Can anyone recommend a good firewall?

In another thread, the Comodo uninstall process also did not work cleanly. so is there a real difference between the two?

 

Well, when I uninstalled CFW there was no trouble. It Left only one empty folder. I ran CCleaner and Registry Mechanic and the registry is clean.

The poster you quoted hasn't actually done it, just reading posts elsewhere.

I've done the work and can confirm CFW 2.4 is easy to uninstall.

 

I had no trouble uninstalling CFW. I do not use it currently so I am unsure and don't remember much except the mentioned CCleaner and my registry cleaner finished off any left overs. I think I had to manually delete a "dead file".

ZA on the other hand leftovers have a history of causing problems. If you don't follow those steps you are going to have problems more then likely so don't skip one or.... you could be sorry.

 

Amen to that. I was a nervous wreck by the time I finished the special clean uninstall instructions.

 

Hi Xene:

Your setup interests me!

Which of your SW tools are real time or active all the time and which do you use as only on demand.

Do you use SS (what version?) in real time with NOD32?

See you!

 

Was the 5.6.3408 version offered for the free and/or Pro version or both?

 

I believe 3408 was produced for both free and pro versions...

 

Thanks for the reply.

 

yes indeed, they are both available at the link I provided above

 

I agree. From the job....I've seen sooo many computers with screwed up TCP stacks and issues stemming solely from ZA installs. There is more damage and remnants left behind even after following ZA's removal steps...requiring a lot of extra work by the tech attempting to fix the damage.

 

Thanks for the link. I am going to try it out on a PC that is currently only using the XP firewall and see how it works. Is there any uninstall issues? Can I easily jump between versions if one should not work properly?

 

I'm sure you'll like it, it's an great firewall with excellent logging features.

Like with many firewalls there are some issues, I think mainly related to going back to a earlier version than the one installed. If you have any problems here is a complete uninstall procedure.

http://www.hackfix.org/software/uninstall/sygate.html

 

I used ZA a long time ago, but seem to recall it being bloated. Panda slowed me down to a crawl. I was using Commodo Firewall Pro for a while and really liked it, but when I wiped my hard disk and tried to re-install it, it said it couldn't because it is already there. I may have brought some files back with me when I move back some application data that I moved back from another drive. I'm not sure. I removed all references I could find,but still couldn't re-install. Their support gave me instructions to edit the registry, but I'm affraid of that. I currently have F-Secure Security Shield 2007. Since, installing, I have read that this is a "not so good" product and may have it's own spyware or something. Anyway, I was thinking of giving PC-CILLIN Internet Security 2007 a try. Has anyone tried that firewall?

 

Alant - have you tried a hardware firewall and limited user account ? A lot less trouble.

 

The only hardware firewall I ever used was with XP. I use a password protected administrator account. I understand that the windows firewall doesn't provide outbound protection. What are any other kinds of hardware firewalls?
thanks

 

I'm sure that any inexpensive firewall/modem/router would be fine.
I have only ever had one - NetgearDG834 - there is probably a cheaper and more up to date version available - much better than the cheap modems that ISPs tend to give away "free"

Using this I don't run any software firewall, nor online anti-virus, nor on line anti-spyware, no Hips, no nothing.

Firefox helps. running as a limited user rather than administrator I am told would stop lots of bad things running. I use Returnil to freeze C: so anything that did get on would be gone at reboot.

In summary I guess I'm just questioning whether a software firewall is really needed by most users ?

Having seen one client run Kerio with allow all and another deny herself access to the Internet I have my doubts.

 

Has anyone else ever used hardware firewalls? What are your thoughts? What are some other names of hardware firewalls? Do they update the same way software firewalls do?

 

I did a firmware upgrade 3 or 4 years ago and that was the last time I made any change. It just sits there 24/7 doing what it is supposed to do - no further action required on my part.

 

This is my current setup.

Antivirus: Nod32 (real-time protection), Kaspersky (weekly scans)
Firewall: Router (hardware) and Outpost Firewall Pro (software)
Antispyware: Spybot S&D, Spyware Blaster

I reckon that this combined provides the best security possible. What does everyone else think?

 

Been running Comodo (the old version. on server 2003 (used as a souped up XP workstation). It runs fine with no slowdown even when I (experimentally) installed it on an old 1 GHz Celeron with Windows 2000.

Also run Emule and Utorrent with high ID and no port problems.

It has two "drawbacks" which are in fact features, but are poorly explained even by the enthusiastic support crowd.
1.Learning how to set up the rules is unnecessarily difficult. The real answers are simple. I'll write a new FAQ one day I swear!

2.It flags every incidence of one application launching another as a new potential rule and then tags the launched application as a potential risk. (for example if your email client launches your browser, then anything the browser launches will be queried . There are better ways to do that but most firewalls ignore it or silently put rules in palace that you never see and can't change.

The Strongest competition I found for Comodo (and I'm picky) was Outpost. But the support during the trial period was minimal and I experienced BSODS too often for me to tolerate.

I also tried the latest Zone Alarm, but it was a bloated dog. You needed one PC to run ZA and one to run the rest of your apps.

Black Ice got thrown out for no outbound protection.

I like applications which are light on the CPU, don't BSOD, that I can control. Comodo is my vote.

I aslo use their Boclean and AVG. No conflicts at all

My biggest security complaint at the moment is still svchost. Not a firewall problem, and MS problem - anything can hide in there! .

 

I used Comodo for a while and was happy with it. A couple of weeks ago, I re-formatted my hard drive completely. When I was done, I moved alot of stuff back to my hard drive (maybe too much). When I went to re-install Comodo, it said it already exists. It is not located in any program files or application files that I can find anywhere. Comodo tech support told me what registry files needed to be removed. Still couldn't re-install. Finally, I gave up and am using 3 months of free updates to Trend Micro's PC-cillin Internet Security 2007. I tried a couple leak tests last night and it seemed to catch stuff. Can leak tests really be trusted? Could there be any malware on these kinds of sites? What does anyone think of this security suite?
Thanks

 

Use your built in Windows firewall. I use the firewall in XP Pro. I have used computers since 1969, have owned computer companies, and I have never had a virus or a hacker get inside my system.

I have argued previously in this forum that outgoing "protection" is fallacious and the fear of not having same is a chimera. Look, once they are in, it is 99% likely they can disable your firewall and get data out. I know some will contend that it adds another layer of protection, but any alleged protection is marginal at best. Windows firewall works great and is light along with Eset or Avira as your best choice for an AV. You don't need anything else.

 

Thanks for your clear vision and I'll second that!

 

But the "control" is handy to minimize the outbound adventures of your software and that together with the maybe marginal protection makes it added value.

 

To "Bunkhouse Bunk" >>>>

To state you've never had a threat makes me wonder:

1) Do you ever turn your unit on?

or

2) Do you expect me to believe you, if so might I share some of your wine?