Sygate Personal Firewall alternative?

mt12345 · 10 Aug 2014

I miss old good Sygate Personal Firewall (XP). I need simple program that controls/monitors network traffic rather than protect me from hackers attack. SPF was perfect:
'Process xxxx is trying to connect to microsoft.com. Allow? yes/ no /remeber choice' or 'Application googleupdate.exe is trying to connect interenet. allow?' etc.
I installed zonealarm, restarted, launched firefox, startpage was loaded. Nobody asked me for permission for firefox to access internet

I think comodo works like spf, I tried it years ago, but I dont want to waste 200+ MB download on mobile broadband connection... Any recommendations? Freeware only.

andrew129260 · 10 Aug 2014

Sounds like you would like tinywall. It works with windows firewall to give you outbound protection.

The average user who has a router (which in it has a hardware based firewall which should be on) combined with windows firewall is more then enough protection. A software firewall will only cause issues and drain system resources. In my opinion, they are completely unnecessary. A common argument is that with comodo or zonealarm and other similar firewalls you can block programs from connecting to the internet. I say if you do not trust the program to connect to the internet, you should not have it in the first place installed on your pc which essentially defeats that argument.

That is what Virtual Machines are for

However, it is up to you :)

mt12345 · 10 Aug 2014

Thank you for answer. As I mentioned before, it's not about protection, it's rather minimising and controlling internet use and connections. My laptop connects to internet via android phone (wifi hot-spot - kinda router?). Android is Linux. Linux kernel has firewall built-in so I guess I am protected. Back in the day on XP machine I was using SPF to block IExplorer and lot of Windows services/processes - applications installed by default in Windows - quite hard to remove. Example: I installed iTunes because it has very good CD to mp3 converter but I don't want my laptop to connect to Apple website to check for updates. I dont need latest visualisations etc. (yes I know I can disable 'check for updates' in preferences but...) I tried tinywall - size impressive, 8x smaller than spf. It does the job, but whitelist'ing is inconvenient. I removed WindowsUpdate from whitelist but still I am not sure whether other system processes try to connect to microsoft etc. In SPF it was clear: any attempt of connecting to net, instant pop-up window; allow? yes,no. BTW I'm dualbooting linux/windows and use VM in linux to run... other linux'es. With networking enabled.

mt12345 · 10 Aug 2014

if tinywall is just windows firewall extension It will obviously not block any windows processes

andrew129260 · 10 Aug 2014

If you want something beefy, comodo firewall is the way to go.

It will warn you about everything. And I mean everything. The original install won't, you have to tweak its settings to get it to behave like you want.

mt12345 · 11 Aug 2014

I need features from comodo with footprint of tinywall. (Downloading comodo). About draining system resources: I think firewall helps to prevent it. Especially on slow connections. Antivirus programs are usually resource-hungry. Panda (in your signature) is lightweight but not 100% secure. I don't use antivirus software at all but firewall is a must. Thanks! Martin

andrew129260 · 11 Aug 2014

Nothing is 100% secure. But panda does well in the higher categories for testing and usually comes out near the top. Using a pc without antivirus is not very smart. A antivirus is a must, as well as something like malwarebytes as a second opinion.

No matter the firewall, they can be easily fooled. Malware can get past any firewall easily.

mt12345 · 11 Aug 2014

Well perhaps my antivirus ranking is outdated. I was using panda few years ago and convinced some friends to switch. We all get infected some time later and those who stayed with Avast resisted the attacks. I use linux for internet, from time to time I use windows OFFLINE to use some windows-only software. Sometimes I go online to google this or that, download tutorial etc. but I never do banking or even email under windows. I know firewall can be hacked easily (comodo is known example) but as I mentioned I dont fear attacks from outside, I simply want to block the traffic. I will check malwarebytes though. Regarding your signature: many of my friends replaced ccleaner with glary utilities, if I was regular windows user I would use avg pc tuneup, (but it's not free and again, draining resources).

andrew129260 · 11 Aug 2014

Here is the latest test results:

AV-Comparatives Independent Tests of Anti-Virus Software » AV-Comparatives

AV-TEST | Home | Comparative tests of antivirus software for Windows and reviews of anti-malware Apps for Android

I never have been a fan of glary utilities, it is a known cause of BSODS. CCleaner is clean and powerful. Avast was a lot better before, but now panda is leading. Avast used to be the top so I am not surprised by your statement. I used to love avast and it was the main one I recommended. When avast started shoving ads in my face constantly and got annoying with the constant year email register I dumped it.

After doing so and switching to panda, I noticed how much lighter panda is. For laptops I still recommend avast. Panda works best with always on internet connection.

mt12345 · 12 Aug 2014

Panda is a cloud service, no need to 'update virus database', whenever you connect to internet the database is up to date on the server. With Avast (and others) you connect to internet and start browsing with outdated database. Thus I would recommend Panda for people who connect to internet not often (like me). I would say no matter what antivirus you use, it works the best if you are constantly online. What do you mean by avast for laptops?