Thread: Point me to a good free Firewall App.

So I wanna get rid of Norton. I have Ad-Aware, I'll download AVG for viruses. What is the firewall tool that everyone is downloading?
This is for a desktop with a high speed connection, and occasional file sharing on a home network.
Zone Alarm?
Please no flaming, I'm getting RID of Norton. Any tips on getting is filthy tentacles out of the depths of my registry are also welcome.

ZoneAlarm is still free, but they increasingly encourage you to buy add-ons: http://download.zonelabs.com/bin/fre...seHistory.html

If you are planning on a dedicated box, monowall is pretty good and easy to use.

Otherwise... FirewallPAPI... But really why bother. Chances are you're NATed anyway.

Originally Posted by Nobody Famous

ZoneAlarm is still free, but they increasingly encourage you to buy add-ons: http://download.zonelabs.com/bin/fre...seHistory.html

I use this app as well...

Although it is a paid service, I would recommend getting Panda online security.

http://www.pandasecurity.com/usa/

Last year in testing it came in #1 (above McAffe, Norton, etc...) in internet security. I use it myself, and it is very user friendly/does not interfere. In my honest opinion, I would spend the $40 and get a high-quality internet security. Its just not worth the risk these days.

Originally Posted by mmmthmtskier

I use this app as well...

thirdeded

Having worked at Symantec (Norton) I can say that the only way you are getting rid of Norton is nuke and pave.

Windows firewall works well enough.

^not^

ZA and Avast! is a good combo, and that's what I run. They play well together.

Windows firewall only blocks incoming traffic, where ZA will monitor outgoing as well. t least that's my understanding.

Windows firewall + common sense then If are careful with what you install, keep os and applications updated, and don't click on links in spam emails, you really shouldn't need anything else.

iptables

For a better than Windows SP2 software firewall (which is only checking incoming not anything outgoing), as others have stated you can load up Zonealarm (Free) or 2 other free ones I'd look at are Comodo or a third one out there is Kerio now called Sunbelt Personal Firewall Software.

Your other option is to instead of getting a free AV solution look at a few of the paid (but cheaper than Norton) offerings that do 2 year licenses of Anti-virus, firewall, spyware, etc. Most go by the Internet Security moniker like Bitdefender Internet Security is 2 years license on up to 3 computers, for about the same as Norton's 1 year basic AV. AVG has a full suite of AV, Firewall, and Spyware called AVG Internet Security. Kaspersky likewise. These many times include Spam software too for under $50.

I used to have like 6 different free apps I downloaded: spyware, adware, defrag, registry scrubber, cache/temp file cleaner, antivirus. I diligently updated them and ran them. Some appeared to be doing stuff, some I wasn't so sure.

Then our shop pc's went tits up. Called a pc guy and he came and rescued our ass. Turns out the hard drive was dying. Nearly lost everything, but he saved everything. He was a nice guy and seemed to know his stuff, certainly more than me.

Long story short: this pc guy told me all free utility software is crap and just bogs down your pc, draining resources.

Opinions?

Zonealarm, plus a wireless router.

I was told that a router functions as a hardware firewall, and can block some things better than a software firewall (e.g. Zonealarm), and the best (and cheapest) way to do this for home use was to have both. I think my wireless router cost something like $20, and is used just for wi-fi internet access at home (laptop on occasion, 2nd desktop upstairs for the kids).

Originally Posted by Gordyman

I used to have like 6 different free apps I downloaded: spyware, adware, defrag, registry scrubber, cache/temp file cleaner, antivirus. I diligently updated them and ran them. Some appeared to be doing stuff, some I wasn't so sure.

Then our shop pc's went tits up. Called a pc guy and he came and rescued our ass. Turns out the hard drive was dying. Nearly lost everything, but he saved everything. He was a nice guy and seemed to know his stuff, certainly more than me.

Long story short: this pc guy told me all free utility software is crap and just bogs down your pc, draining resources.

Opinions?

Did he try and sell you something? There are good free open source stuff out there. (Speaking from over 25 years of PC support), and there are free applications out there that are complete junk too (worst than a virus that can infect you).

So I would say that his logic that some free package led to your drive dieing could be complete bull (but you do not state which free stuff you were using)- if you read about any of the spyware, trojan, etc. packages many will recommend free ones that are just as good as some purchased ones. Anti-virus is a little different in my opinion- 4 are available AVG, Avast, ClamAV, and AntiVir and each has some limits in either licensing, a feature they do not include in their free version but do in their paid versions, or have some sort of nag screen trying to get you to pirchase their paid package.

Originally Posted by stuckathuntermtn

So I wanna get rid of Norton. I have Ad-Aware, I'll download AVG for viruses. What is the firewall tool that everyone is downloading?
This is for a desktop with a high speed connection, and occasional file sharing on a home network.
Zone Alarm?
Please no flaming, I'm getting RID of Norton. Any tips on getting is filthy tentacles out of the depths of my registry are also welcome.

Zone alarm is good, but it is a software firewall....The best solution (least system intensive) is to get a hardware firewall. Something other than your computer that runs the firewall. That way your computer doesn't have that running in the backround.

I believe you can get routers to do the job, or if you set up a file server as an access point to the internet, you can run a firewall on that machine. that way the machine you use doesn't need to run it.

Originally Posted by RShea

Did he try and sell you something? There are good free open source stuff out there. (Speaking from over 25 years of PC support), and there are free applications out there that are complete junk too (worst than a virus that can infect you).

So I would say that his logic that some free package led to your drive dieing could be complete bull ....

He did not try to sell me anything. He recommended CA Security Center that I could download free from my telephone/internet provider. He also didn't say that the free utility apps killed my hard drive. Our shop computer is a $400 eMachines, so the hard drive failing was no surprise.

I had Spybot, AVG, Ccleaner, Ad-aware, Spywareblaster, Auslogics Disk Defragger, RegScrub, and maybe a couple other.

Originally Posted by Gordyman

He did not try to sell me anything. He recommended CA Security Center that I could download free from my telephone/internet provider. He also didn't say that the free utility apps killed my hard drive. Our shop computer is a $400 eMachines, so the hard drive failing was no surprise.

I had Spybot, AVG, Ccleaner, Ad-aware, Spywareblaster, Auslogics Disk Defragger, RegScrub, and maybe a couple other.

When I read you mentioning a PC Tech- I was thinking some store guy- like Geek Squad, not an in house IT person.
If it was an EMachine then that explains part of the issue, they have the cheapest power supplies of any brand out there. When the power supply goes it usually takes some other device with it- motherboard or motherboard and CPU, hard drive, etc.

Of the ones you listed the last 2 utils I have never used. The others are solid packages (some others out there are not AVG fans) and the free edition of AVG is licensed for non-networked, non commercial usage (home PC's)- Ad-aware has also changed it's license for the free edition.

CA 2008 Internet Security Suite Plus package includes Etrust for anti-virus, an anti-spyware package that CA purchased some time back, personal firewall, anti-phishing and a backup. It does not have a defrag or registry utility to the best of my knowledge. However I have not seen any registry scrubbers or cleaners that I would trust to know the difference between legitimate software and bad software and be able to "clean" or scrub. Only way to have a trusted registry utility is one that monitors changes to the registry (which Spybot now does) and record changes and allow you to roll back to a previous date removing all changes made to the registry.

Defrag that is built into Windows is OK, Executive Software is probably the leader (and the one Microsoft licensed some time back to include in the Windows OS for free)

Hard drives die since they are one of the few moving parts inside a computer- they are built by one of probably 5 companies for every desktop system out there and a Dell, HP, Gateway/Emachine, Acer, etc. could be using Seagate (maxtor is owned by Seagate), Western Digital, Hitachi (was IBM drives) as the biggest market share. Fujitsu and Toshiba are the other 2 companies and they are a little more geared toward portable notebook drives.

If your ISP offers a software bundle with their services, and it is one installed on your PC and not just some on line only protection, then usually for the average home user, that can be good enough for Antivirus (as long as it is not Norton or McAfee's which have become memory hogs lately)

CCleaner and ATF Cleaner by Atribune are the 2 automatic temp file disk clean-up utilities I use the most (unless I do it manually). CCleaner does a few registry items, but I would not consider it a registry scrubber that can uninstall entries like a HiJackThis package can do with the proper knowledge.

the freebes avg free,ad aware & spybot

along with a hardware firewall ... no problems in almost 3 yaers

Originally Posted by Gordyman

I used to have like 6 different free apps I downloaded: spyware, adware, defrag, registry scrubber, cache/temp file cleaner, antivirus. I diligently updated them and ran them. Some appeared to be doing stuff, some I wasn't so sure.

Then our shop pc's went tits up. Called a pc guy and he came and rescued our ass. Turns out the hard drive was dying. Nearly lost everything, but he saved everything. He was a nice guy and seemed to know his stuff, certainly more than me.

Long story short: this pc guy told me all free utility software is crap and just bogs down your pc, draining resources.

Opinions?

When the tech referred to "free utility software" he was likely really talking about malware -- things advertised like "free toolbar that organizes your IE bookmarks for you!" or some such thing, where in reality it's really spyware or something more vicious like a keylogger. There are a vast number of legitimate, free utilities out there. Being able to tell the difference between the good and the bad is something of a crapshoot, though. For your particular case (bad disk), software tools, free or not, wouldn't have made a difference. I wouldn't steer away from well-known freely available tools -- some are better than the pay versions!


Firewall Comments:
If you're worried about inbound connections, a router is probably sufficient. NAT (Network Address Translation) was mentioned a bit earlier, but without explanation. Basically, if you're behind a router, systems outside of your local network can't talk to your computer unless you initiate that conversation through the router. So, for instance, if someone is maliciously and randomly trying to get to your computer, the router will see the connection come in, but have no idea where it's supposed to go and drop it. Incidentally, this is a big pain in the ass for lots of people trying to run bittorrent and various games from behind a router, but for security it's kind of nice.

For outgoing firewalls, you can't beat a dedicated, locked down machine sitting between you and the internet. Of course, if you were interested in spending the time building a server solely for this purpose, you probably wouldn't be asking this question. For a purely software solution, Zonealarm seems reasonable.