (Sygate) listens on port 1026 or 1027, and when random UDP packets come in to that port, Sygate let's them in without a word. It also appears to allow packets in to listening ports even when you restrict those ports in the program's app rules to deny it. I posted at the Sygate forum and got nowhere, nor did anyone from Sygate appear to be interested either. Oh well..

 

Re: Memory Leak...

Kerodo, I don't dispute what you are saying here (as I haven't yet upgraded) , but I'm wondering how you went about 'measuring' the memory leak? Would you please elaborate on that!

 

Nothing too scientific...

I removed all apps that I suspected of eating ram (for example, Avast with it's web shield, Treewalk DNS, and a few others), and then browsed for several hours, using my computer normally, and then added them back one by one, browsing some more and watching my free ram closely, taking into account normal system app usage of ram and so on. I watched free ram and also watched what all the apps were using and wrote it down. So, one by one, I elimated several other apps after seeing that they were not the cause of the ram eating problem.

Everything went fine, until I installed ZA Pro 5.5 last. Did an hour of browsing, and noticed that free ram had gone down by 20 megs. Did yet another hour of browsing and free ram went down another 20 megs. So ZA was obviously eating ram and not releasing it. Looking in task manager, it *appeared* that ZA was using a normal amount of ram. So you wouldn't expect problems unless you watched free ram drop as you worked on your machine, keeping an eye on all other processes for ram usage as you go to make sure it wasn't something else using more ram.

So that's what I observed here. I tried ZA 5.5.094.000, 5.5.062.011 and believe it or not, I even tried the old 4.5.594.000. ALL of them leaked and ate ram as a result of browsing and the firewall filtering traffic.

Remove ZA, and the ram eating behavior disappears and all is well.

Now I have mentioned this to one other user here in PMs and he doesn't have this problem, so it might be something peculiar to my machine. I can't say. All I know is I don't seem to be able to use ZA Pro without this happening. I would suggest trying something similar on your own machine if you want to see if it happens on yours also.

Anyway, it's on to other things for now..

PS - I am still watching things here just to make sure it isn't something else, so I will post again if it turns out otherwise...

 

Re: Memory Leak...

Well, I rechecked everything here again and found out that it is NOT ZA that was leaking after all. Or if it is, it is very very small memory leaks. It turns out the memory leak was from the latest Avast 4.6 and it's web shield. I made the mistake of putting Avast back on right before I checked ZA, and thought it was ZA that had the problem.

Sorry about that. My apologies for misleading anyone. I will report the problem in the Avast forum..

 

Oh that explains it. You had me wondering, I have had no problems with any of the 5.5 versions what so ever. Those 5.0 and 5.1 versions were another story altogether though. A number of people have posted in ZA forums about vsmon soaking up cycles though so it was possible. Glad you sorted it out.

 

Nope, on my system, ZA has been very tight with memory, strangely no problems with Avast either.

 

Yep, ZA is fine. I will keep an eye on things here for a few days, and if all is well, then I'll report my problems in the Avast forum and see what they say...

 

Why wait? You can report it immediately.
Are you talking about the ashWebSv.exe process taking up a lot of memory?

 

Hi VlK,

It is the web shield component according to Kerodo last I checked with him.

 

Vlk - No, when I view it in task manager or Process Explorer, the web shield appears to be using from 2-6 mb, which is fine. What I am seeing here is my free ram slowly going down, by as much as 20-40 mb over a period of 2 hours of web browsing. When I remove Avast, the ram leak/usage stops and all is well again. If I install Avast again and browse for a few hours, I get the free ram decreasing again.

I saw this exact same problem with a beta of Jetico firewall once. Reported it and they checked their recent code changes and then fixed the problem in a few days. Then all was well. So it appears (to me anyway) that Avast has a similar leak or problem.

PS - The reason for waiting was to watch things here and make sure I'm not jumping to any conclusions like I did earlier with ZA.. However, I'm fairly certain that there is a problem with Avast.

PSS - Vlk, I have posted this in the Avast forum just now, which seems like the better place to discuss it..

 

Allrighty thanks lets proceed on our forum.

 

I recently upgraded my system from Windows 98 to XP. I had Zonealarm with Antivirus as the only aditional program. Zonealarm ate memory like crazy until I unnstalled it and went to Nod32 2.5 and a router. I did not have this problem with the free version of Zonealarm which I was using on Windows 98. Maybe CA's antivirus was not a good fit. Although a friend reported the same problem with Zonealarm Pro and told me I would have the same problem and sure enough I did. I hope they fix this as a ruter does not monitor outgoing applications.