New
#11
My two cents are that if you are behind a hardware firewall, there is really no need for a 3rd party software firewall. As pparks said, I am also in the camp of not caring about outbound, as I only use trusted software, stuff that I know what it's doing.
The Windows firewall is more than adequate for a machine behind a decent (and well configured) router. If you are really concerned about blocking all but trusted (by which I mean, stuff you personally allow) outbound connections, well Windows Firewall does that as well, with this Windows7FirewallControl: Sphinx Software
Having said that, if you aren't behind a router, then yes, I would recommend a 3rd party firewall, simply because Windows FIrewall leaves a couple of ports (443 off the top of my head, but there is another) always open because of Windows update and such.
Not to mention Windows Firewall is the only software firewall I know of that doesn't mess with Homegroups and Workgroups straight out of the box.
Last edited by severedsolo; 12 Oct 2011 at 10:14. Reason: Windows firewall isn't 3rd party... stupid typo