Is windows 7 firewall enough?

[knk17forever]

Is windows 7 firewall enough... I am using zonealarm at the moment... but it is becoming annoying to me and some of my game on demand platforms are not working properly and thinking about ditching zonealarm and just going with windows 7 firewall... is this enough?

Thoughts?

 

[I be he]

No. Its the same with most A/V's also.
Sandboxie is your friend

 

[Golden]

Hi,

It depends on your surfing/download habits. From a "normal" browsing/surfing/gaming perspective, then YES, Windows Firewall is more than adequate.

Regards,
Golden

 

[metalmania31]

People still use Zone Alarm?

 

[zigzag3143]

Afraid so.

The win 7 firewall is enough.

 

[JMH]

For Windows 7 OS the Windows Firewall is recommended as being appropriate.

No firewall can protect you absolutely if you DON'T surf sensibly staying away from sites known to cause problems.
NEVER randomly click on things you know nothing about.

In addition -
ALWAYS use
* Anti Virus plus Anti Malware software,
* have a router plus firewall,
* keep all relevant programs updated & scan on a regular basis for infections.

 

[SIW2]

You can test your settings here :

  Home of Gibson Research Corporation  

Click Services>Shields Up

 

[Ciara]

Hi knk17forever Windows Firewall is a good one to use, please see here ... http://www.sevenforums.com/system-s...decent-firewall-suggestion-5.html#post1304265

 

[fafhrd]

It is an interesting discussion. Modern home routers do a good job at hiding home PCs from port scanners on the internet, as anyone who visits GRC (above post) will testify. If your router is leaky, or you do not have any firewall device between your modem and PC, it is probably a wise investment to get one or it's time to request a replacement from your ISP if the device is their property.

With most people today having broadband connections from their router between their PCs and their ISP, with NAT and private IP addresses in the range 192.168.xxx.xxx, what is the function of a software firewall on the user PC?

I use Linux versions on several multibooting PCs, and have never set up UFW, IPTables, IPchains or other Firewall management software. I have the same browsing habits on Linux as I do on Windows. It would be pretty easy for someone who had penetrated my system to scan my keyboard buffer for the occurrence of "sudo" then log the next few tens of keystrokes to get my root password. Once and they would have a pretty good guess. Twice, and they would be certain.

But I don't get hacked, or at least, not in away that has ever harmed me, my PC or has ever been in any way noticeable.

Windows firewall is so passive I don't notice it at all. I cannot find a pfirewall.log file in any of my systems. Is it doing anything at all?

Then again, I don't online game or practice anything other than safe hex, so why should I be troubled.

 

[Layback Bear]

I have used Windows 7 built in firewall for over a year now with no problems. I have used Norton, KIS, Z/A, and some others all with problems. Windows 7 has never give me a problem.

 

[Ciara]

I have used a few 3rd party Firewalls but today I use Windows 7 Firewall (configured), its a great two way Firewall

 

[Karln]

I have used a few 3rd party Firewalls but today I use Windows 7 Firewall (configured), its a great two way Firewall

Yes it's just difficult to configure for windows live applications in advanced mode and winupdate also.

 

[seth500]

It's not as easy to configure as my firewall or as effective but it will do ya if you don't mind having to go into it and setup "some" rules manually but it I feel it needs to have other hardware and software firewalls added such as your router and a third party "realtime protection" firewall and antimalware in todays internet..

 

[severedsolo]

I have used a few 3rd party Firewalls but today I use Windows 7 Firewall (configured), its a great two way Firewall

Yes it's just difficult to configure for windows live applications in advanced mode and winupdate also.

Eh? Windows Firewall does that for you, should be no need to fiddle with it.

to the OP: If you are behind a router with a built in hardware firewall (IE pretty much any router) then yes, the Windows Firewall is more than enough.

If however you are using a Modem, then it may be a good idea to look into a 3rd party Firewall such as Comodo Antivirus Firewall Software and SSL Certificate - Internet Security Software from Comodo which is IMO anyway, a hell of a lot better than ZA, (Although I loved ZA for many years, it just breaks so much in Windows 7)

The default Windows Firewall leaves Ports 443 and 49519 wide open, other than that it does a great job, and as i said, a hardware firewall negates that anyway.

 

[pparks1]

For the overwhelming majority of people the built-in firewall should be sufficient. It is what I use, and I've not run into issues. There are other more advanced products out there like Comodo firewall, and these are suitable for the paranoid types who want to make sure that no application accesses the Internet without their direct consent.

While I have dabbled with Comodo and such in the past, usually I run into things like setting up rules for RDP which become more troublesome than they are worth and often cause problems in unique situations that I wouldn't have expected. These issues cause me to be less efficient and effective while often providing features and protection that I simply don't need.

 

[Ciara]

I have used a few 3rd party Firewalls but today I use Windows 7 Firewall (configured), its a great two way Firewall

Yes it's just difficult to configure for windows live applications in advanced mode and winupdate also.

Eh? Windows Firewall does that for you, should be no need to fiddle with it.

to the OP: If you are behind a router with a built in hardware firewall (IE pretty much any router) then yes, the Windows Firewall is more than enough.

If however you are using a Modem, then it may be a good idea to look into a 3rd party Firewall such as Comodo Antivirus Firewall Software and SSL Certificate - Internet Security Software from Comodo which is IMO anyway, a hell of a lot better than ZA, (Although I loved ZA for many years, it just breaks so much in Windows 7)

The default Windows Firewall leaves Ports 443 and 49519 wide open, other than that it does a great job, and as i said, a hardware firewall negates that anyway.

I used ZA for some time but got fed up with (allow pop ups), just wondering what does it break ?

 

[severedsolo]

Ciara, bear in mind that the following all occurred when WIndows 7 was still new, so they may have been fixed, but here are some links outlining the problems I had:

http://www.sevenforums.com/system-security/151165-win-defender-real-time-protection.html
http://www.sevenforums.com/system-security/78321-firewall-choice.html#post684396
http://www.sevenforums.com/crashes-debugging/70511-dump-analysis-please.html

In a nutshell, it was ripping the NTFS filesystem to shreds every time it scanned. On top of this, it wasn't stealthing ports properly, even with all options properly configured.

 

[Ciara]

Thanks for the info Martin

 

[knk17forever]

Thanks everyone for replies and input.

Hi knk17forever Windows Firewall is a good one to use, please see here ... http://www.sevenforums.com/system-s...decent-firewall-suggestion-5.html#post1304265

And thanks for this link now I can learn how to configure my Windows 7 fire wall!

P.S. Your avatar is hot... very hot... I want one... in rl that is

 

[knk17forever]

I have used a few 3rd party Firewalls but today I use Windows 7 Firewall (configured), its a great two way Firewall

Yes it's just difficult to configure for windows live applications in advanced mode and winupdate also.

Eh? Windows Firewall does that for you, should be no need to fiddle with it.

to the OP: If you are behind a router with a built in hardware firewall (IE pretty much any router) then yes, the Windows Firewall is more than enough.

If however you are using a Modem, then it may be a good idea to look into a 3rd party Firewall such as Comodo Antivirus Firewall Software and SSL Certificate - Internet Security Software from Comodo which is IMO anyway, a hell of a lot better than ZA, (Although I loved ZA for many years, it just breaks so much in Windows 7)

The default Windows Firewall leaves Ports 443 and 49519 wide open, other than that it does a great job, and as i said, a hardware firewall negates that anyway.

Yeah my modem has a built in hardware firewall... I was playing a lot of worldofwarcraft for awhile and configured it for those ports... I need to close them again now I suppose as I am not playing that game much at all anymore.

Thanks again all!!!