What Firewall have you got ?

I have searched the Forum on "Advanced" for Firewalls and got nothing, so here goes.

What Firewall have you got ?

I have used Comodo FW individually or incorporated in CIS for years. It has been 100% perfect and in my opinion is probably the best Firewall on the Internet.

I always use FREE editions. Not mean, money is no problem but my experience is that FREE versions are just as good as paid versions.

Comodo Firewall :-
Operation = perfect. No pop-ups and a magnificent protection.
Defense+ = A proverbial pest and pain in the butt, with a barrage of pop-ups. Unless the user knows exactly what the pop-up means then it is a matter of saying YES to everything. I have often disabled Defense+ so that these infernal pop-ups are killed off.

Comodo on my PC takes an age to load, always last and I can feel my hair growing longer by the minute.

Current :-
Uninstalled Comodo FW and installed Online Armor. This is a superb FW with a wide variety of user control, extremely efficient and the tray animated icon is really great for seeing what traffic is present.

OA loads quickly without any problems, no pop-ups, just a program that is so versatile and efficient that it gives enormous confidence to any user.
The control panel is efficient and versatile for user control, very comprehensive. I love the animated tray icon that shows traffic.

Emsisoft is a provider that you cannot surpass in the entire software Internet services availability for efficiency and high level protection.
I am so over-joyed at OA that I wonder why I never installed it years ago.
The portrayal of events is magnificent, cannot believe my luck in finding such a wonderful program.

 

I've actually tried Comodo Firewall (3.x - 4.1.x), OA Free (last version before it got sold to Emisoft), ZoneAlarm Pro and Free (various versions), Outpost Pro and Free, PrivateFirewall, FortiClient FW, Jetico (trial), LnS (trial), SoftPerfect, FortKnox (trial), PCTFW+ (various versions), Sunbelt Firewall (also Kerio 2.1.5) and Sygate.

I've had problems with some, others I liked. But right now I'm using Win XP Firewall, and added a security policy to block ICMP requests (when I'm outside my home network). I'm just relying on other applications (as per my sig) to compensate for my lack of outbound protection.

I think Stem can provide us better insight.

 

Windows Firewall with Advanced Security.

 

Funny, you start off praising it then finish by criticizing it

Anyway, I'm currently using Jetico 2 with only its network packet filtering components enabled. Windows 7 Advanced Security is otherwise the incumbent.

 

Well, that`s the way it goes. I got rid of Comodo because of the time it takes to load - a 24 hour clock pays dividends, all those infernal pop-ups that D+ throws up which I say YES to so no point in having it, my V3, no update except to download Comodo CIS and select that brand new Firewall which crashed out 5 times on me. I guess that`s enough to say.

For years Comodo served me fine before they crapped it up with their CIS package and honestly - that joke of a sandbox gave me a rupture laughing at it.

Nah, I`m really happy now I have discovered Online Armor, it is superb and NO Pop-ups ! Österreich über alles, ya just gotta believe it.

 

I don't understand.
You have problems with D+ and not with firewall.

Have you tried to turn OFF everything except pure firewall ?
And I mean everything, Image execution control included, D+ and Sandbox are mandatory.

That way you are only left with firewall , no cloud scanning and other BS.

 

Lets see.

Comodo Firewall is perfect.

Defence + is perfect sadly you do not understand the capabilities of Defence +. You can decide that Defence + will block EVERYTHING that is malware or unrecognized, this is basically any programs most people DONT use. The popups are only a pain the first hmm 4 days so you have not been using comodo for a long time.

The fact that it takes you and age to load is rather sad because Comodo takes me less then 1 second to load, sadly you are perhaps using an PC equivalent the old Commodore 64.

I have found the pop-ups to be rather helpful, the fact that it alers you about changes that are import for the computer, or about programs it dont recognize trying to connect to the internet is great, sadly you must prefer firewalls keeping quite allowing mayhem to take place in your PC

 

I've been a long user of Outpost Firewall Pro, and essentially because I never bothered to actually learn what actually needed access to the Internet or not. For quite some time I've been learning the capacities of Windows Firewall with Advanced Security.
I'm taking advantage of Outpost Firewall Pro rules and apply them to Windows own firewall, with more or less restrictions.
But, I mainly run Outpost in a virtual machine, with the same applications I have in the real system, and then play with the firewall rules.

 

Windows7 Firewall

 

outpost is what im currently liking, just wished its logging didnt use up so many IO resources

 

For a month or two I'm on a router with ddwrt firmware. No need (for me) for any other firewall, now I'm searching for a nice free HIPS for Seven x64 (until Comodo comes with that strange DACS). And searching...and searching...

 

I am so grateful for your valued comments, but alas Comodo FW with D+ and I have had a quick divorce after many years of marriage.

Know about Comodo ? You must be joking, having had Comodo and it`s D+ for around ten years - do you really think you can lecture me on it ? I don`t allow mayhem on my patch, only guilty of tolerating the incredible slowness and PITA pop-ups etc. of Comodo for far too long.

Having suffered D+ for all those years and knowing it like the back of my hand inside out, I could probably tell you how to use it.

My Online Armor is so good and loads with lightening speed, that not wishing to hurt anybodies feelings, I will not miss all that Comodo jazz one jot.

My machine - call it what names you like, be my guest, it is an extremely efficient and reliable piece of equipment. Would`nt swap it for any other including a new one, which I could buy tomorrow if I wished.

Life now is immensely happy with OA, so I am not at all interested in any further discussion concerning Comodo and consider that chapter closed.

The thread is "What Firewall have you got ?", it is not Comodo vs The Rest.

 

Malware Defender.

 

A firewall that is serving me very well is that of NIS 2011. It's smart, fast and works very well with the rest of the suite, all in perfect sync.

I used a long time PC Tools Firewall Plus 6.0.88 I found it super easy, Mode "ask" only allow you to connect digitally signed applications to join the internet and if something is not signed to try to connect to the Internet he would ask I was allowed or blocked.

For me, a firewall has to be fast and does not fill me with pop-ups, just enough.

Sorry for my english!

 

I've tried them all but currently ... Windoze.

 

Are you ready?

Windows Firewall w/ Linksys router

 

In regards to 3rd-party firewall, my first try was with PCTool's if I remember correctly. It was fine for me despite me noticing that it didn't 'remember' my choices at times. I could have lived with it but out of mere curiosity, I decided to give a try to something else.

I gave OA a shot and I liked the Wizard during the installation process. It soon became my personal favorite and I had it running for quite some time. I even 'upgraded' to the Premium and ++ thanks to giveaways such as the ones in GOTD and access to the other features for short period of time (I didn't use all of them since I considered a few as redundant on my setup). However, I had to drop it as at one point in time, it was causing problems on my side - constantly getting me disconnected and only 'fix' was to reboot so that I could get my connection back. I've tried figuring out what's wrong and had even reset things but to no avail. I'm not blaming OA - it might have been an incompatibility somewhere on my setup but I was too 'tired' to do anything more than that. I've not had a try on the latest version though....but I might in the near future or so depending on my mood and how things go.

Next was Windows Firewall Control Free. It was so damn darn basic, it doesn't take a genius to figure out how to use it. And it complements the built-in Windows Firewall nicely.

Next was ZA Free. It was a reasonable and simple to manage firewall, especially more so for beginners. Things were running fine with the exception of a small increase in boot time. The drawback that pushed me off was when I found that it didn't support ICS (Internet Connection Sharing) in the free version. There seem to be a way to circumvent such matters in the settings and I even had a key for the Pro version thanks to an official "Windows 7 launch giveaway' but I didn't bother to give it a go. I knew of the ZA 'scare tactics' news but I have a neutral view towards the matter...so that wasn't the driving factor.

As of the time I'm writing this, I'm toying around with Comodo's offering - just the firewall and Defense+. I can manage the Defense+ alerts fairly well and I've got a good grasp of how it works after reading up the Help guide. Nevertheless, I can understand that it's not everyone's meal for the day. And I find it funny when reading the conflicting and 'hot' views of the fanboys and the haters. All sorts of arguments arise and guys simply fight worse than kids do. Comodo's firewall (on it's own) is pretty much silent on my side, popping out only when needed, especially more so in it's default settings. Defense+ depends on individual computer setup, usage and preferences. One size doesn't fit all. If you're totally pissed off by it, then you can either turn it off or reduce it's monitoring settings. Or just don't use Comodo at all - it's your choice...not the other way round. The haters will continue to bash it up while the fanboys will continue to spread their wings...so don't listen to both sides and take a neutral stand instead.

I must admit that I still know nothing much about firewall and it's terminologies seeing that my focus has always been on other stuffs. I'm trying to learn my basics though and currently doing some read-up on Windows Firewall with Advanced Security. Getting the grasp of a few things here and there but have not applied it to practical usage yet.

If there's a 3rd-party stand-alone firewall that I would like to give a try next, it'd be PrivateFirewall....a few of my online acquaintances have had good words for it.

P.S. I've got no problems running on a one-way (inbound only) Windows Firewall only. Outbound is more like a learning process for me more than a last resort against unwanted connections...it's just an additional tool that's complementary rather than my 1st priority. Different folks have different thoughts/needs over the matter so don't shoot me for saying this...

 

Running Windows 7 built in firewall. I would be in heaven if I could find a firewall that: resolved IP addresses to the url name and blocked banner ads. I've not been able to find one, even in a paid firewall. If anyone knows of one please let me know.

 

I think it would quite difficult to find one, not to say impossible (I might be wrong.). The reason is that domains are translated to IPs, not the other way around. One single IP can be in use by more than one domain.

Now, what you can do is place urls (say, ad(.)something(.)com) and then the firewall translate to the IP. I don't know how all firewall works, but Outpost Firewall Pro blocks ads and allows you to add your own lists. If memory serves me, it allows the use of wildcards.

-Edit-

I think that the part that blocks ads doesn't even translate to IPs. It only matches the urls. Only IP blocker component translates.

 

I am really glad that OA is working for you. At its best it is a superb firewall. CFP CIS has always drvien me crazy with the popups just like your case. Unfortunately it has not always played nice with my computer or its apps. But I like it so much I keep returning yet again. The latest try seems to work perfectly however. CIS CFP does seem to work pretty nicely however in its latest version.

 

idk about IP addresses to URL names but in Outpost Firewall Pro it does block banner ads with the web control component of it

 

Hello,


From “John Bull's” signature, I take it he's still running Windows XP which after SP-2 has the windows Firewall ON by default. Windows 7 Firewall [and Vista Firewall for that matter] is more robust than the XP firewall.

It looks like 80% of Wilders users are on XP and it seems they will keep running XP until the EXTENDED SUPPORT PHASE for that OS ends in April, 2014.

I had thought that with the new technologies developed for Vista/7, these OSes were more secure than XP but...to each his own.

Back on topic, the only 3rd party Firewalls I've used are OA [paid] and ZA Pro.
I had really some issues with ZA Pro. Among these issues, there was one related to vsmon.exe [the main firewall driver] and I/O. A lot of activity on my HDD, the ZA icon appearing on my system tray nearly 3+ minutes after everything had already loaded, the high CPU usage, the forgetful basic HIPS included with this FW that seemed to forget decisions I had already made related to granting permissions to an .EXE file., the programs control panel that did not purge by itself old entries of Temp files or installs that I had done several weeks before, etc.

Dumped ZA Pro and tried OA [paid] and saw some incompatibilities between OA and some of my programs and, OA sometimes denying outbound connections to LEGIT programs that were running on my computer.

Dumped OA [paid] as well and now, I'm using the Windows 7 Firewall and I'm very pleased with it. No HIPS going like crazy for everything I install or uninstall, no questions to answer about my LEGIT programs making outbound connections, etc. If I want HIPS, I think that UAC is more than enough for me cause it acts exactly like that, like an HIPS.

My be John Bull is getting better results results from OA on XP than I did. PC configuration plays an important role when it comes to the security software installed on that PC.


By the way, my security software on Win 7 is:

• AV: ESET NOD32 v4.2.64.12
• AS: Windows Defender
• AS [ON DEMAND ONLY]: MBAM [free version]
• AS [ON DEMAND ONLY]: SAS [free version]
• FW: Windows 7 Firewall
• Browser: Firefox + NoScript
• Sandboxie [paid]
• Ad blocker: Ad Muncher
• Back-up: A pristine image of my Win 7 installation with everything but the security software

Regards,


Carlos

 

acr1965, why not use MVPS Hosts to block banners ads on web-sites? It's free and requires no install. Just replace your Win 7 Hosts with it. Also, it's updated monthly and it's very good at blocking Ads.

I do not have it myself since I use Ad Muncher [ which I purchased back in 2006 for US$25 for a lifetime license].



Regards,




Carlos

 

Well in my home machine I use something simple that works and can control outbound connections.... Windows 7 Firewall Control Free

 

ZAP was notorious for doing that when I used it. Forgetful, indeed. And something was always getting corrupted, and tech support was always recommending uninstall/reinstall. I ran either ZA or ZAP for 9 long years... finally took a leap of faith and went with Online Armor Free. I have not regretted it.

@John Bull: Are you using OA's Run Safer feature for your internet-facing programs? That is one of the main attractions of this firewall, in my opinion.

By the way, regarding this...

You might need to bone up on your search skills. I get 40 pages of results when I use advanced search for firewalls... including some very helpful firewall polls.