Best freeware firewall

[Tango57]

I just wanted your opinion on this. What do you guys think is the best freeware firewall program out there. I've been using Zonealarm but is there a better firewall program out there besides this that offers better protection?? Is the Zonealarm Pro worth the upgrade?? Thanks for your input!

 

[Frazas]

Kerio Personal Firewall

 

[monzie]

Depends on what type of person you are (and how much you want to fine tune the settings)....and when ZA goes tits up......and it does....it can really mess things up.

All these are good:

Kerio PF (free)
Outpost (free) and Pro
Sygate Pro

This might go against the pervcieved wisdom but I do not think ZA or Norton make good firewall solutions.

Go with any of the above.

hth

 

[Frazas]

Originally posted by: monzie
This might go against the pervcieved wisdom but I do not think ZA or Norton make good firewall solutions.

I concur!

 

[bsmithy]

I use sygate personal firewall and it's pretty solid.

alot more control than ZA and without all the conflicts

 

[Nothinman]

Linux =)

 

[Sunner]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Linux =)

OpenBSD/pf

 

[Nothinman]

My firewall is a sparc64, last time I tried OpenBSD on it a lot of little things didn't work quite right. Linux/sparc is much more mature it seems, so I'll stick with it.

 

[yelo333]

Originally posted by: bsmithy
I use sygate personal firewall and it's pretty solid.

alot more control than ZA and without all the conflicts

In Complete Agreement.

 

[Sunner]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
My firewall is a sparc64, last time I tried OpenBSD on it a lot of little things didn't work quite right. Linux/sparc is much more mature it seems, so I'll stick with it.

Well, my oppinion on what OS to use on a SPARC box is probably somewhat well known for visitors of the OS forum
I just never liked ipchains/iptables, pf rules all.

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: Sunner

Originally posted by: Nothinman
My firewall is a sparc64, last time I tried OpenBSD on it a lot of little things didn't work quite right. Linux/sparc is much more mature it seems, so I'll stick with it.

Well, my oppinion on what OS to use on a SPARC box is probably somewhat well known for visitors of the OS forum
I just never liked ipchains/iptables, pf rules all.

Does OpenBSD support mutlicasting routing? I am getting a new firewall machine...(a 500mhz pentium with 128 megs of ram to replace my junker 200mmx firewall/router) and want to play around with it a bit more then my old router.

 

[Mem]

ZoneAlarm and Sygate are my favourite free Firewalls,there`re a few more to choose from.

 

[Tango57]

thanks everyone for your input! i'll try each of your suggestions. testing out the sysgate right now. just gotta love these forums!

 

[Davegod75]

http://www.smoothwall.org

 

[Abhoth]

Originally posted by: bsmithy
I use sygate personal firewall and it's pretty solid.

alot more control than ZA and without all the conflicts

Ditto from me here... Sygate is so way better than ZA.

Get the free one here... http://smb.sygate.com/products/spf_standard.htm

Here's a help page someone put up... http://bellsouthpwp.net/i/k/ikpe/SygateBasics.html

 

[TheWart]

another vote for kerio

 

[Mitzi]

Originally posted by: TheWart
another vote for kerio

I switched from ZoneAlarm to Sygate to Kerio. I believe Kerio to be the best free Windows based software firewall.

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: Frazas

Originally posted by: monzie
This might go against the pervcieved wisdom but I do not think ZA or Norton make good firewall solutions.

I concur!

I agree also.

ZA caused numerous problems for me, so at this point I'm running only the WinXP ICF. However, a software firewall is certainly something that I should be using, so I'll probably try this Kerio firewall that everyone seems to love.

 

[Robor]

Originally posted by: monzie
Depends on what type of person you are (and how much you want to fine tune the settings)....and when ZA goes tits up......and it does....it can really mess things up.
hth

I've experienced a ZA "tit's up" once. Never again ZA, never again... :disgust:

 

[eigen]

Kerio ++

 

[Armitage]

Originally posted by: Davegod75
http://www.smoothwall.org

I'm going to try setting up smoothwall on an old PPro 200 this weekend. Was using Freesco on a 486 box until I got DSL

 

[Rottie]

I have seen people are not happy with ZoneAlarm but I am curious about Pro version? I have no problem with Pro version 3 and then now 4.0...I used default setting and nothing is wrong.

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: Rottie
I have seen people are not happy with ZoneAlarm but I am curious about Pro version? I have no problem with Pro version 3 and then now 4.0...I used default setting and nothing is wrong.

ZA Pro prevented my applications which require the FTP protocol (ftp.exe, Macromedia Dreamweaver, etc.) from working, despite those applications being in ZA's "allow" list. It also somehow caused my ICS computer (the one it was running on) to drop LAN connectivity every few days and as such required a reboot since there would be no other way to restore local network function (yes, my ethernet adapter was in the Local Zone). It was a general PITA, so I went back to plain ol' ICF, despite that being less "secure" in the outbound security area than ZA.

 

[screw3d]

What do you mean when ZA goes "tits up"? What happens?

 

[monzie]

C'mon.... 'tits up' (a good old anglo-saxon computer expression... circa AD1283) means dead or dying (on its back...ie>tits up) or simply broken/kapputt/knackered/bolloxed/not working correctly/fcuked etc.

Both ZA and Norton go tits up regulary.