Best Free Low-Resource Firewalls?

Hello, I use NOD32 2.7 Antivirus and I need a firewall to go with it. I really liked Comodo Personal Frewall but that has caused me several blue screens so I am unable to use that anymore. I've tried Zone Alarm, PCTools Firewall Plus, Sunbelt Personal Firewall, Sygate Personal Firewall, GhostWall, Jetico... can I get some suggestions of the best free low-resource firewalls please? (I'd use Windows Firewall if it was 2-way secured)

 

About the only free ones you have not tried are

Online Armor

http://www.tallemu.com/online_armor_free.html

Webroot's Desktop Firewall

http://www.webroot.com/consumer/pro...nks-DF&WRSID=15a9a0629441bc50f1665c2c58b18928

Netveda Safetynet

http://www.netveda.com/downloads/index.htm

With the Sunbelt firewall did you use their paid version and the Kerio free version?

Of the above, I have used Online Armor with NOD32 before and they worked nicely together. It used to be able to have its HIPS component shut down if you need to save the resource usage. It is a very good furewall but is even better with its HIPS enabled. There are a lot of people using Webroot's firewall on this site. Both OA and Webroot have many learning threads going should you need any assistance.

I cannot speak for NetVeda. But I have heard from others that it is a good firewall.

 

There are hundreds of posts on low-resource firewalls. Look'n'stop is probably the pick of the bunch...

But free... hmmm...

Don't want to start a fight between different brands like I feared I did in the Inbound Filtering thread but Sygate is still good but discontinued.

See here for a list of decent firewalls: http://www.firewallguide.com/software.htm

 

this was the best free low ressource firewall i ever tried:

http://www.ghostsecurity.com/ghostwall/

 

Did you like either Sygate or Jetico? Both fit the requirements you asked for: light, free, and 2-way protection

 

I agree totally about Sygate. I have used it for years - low in resources, dependable and though its discontinued it still represents good defence against attacks. As many people are behind NAT routers these days Sygate's ability to filter outgoing data is just about all that the ordinary punter needs + low resource antivirus like NOD32 + Spybot.

 

Thank you all for posting =) I haven't tried Online Armor or Webroot but ill download both and try them. I did infact like Sygate, but I don't like the fact its outdated and last version was 2005. Sounds like a security breach waiting to happen. Unless im just paranoid, is it okay to use?

 

sygate , best part is you can make your own rules , nothing beats that . only outdate i know is it's not vista certified

 

OA best. Forget Sygate, I also like it very much specially IDS is nice but too easy to bypass.

 

Will Online Armor Free do? Or do i need the paid for version

 

See the comparison chart and check on the features column whether you need the extra shareware features.

http://www.tallemu.com/comparisons.html


Also try out Webroot a different style but probably equally as good securitywise.

Depends really which you are personally happier with.

 

Hey Hairy Coo. How are you? Where's my Moo? LOL. Good to see ya in here. I have gone back to Webroot Desktop Firewall. (Who'd a guessed? LOL.) My PC is more responsive now and my boot up time is faster than when I used OA Free and especially Zone Alarm. Plus I believe WDF with DSA enabled is great protection. I still have Avast on board (believe it or not, LOL.) and it runs well with WDF. I see you have AVG installed again. Do you feel that it's a good combination with WDF? The only thing I am concerned about is WDF forgetting any answers already given to the few pop ups WDF has, like 19monty64 reported. Any memory problems with WDF for you? If not then I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this program as a very light running Firewall and HIPS combination with great protection.

 

Wordward-

As we say locally "Ma-ate,Ya got a kangaroo loose in the top paddock" for going through the whole wall list in a week-some sort of record!

Interesting observation,though about your performance increase,I cant really test this ,as my computer is quite powerful and they all feel the same.

You talk about memory problems with WDF-I think its got Alzheimers.

I just keep pressing the button-but its quietened down a lot.

I like AVG,even though the detection rates may not be as good as the best-the interface and lack of bugs,reliability and easy operation make up for it.

Ps;thinking of just using Micropoint-(no firewall-)see malware section.

2 big moos

from

the Coo

 

Well so far I like Look'N'Stop... how do you all feel about this firewall? So far it looks easy to configure and uses like no resources

 

ROTFL. I love that local saying Hairy Coo, and for me it may be well deserved. LOL. I am at the tail end of all this however, and if it turns out that WDF shows signs of Alzheimers for with me as well, then maybe going back to ZAAS and ThreatFire is the final verdict. I'll give Micropoint a look and see, but you know me, I don't like trying a lot of different software. LOL. See ya, Mate.

 

I have been running OA Free for a few weeks, the memory usage was about 16 MB (oasrv.exe 8 MB and oaui.exe 8 MB).
oaui can optional be closed ("Close GUI Interface"), because it's only for configuration windows.

Now I'm running Sygate Free (~ 6 MB RAM) and EQSecure ( ~ 9 MB RAM).

All of them (OA, Sygate, EQSecure) aren't resource hogs at all in my opinion.

Cheers

 

Well i've tried Norton,Mcafee,Comodo,Zone Alarm,Online Armor,Jetico and Look N Stop. The only two I can recommend is LNS or Jetico. But LNS with the enhanced ruleset and a good HIPS will provide you with excellent inbound and outbound protection.
LNS is not free but worth the money IMO.

 

Well I guess LookNStop it is, seems like a good personal firewall. Thanks again everybody for the help =)

 

I'm impressed with ProSecurity. Light and one of the new 'geek' firewalls as opposed to the old brick and mortar style.

 

Ahhhh..... ProSecurity is a HIPS a good HIPS but not a firewall.

 

I've tried every free firewall that has been mentioned in this forum, but I keep coming back to Kerio (Sunbelt Personal Firewall now). I quit using it for awhile as some of the builds were very resourse intensive, but I've found the lastest release to be very low on resources. There are several reasons Kerio is a good choice for me: The layout if very good and intuitive. It has the NIPS feature that uses Snort signature rules, something none of the other firewalls have to my knowledge. You have the option of making packet filter rules the same as in Kerio 2.1.5, but are not necessary if you don't want to make your own rules or don't understand how to do so. It's logging features are very good and detailed, although I think Sygate still has the other firewalls beat when it comes to logging. The one drawback is that the free version of Kerio does not have password protection, but then, neither do most of the other freebies. It also have the behavior blocking function which is a kind of HIPS feature, where you can even control parent-child functions as with the HIPS programs. Personally, I use a separate HIPS program for those purposes, so that function is disabled in my setup. I guess mainly it comes down to preference, and being used to Kerio 2.1.5, this firewall makes sense to me.

 

No, not Kerio, easy to bypass only midfield firewall.

Yes its okay then place a good anti-keylogger on its side and everything is fine.
In zero time you have then a bulletproofed protection.

 

I have tried several firewalls, but decided to go another route since I have a router. I liked Zone Alarm Suite and Pro but got tired of the problems and the kitchen sink syndrome. The threats are changing so I decided something radical, against the prevailing trend among geekdom. I decided to use the Windows Firewall in XP Pro SP 2, along with NOD32, Prevx2 (my outbound check), and Sandboxie, plus a couple of manual anti-Trojan and antirootkit scanners. NOD32 now has an antispyware component. The Windows firewall protects early in the boot cycle against incoming, if any gets past the router, so does NOD32, and Prevx2.

Run your browsers and email client sandboxed with Sandboxie and any malware that gets through the them will dissipate when you delete the sandbox. You have to willfully, with stupidity or ignorance and forethought allow some malware in. You have to willfully take it out of the sandbox onto your system.
Prevx2 monitors Address Book, Creating a Server Listener, FTP Outbound,
Hosts File Modification, HTTP Outbound, IRC Outbound, NetBIOS Outbound,
POP3 Outbound, SMTP, TCP Outbound, and Telnet, this last I uninstalled; it also protects against Bypassing XP Firewall and monitors to see if it is modified; it also warns against a desktop webpage; it monitors MAPI services; that's just the outbound. It works well with NOD32; although you could use a free av like (in order of effectiveness) Avira AntiVir PersonalEdition Classic, Avast!, and AVG. But with Prevx2 almost any av will do, even ClamWin.

I use Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird, and Opera (most secure browser out of the box without adding anything; although to you can, with extensions, do it with Firefox), K-Meleon, K-Ninja, and IE 7. Sandboxie supports all.

The Windows firewall will stealth all ports.

 

Online Armor Personal Firewall is definately not a low-resource program.

It is extremely resource heavy as far as dos programs are concerned.

 

Hi lassar,

Could you elaborate a little more please ?
Did you post about your issue in OA support forum ?

Regards,

MaB