Free Firewall

  • Thread starter Thread starter MightyKitten
  • Start date Start date
Pro's and Con's against ZoneAlarm and Kerio 2.1.5?
MightyKitten

--
Click to expand...

Hi:

Zone Alarm (when I was using it a long time ago) I found it Bloated, but did
a great job (with the few exceptions when it crashed leaving the internet
directly exposed)

Kerio Version 2.15 (or 2.??) is what I tried out, and found very resource
friendly, and never crashed on me in all the time i had it installed.

Kerio has a newer versions out that I don't like.. I found it a bit more
bloated than V2.

Personally I'd eccomend V2.15 (or like that) for stability, and resurce
friendlyness.

it'll be hard to convince me of a better app, and version.

Hope this helps
 
No_Name wrote:
<SNIP>

Thanks for your efforts, but I was rather more curious about the Wyvernworks
Firewall.
I'm currently only able to use my 'production' computer, so I rather
wouldn't want to install or try out any software on it without testing or at
least a positive (confir/infor)mation from this newsgroup.

MightyKitten
 
MightyKitten said:
Thanks for your efforts, but I was rather more curious about the Wyvernworks
Firewall.
I'm currently only able to use my 'production' computer, so I rather
wouldn't want to install or try out any software on it without testing or at
least a positive (confir/infor)mation from this newsgroup.
Click to expand...

I'm interested enough to have a look. I should be able to put a post
in within a day or to.
 
MightyKitten said:
T.I.A. for your efforts. I'll be looking foreward for your findings.
Click to expand...

You could always put a post into comp.security.firewalls as well;
there are some knowledgeable types in there.
 
MightyKitten said:
Can someone tell me about this firewall?
http://www.wyvernworks.com/firewall.html
Is it any good?
Click to expand...

I've just spent half an hour with it on 98SE and think it is
absolutely awful. I assume it is configurable, but I got bored trying.
I launched MyIE2 and was warned it might be a trojan and to block it.
I allowed it and was able to browse.
I launched The Bat!, was warned it was a trojan, allowed it, but was
unable to connect to the pop server.
I launched IE6, allowed it, and was unable to browse.
I launched Agent and got a silly error message about not having enough
memory to find the winsock. No notice box at all from the FW. I
manually added Agent to the 'allow' list but still had no joy. Neither
could I get PowerGrab, or NewsBin Pro to go online... again, I got no
pop up box of any kind from the FW.
At some point during an increasingly frustrated half an hour I decided
to RTFM. 'Help' is online and I was blocked from it. :-)

So my feeling is that if you want this level of protection you might
as well take the hardware route of unplugging the phone line.

I'm sure it must be possible for someone more patient than me to get
some sort of functionality out of this program, but AFAICS it is
wholly non configurable even if you can get it working.

One thing to be said in its favour is that it makes Zone Alarm look
good which is an achievement of sorts.

So stick with Kerio or Sygate...

(This being usenet I am sure that everyone and his brother, inc the
writer of the app, are now going to come out of the woodwork and
reprimand me for my lack of patience and point out the ease with which
one can fine tune the app to only allow outgoing UDP packets on port
54879)
 
jo wrote:

<Snip>

Point taken. It goes from the Freeware storage for now. As soon as I get my
test machine running again, I'll try it on W2K untill then, this package is
grounded.

Thanks for testing

MightyKitten
 
Zone Alarm (when I was using it a long time ago) I found it Bloated, but did
a great job (with the few exceptions when it crashed leaving the internet
directly exposed)

Kerio Version 2.15 (or 2.??) is what I tried out, and found very resource
friendly, and never crashed on me in all the time i had it installed.

Kerio has a newer versions out that I don't like.. I found it a bit more
bloated than V2.

Personally I'd eccomend V2.15 (or like that) for stability, and resurce
friendlyness.

it'll be hard to convince me of a better app, and version.

Hope this helps
Click to expand...

I feel the same as ZoneAlarm is quite bloated but the they (the company)
try to maintain 7mb plus of memory usage (even the latest ZoneAlarm
Pro).

Even Kerio V2.15 no so bloated but it do occupy 6mb plus of memory usage
in my Win98 OS.

Quit interesting right ?
 
| I've just spent half an hour with it on 98SE and think it is
| absolutely awful. I assume it is configurable, but I got bored
trying.
| I launched MyIE2 and was warned it might be a trojan and to
block it.
| I allowed it and was able to browse.
| I launched The Bat!, was warned it was a trojan, allowed it,
but was
| unable to connect to the pop server.
| I launched IE6, allowed it, and was unable to browse.
| I launched Agent and got a silly error message about not having
enough
| memory to find the winsock. No notice box at all from the FW. I
| manually added Agent to the 'allow' list but still had no joy.
Neither
| could I get PowerGrab, or NewsBin Pro to go online... again, I
got no
| pop up box of any kind from the FW.
| At some point during an increasingly frustrated half an hour I
decided
| to RTFM. 'Help' is online and I was blocked from it. :-)
|
| So my feeling is that if you want this level of protection you
might
| as well take the hardware route of unplugging the phone line.
|
| I'm sure it must be possible for someone more patient than me
to get
| some sort of functionality out of this program, but AFAICS it
is
| wholly non configurable even if you can get it working.
|
| One thing to be said in its favour is that it makes Zone Alarm
look
| good which is an achievement of sorts.
|
| So stick with Kerio or Sygate...
|

Thanks, from me, too, jo, for doing the usability analysis.
Let's not forget Agnitum Outpost, too. I think it's time to
discuss this one some more.

Usability looms large in my life. I say this being a diehard
advocate of the all-time writing software masterpiece known for
its steep learning curve, _XyWrite_. This was the ultimate
heavy-duty, two-fisted, cigar-chomping publication package that
many of us have read without knowing it (the pages of The New
York Times and in almost all publications put out on PCs before
WYSIWYG).

One of the damn worst experiences with software is getting bogus
error messages. They send the user on wild goose chases that can
last for hours, even days. A program that produces more than one
upon first use is suspect in my book. I put it in the same bag as
crashing.

Richard
 
Richard said:
One of the damn worst experiences with software is getting bogus
error messages. They send the user on wild goose chases that can
last for hours, even days. A program that produces more than one
upon first use is suspect in my book. I put it in the same bag as
crashing.
Click to expand...

Yep.

I have no objection to steep learning curves, providing I feel the
software is working with me and rewarding my efforts with increased
functionality. I discard quite quickly software that makes me jump
through hoops just to get it to do what it ought to do anyway.

The default response of the FW under discusion appears to be to assume
that any outbound connection is a trojan, apart from its very limited
DB of apps it has heard of, eg Internet Explorer. Which it did not
allow anyway. :-)

AtGuard remains the best ever FW IMHO. I wish they had released the
code to the open source community rather than selling it to bloody
Norton.
 
| Richard Steinfeld wrote:
|
| >One of the damn worst experiences with software is getting
bogus
| >error messages. They send the user on wild goose chases that
can
| >last for hours, even days. A program that produces more than
one
| >upon first use is suspect in my book. I put it in the same bag
as
| >crashing.
|
| Yep.
|
| I have no objection to steep learning curves, providing I feel
the
| software is working with me and rewarding my efforts with
increased
| functionality. I discard quite quickly software that makes me
jump
| through hoops just to get it to do what it ought to do anyway.
|
| The default response of the FW under discusion appears to be to
assume
| that any outbound connection is a trojan, apart from its very
limited
| DB of apps it has heard of, eg Internet Explorer. Which it did
not
| allow anyway. :-)
|
| AtGuard remains the best ever FW IMHO. I wish they had released
the
| code to the open source community rather than selling it to
bloody
| Norton.

The peculiar thing to me is that I recall hearing only negatives
about the "Norton" firewall. Actually Symantec. Symantec to me is
tied with Intuit as having the most contemptuous customer
relations after the sale of any software outfit I've ever dealt
with. No more bucks from this ex-customer.

Richard
 
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