i need a good one .
best free firewall
Miscellaneous Forums/General Discussion/best free firewall ZoneAlarm is probably your best bet :)
Get a hardware firewall, doesn't take any of your resources and you can tell people with terrible coputers that your firewall is better that their computer.
If you choose to go with the above loook at smoothwall or ip cop
or if you want a software have a look a sygate though it got taken over recently so it mioght of gone bad or not free.
If you choose to go with the above loook at smoothwall or ip cop
or if you want a software have a look a sygate though it got taken over recently so it mioght of gone bad or not free.
Sygate was the best but some shyster company just bought it up and killed it off.
I use ZoneAlarm as well, great little firewall! :)
Dabz
Dabz
ZoneAlarm regularly causes BSODs on my win98SE machine. I have a hardware firewall (in my wireless modem/router) but how would this stop apps 'calling home'?
>>ZoneAlarm regularly causes BSODs on my win98SE
Really? Not on mine. Must be a hardware thing then.
>> but how would this stop apps 'calling home'?
That's exactly why I suggest to use both, a hardware firewall (may be part of a simple router anyway) to block the thoudsands of door-knocking script kids hacking attempts every day, and something like Zonelalarm that tells you if there's an App trying to phone home.
well, there's one thing that is cool about win98: when you disable NetBios eg. by renaming VNBT.386 to say VNBTsucks.386 (in dos mode) or something, and when you don't surf the internet, you may run NETSTAT /a and you'll get zero ports listening! That's a real stealth mode. Compare that to Windows XP that forces you to allow several "generic" services to access the web, just to make sure your web browser will be able to use the internet at all.
Really? Not on mine. Must be a hardware thing then.
>> but how would this stop apps 'calling home'?
That's exactly why I suggest to use both, a hardware firewall (may be part of a simple router anyway) to block the thoudsands of door-knocking script kids hacking attempts every day, and something like Zonelalarm that tells you if there's an App trying to phone home.
well, there's one thing that is cool about win98: when you disable NetBios eg. by renaming VNBT.386 to say VNBTsucks.386 (in dos mode) or something, and when you don't surf the internet, you may run NETSTAT /a and you'll get zero ports listening! That's a real stealth mode. Compare that to Windows XP that forces you to allow several "generic" services to access the web, just to make sure your web browser will be able to use the internet at all.
Really? Not on mine. Must be a hardware thing then.
Hmm, well, it only started playing up after I upgraded to the latest version. I don't think the old version is available anymore. Which version are you using, jfk? I could tell you that, but then I'd have to kill you :P
Seriously, I think it's an older version. You may find an older version on a cover disk.
Probably you also need to completely uninstall it, then reinstall it after a reboot.
Seriously, I think it's an older version. You may find an older version on a cover disk.
Probably you also need to completely uninstall it, then reinstall it after a reboot.
I might have an older version still knocking about on my HD - I'll have a look.
The only reason I upgraded was because of the nag screen. It was only after upgrading I discovered I could turn the nagging off. :/
Probably you also need to completely uninstall it, then reinstall it after a reboot.
Tried that - no joy.The only reason I upgraded was because of the nag screen. It was only after upgrading I discovered I could turn the nagging off. :/
You can still probably find "Sygate personal firewall" install somewhere on the net. It is really good. You can search for filename spf.exe thats the name of the installer (i still remember because i had to search for it thru my backups once).
The one built into xp is fine.
Guess what? it's just as good.
Guess what? it's just as good.
The one built into xp is fine.
Guess what? it's just as good.
Guess what? it's just as good.
Not really as it only filters incoming packets. Say for example your PC acquired a piece of spyware due to a security issue in the browser you used. The firewall built into XP would not alert you to the spyware sending info outwards but sygate(for example) would alert you straight away as that programme is not on its allowed list of network traffic.
No actually the xp firewall asked me a few times if some apps wont to be allowed access. The problem is when spyware uses something like the "Generic host process" to connect, then with sygate you can tell whats dragging your connection and what its doing and where it's sending.