Win2k Firewall?

[derekjr_1]

What do you think the best firewall for win2k is? Zonelabs, Blackice, or Norton 2001? I need a firewall as I have always on cable access, but not sure what to get? Any ideas? I herd zonelabs doesn't protect good on win2k and only on 98. Any help again much appreciated. Thank's

 

[IamDavid]

I'm using norton now. I used to run Black Ice but had to many problems with it so I switched..

 

[The Wildcard]

I love ZoneAlarm. Might not be as good as Norton but it's free, lol.

 

[cirrus1]

I'm using Blackice Defender.

 

[Twilling]

Black Ice is decent for the money. And you know what the saying goes... You get what you pay for as far as zone alarm is concerned....

 

[tjll11a]

I use black ice defender. Never had any problems. Some times gets alittle crazy playing online games but other then that great software package. Was wondering if any of have a program that allows you to read the history files

 

[Davegod75]

twilling...zonealarm is actually very good.

 

[Moohooya]

Any other free ones worth considering? What does Blackice offer that zonealarm doesn't that I would wan't/need for a home network of two computers attached to a cable modem?

 

[syf3r]

blackice doesn't offer anything that zonealarm doesn't offer. twilling is wrong in implying that blackice is better because zonealarm is free. that isn't true. in terms of total features, zonealarm is better. blackice will only block incoming traffic per user-configurable danger levels. it will not allow you to block or allow an entire domain range (if you want to allow someone access to your machine and they are on a dynamic dialup account. try entering 255^4 numbers manually and you'll begin to understand the seriousness of *that* flaw. i contacted them long ago about that, the simple feature of allowing wildcards in the domain fields. nothing yet). zonealarm, on the other hand, while also not allowing domain wildcarding, *does* prevent traffic from coming in *and* going out... that means that if you somehow have a trojan horse installed on your machine, it will stop that trojan from contacting the server it is programmed to contact. blackice won't do that. blackice only cares about what's coming in, and doesn't try to stop anything going out. zonealarm does both. zonealarm will also recognize if one of your executables (i.e. netscape.exe) has been replaced with an altered or compromised copy (i.e. it has back-oriffice shrinkwrapped to it, or any other piggybacking trojan), and will stop it from accessing the net. blackice doesn't come close to that. i can't speak for norton 2001. i don't know if it will allow domain range wildcarding, which seems to me to be a feature most of these low-end firewalls are lacking. but to say that zonealarm isn't as good because it's free is just ridiculous and not a solid argument in any way.

-syf3r.

 

[Sunner]

I have a quick question for people using ZA.

A friend of mine has recently gotten DSL, but he doesnt know a whole lot about comps, so he asked me about firewall software.

I dont know a whole lot about personal firewalls, and setting up a real firewall at his place is sorta out of the question, so I recomended ZA based on oppinions expressed here

Anyway, it seems to be working fine, but Im just curious about one thing, is there no way to setup rules without that lame "easy to use" interface?

I took a quick peak at it when I was at his place recently, and the rules interface got me somewhat annoyed.
I'd really like a "cleaner" interface where you specify ports, protocol, etc etc without handholding, any way to get one in ZA?

Also, is there any way to block on a inbound/outbound basis, like I said I only had a short peak, but I couldnt find any way to do this.

 

[derekjr_1]

I decided to go with Blackice Defender 2.1cn. I think it is great! Kind of difficult to use but I had no problem figuring it out. The only concern is I want to know if the attack it being blocked. Are all attacks coming it blocked? I know you can clicj advICE, but that doesn't really tell you if the attack was blocked. Other than that I really like it..

 

[syf3r]

if you have your settings set to paranoid, it is being blocked. there are two views, or rather, two tabs which allow you to see your attackers. one is the "attacks" tab, which shows a list of attackers and attack-types which you can sort by the time they occured. right-click each attacker as it comes in and choose "block intruder forever". in the "intruders" tab, each attacker is also listed, once each. if it has a black circle with a line through it, that means that attacker has been set as blocked. that tab also shows each attack's severity and the originating ip. if it's a machine on your local network (as in the case of a university net or corporation) it may show you the netbios id which may or may not reveal the username of the person logged in at that terminal.
blackice used together with zonealarm is a good pair, because they both block incoming traffic, but zonealarm blocks outgoing traffic as wel as allowing certain applications to act as servers as you choose, which means you can control *how* each applications on your machine allows itself to be accessed from outside...

-syf3r.

 

[Moohooya]

Thanks for the help syf3r

Moohoo

 

[TomBilliodeaux]

Thank all for the discussion.
I'v been trying to decide about firwall protection.
I just d/l Zonealarm and love it.

 

[Biggs]

Additional information can be obtained right here.

 

[derekjr_1]

Yeah definetely, I have learned alot from this discussion. I however have chosen black ice defender, and I love it. Does everything that I need it to.. They both look like great programs however so pick one and you'll probably be set!

 

[tjll11a]

You people use blackice and zonealarm at the same time??????