Firewall/Antivirus

[Tatu]

Two years ago I got the bloatotron of all, McAffee Home Office which contained 60 peices of crappy software I didn't need. Such a waste of money and time and space. I promised myself I would never touch anything McAffee again.

I got paranoid with my always-on connection so I went to get a new unfat antivirus program and firewall software. I chose Norton Internet Security 2001 which had both in one package. Guess what I discover after I installed? Norton and McAffee are both from the same company. Yay.

So, is Norton firewall any good?

1. What antivirus software do you use? What do you wish you used?

2. What firewall software do you use? What do you wish you used?

Tatu

[frankc]

Tatu, dunno 'bout Norton FW, but I've been a user of their antivirus software for some years now and have been happy.[nbsp][nbsp]Only real change I've seen is that now virus signature updates are limited to 1 yr without renewing access or upgrading to that year's version.

For a firewall, I use ZoneAlarm Pro.

Both have trapped viruses and other mischief.[nbsp][nbsp]I've been happy with 'em both.

It's like Chev vs Ford vs Dodge, et al--a whole lotta personal taste/preference but at the core, they're all roughly equal.[nbsp][nbsp]As long as the sigs are updated every 2 wks you're OK.[nbsp][nbsp]I *do* like Norton's "Live Update" feature.

[nbsp][nbsp]Frank

[janderk]

I've used MCAffee for a long time. Normally its OK, but I ran into terrable problems with the 4.0.x version on Windows ME and 2000. They refused to boot with MCAffee installed. Installing a newer version and some patches repaired the problems.

For a software firewall go with ZoneAlarm (www.zonelabs.com (http://www.zonelabs.com)). It is really good, easy to install and free for personal use.

Jan Derk

[Tibbits]

Take a look at Sygate Personal Firewall.. it's free and a darn sight more configurable than Zonealarm:)

http://www.sygate.com/products/shield_ov.htm

[jimbo]

I use Norton AntiVirus 2001, and it has served me well.

I use Zone Alarm, and I love it.[nbsp][nbsp]It gives you the basics, and lets you decide what to let in and let out of your machine.

-jim

[Shalazar]

I had a lot of problems with ZoneAlarm, which is what made me go with BlackIce Defender (www.networkice.com (http://www.networkice.com)), and I'll never look back.

It is an excellent firewall program, IMO.[nbsp][nbsp]Very easy and intuitive interface, multiple security levels, and an excellent history and logging utility which references each possible attack and logs the intruders information (can even go so far as getting the computer and network's name!).[nbsp][nbsp]What I like best about the program is the advICE button in the intrusion window.[nbsp][nbsp]Clicking on a particular intrusion type and clicking the button takes you to their homepage which details the attack, and gives possible fixes to better secure yourself in the future.

It passes grc.com Shields Up test with flying colors.[nbsp][nbsp]And I recently had my system hammered by the CyberCop scanning suite (over 3000 windows and network vulnerability tests), and BlackICE only flagged 3 out of 3000 intrusion attempts as a serious threat to its security.[nbsp][nbsp]Mind you, this was running at the middle level of security, not even its Paranoid! level.

I recommend it to whomever I possibly can. :)

[YFS200]

Norton says only one year, but that's just for the auto update thing. You can tell download the 5mb sig files from their site.

As for use, I use Norton for everything. It runs on the fileserver and since all email is stored on that server, it detects the virus on all of the systems email clients.

ZoneAlarm is really cool and simple. I like it and it runs full time on the fileserver. But that's a firewall behind a firewall.

I found that Norton Internet Security Family edition is quite good. The normal Norton Internet Security was too hard to setup. The Family edition has a more user frendly UI. The filtering is quite good.

Speaking of, does anyone know of a good proxy based filtering software? My home network is to large and has way to many OS's (Win9x, WinNT, Linux, IMac(soon maybe)).[nbsp][nbsp]I would rather put a proxy filter on the NT server for each computer to use. But I can't find anything thats not for a large corp and cost lots of $$$$.

YFS200

[Tatu]

McAfee (no URL) SUCKS-and I agree whole-heartedly!!! Any one who actually likes McAfee or thinks it's OK (no offense, Jan) just hasn't tried anything else.

It isn't different from Norton comparing virus data files (it would make sense for them to be the same since they are both under one company), but they are both different beasts when it comes to using them.

Is Sophos really good? I've only heard about them two times. At least Norton has teams in a list of different countries, so I'd think they'd be much quicker to the punch regarding virus information and fixes.

-Tatu

[tedloh]

Sophos (www.sophos.com (http://www.sophos.com)) is EXCELLENT.

Norton (www.sarc.com (http://www.sarc.com)) is NOT BAD.

McAfee (no URL) SUCKS.

[tedloh]

They all have teams all over the place; furthermore, they generally share data.

Sophos is excellent if you don't mind downloading virus signature files by hand - but they are generally 1 or 2 K each so time is not a factor :)

Norton is good because you don't have to do anything other than click on LiveUpdate.

McAfee sucks.[nbsp][nbsp]The people there (with one exception) suck, and they are only concerned with the bottom line.
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Ted (Chief Do-It-All)
Got2Bet.com - The Net's Winner's Circle
http://www.got2bet.com
ted@tygresystems.com