Firewalls

[Egeides]

Hi,

I'd like to know more about how to protect my computer without puting alot of time into this. Someone proposed my Sygate. Nice. But I'd like to know if there are things to know to use a firewall EFFICIENTLY. I already have ZoneAlarm and am presently trying Sygate. Is there any tweaking I should do? ZA seems more user-friendly, so is there some more advanced management I should do?

Basically, I'd like to know what I need to know about firewalls :)

[Super-ness]

yeh which one is better?

Zone, Macafee or Norton?

[Atomic Mitten]

McAffee ! but Sygate personal firewall is really good too and it's free !  ;)

[Egeides]

There's a McAfee firewall? I know it's an anti-virus, but I didn't knew it also had a firewall...

What makes it better than ZA or Sygate? What are the criterias to look at when we chose a firewall?

Also, I went on McAfee's website and it seems their firewall are yearly subscriptions (??). It's for updates I guess?

[gryphon]

I have been using the Professional and corporate version of Sygate for a long time. The only real bug it had in it was that with the home versions you had to make an advanced rule to block all traffic from and to the 127.x.x.x network range.

I still hate ZoneAlarm. and not just for the few versions they released with spyware just to get funds. It has more bugtrack errors topics then any other firewall.

McAfee isn't that bad. Easy to use and install and it doesn't have a lot of complicated settings.

Although the main argument on what a good firewall is should depend on what you need it for.

But you don't want to put a lot of time in it but and want to know more about advanced configurations ... . sorry to say but that seems a bit strange. Either take some time to learn the options and how-to's

[Gobalopper]

Kerio is pretty good to, I've been trying it out lately and don't have any complaints so far.

[Atomic Mitten]

McAffee Personal firewall costs just the price of the CD.

I think it's only the corporate version that costs a yearly subscription.

[Egeides]

gryphon, I want to put more time on understanding how a firewall is good or not, but I don't wish to start configuring, twitching, playing with the firewall. I just ant it to work simply. I just want to use these simple-to-use firewalls correctly and I want to be able to know which one fits me.

What spyware did ZA put exactly?