Man...

Since I've been doing my FTP and home network thing, having a firewall is all of a sudden a huge issue...I don't have time to configure advanced rules and all that shit, so that I can do the LIST command, or browse my on my laptop via my ethernet cable and internet connection sharing...

My head hurts from phukkin' around with it even...What firewall do you guys use..? In the past two weeks, I have tried Zone Alarm, Tiny, Sygate, and the Windows default firewall...So far, Tiny is the only one I haven't completely uninstalled, it SEEMS more secure than anything else I've used...

I'm curious to know what you guys are using and why, maybe there's a good one that I've missed...

AYHJA

Outpost Firewall.

A firewall is only as good as the rules it has configured, for that reason I always configure them manually, I never let the firewall setup what it thinks is best.

I'm not sure if this helps as you probably want a software firewall to install but I've been using a Sonicwall SOHO3 for about 12 months now.

Very goood hardware firewall.

I've used some netgear ones as well, you can generally get them fairly cheaply and most now offer SPI as standard.

Sygate Personal Firewall Pro 5.5 Build 2710

Its the best firewall I've used. Best next thing to a router

You can download the free version from here, you can also get the Pro trial from that link! Have fun!!

Yeah man, I like Tiny too, but like I said configuring the advanced rules isn't my cup of tea...I mean, in time I could figure it out, but I just dont' have so much of that now...

Windows firewall on the other hand, will for instance, allow my shared internet connection to go right along, I guess because it recognizes that the laptop is hooked directly to my main PC...

But Tiny, says hell now, and I have to disable it to do my networking, and my FTP stuff....On top of all that, I have a direcway connection, and have to deal with all the bullshit that it provides...

If I had a choice, I'd stick with Tiny, but I've got to find a good tutorial on those rules...

AYHJA

Windows XP firewall.

Outpost Firewall

Router Firewall

Router and XP

Outpost here

Well honstly all of this software firewalls looks similar there is no defference in the power the defference is in the GUI and how its user friendly, windows firewall is so good but its missing important thing which is monitoring the outbound which mean your machine could be infected with a worm that use it to packet another machine or another site all of other famous commercial software firewall have this feature, and personally i liked Zone Alarm, a hardware firewall could be more safe and it can save your machine resources cause firewalls can cause system bottlenecked, if you have an old machine you can set it in front of your machine and use it as firewall only with FreeBSD on it you can run ipfw which is a strong firewall or ISA server in windows which also so powerful and more easy to configure.

Syagte Firewall Pro over here. SImple and does a great job

I have Zone Alarm here. I have been using it for almost a year and it has been good

I think, I'm gonna stick with Outpost...It's allowing me to do everything that I need to do...User friendly, and it seems pretty secure...Doesn't register w/the Windows Firewall bit, but I've been runnin' 'em both anyway...Figure what the hell, eh..?

Thanks for the suggestions, guys...

AYHJA

I prefer Kerio

Kerio and a router here.

I just use router, and make sure only certian ports are open