SillyDog701

[dhump]

I have just gone through a week of re-formatting my hard drive and re-installing all of my programs and putting in back-ups due to what a computer tech guy told me was the result of the firewall I used -- Zone Alarm Pro 3.x. (and, possibly, the installation of Netscape 7.0)So, my question is this: Since I use DSL, do I NEED a firewall? If so, knowing the problems I ran into AFTER INSTALLING ZONE ALARM PRO, what firewall should I use? (I tried using Norton and had all sorts of problems with my system at an earler date). I am using PC-cillin as my anti-virus now and have not had any problems with getting on the internet but I fear not having a firewall will make me fulnerable to some other security problems. And one more question: has anyone had system or internet "surfing" problems with NS7? Any comments and/or advice is welcome.[/b]

UserAgent: Mozilla/4.8 [en]C-CCK-MCD AIT DSL (Win98; U)

[Fulvio]

I have just gone through a week of re-formatting my hard drive and re-installing all of my programs and putting in back-ups due to what a computer tech guy told me was the result of the firewall I used -- Zone Alarm Pro 3.x. (and, possibly, the installation of Netscape 7.0)So, my question is this: Since I use DSL, do I NEED a firewall? If so, knowing the problems I ran into AFTER INSTALLING ZONE ALARM PRO, what firewall should I use? (I tried using Norton and had all sorts of problems with my system at an earler date). I am using PC-cillin as my anti-virus now and have not had any problems with getting on the internet but I fear not having a firewall will make me vulnerable to some other security problems. And one more question: has anyone had system or internet "surfing" problems with NS7? Any comments and/or advice is welcome.[/b]

DSL like Cable is always on, so a Firewall is highly desirable. But Zone Alarm has been a pain. I,finally, took it out after its latest acting up. I can't see how NS7.0 could have messed your computer, but who knows.
I suggest that you do a Search, about Firewalls, free would be nice.
A friend swear by Kerio, which I could not figure out . I used Sygate with no ill effect. But, I do not want to commit myself. The problems occur when some files are shared by two programs, usually a Firewall and an AntiVirus. You would probably be ok with ZA and PC-cillin, but you would have to look at possible conflicts in Windows/System files. I think that this can be handled more or less scientifically, rather than by hit and miss.

UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.0.1) Gecko/20020823 Netscape/7.0