Hm. Question.

[conuly]

Are some firewalls better than others? What's the best free one? I use two different anti-virus programs (not at the same time). Is it wise to also have two firewalls running, or is that just overkill? Why am I posting in the middle of the night, again?

Comments

[moggymania.livejournal.com]

If you're on cable/DSL, I'd say go with a cheap router that has a built-in firewall -- the software ones are a massive PITA that require quite a bit of configuration/reconfiguration/patching/problems. It's the difference between constant maintenance plus hours of setup vs. plugging the thing in and walking away.

Back when I was on 56k dial-up, I liked the firewall Norton offered, as well as ZoneAlarm. I also usually ran BlackIce as a backup... Not something I'd want to deal with again, since I hated doing all the configuration stuff (especially when the firewall would knock one or another service out), but as far as functionality they were okay.

I think there's also an open-source/freeware firewall out there, along the lines of AVG Anti-Virus, but I don't know offhand what it is called.

[malantha.livejournal.com]

I second the router thing!

[zathras26.livejournal.com]

So do I. Having the firewall on a separate machine in front of your computer is more secure.