[hi!]

I think it is.. I love Zonealarm.. the free one.... I tried to install it on my friend's dad's computer but It keeps zapping and bringing me to the Blue Screen Error Message page.. so I have to restart it manually (pulling the plug) I think it's because it's running another firewall....

I think he has Comcast or something like that.. it's Cable.. I don't think it's great because i think it lets other programs enter.. Zonealarm tells me When a program (even a safe one like firefox) wants to enter my computer.. but I don't want to mess with someone eles's computer without asking you experts first........... It was built into his browser....

??? thank you..........

[lunarlander]

Uninstall ZoneAlarm and see if the blue screen stops occuring. Is your friend's dad running Vista? If so you can go to Control Panel > Security Centre and see if he has another firewall running. Windows XP's Security Center may also list the firewalls in use too, but I dont remember.

[calvin-c]

First, any generic advice can be wrong because specific firewalls differ greatly in the security they provide. With that in mind however, software firewalls are generally more secure than hardware firewalls because they know which program(s) attempt to communicate rather than simply what ports are being used. It's true that malware often uses obscure ports that a hardware firewall will block-but it also often uses standard ports too and a hardware firewall won't block those (if it did then your browser wouldn't work either). So the only way to tell the difference is knowing which program is using the port-and AFAIK only a software firewall can do that.

Downside-as you've seen, software firewalls can affect performance & stability. Hardware firewalls, at worst, block communications-there's no way they can affect performance or stability except as a side effect. And you'll definitely have problems if you try to run two software firewalls at once, and probably even if you try to install a new software firewall without shutting down the old one. You shouldn't need to uninstall it, just disable it. (I wouldn't connect to the Internet while it's disabled though. It might even be a good idea to unplug the cable modem while you're changing firewalls.) Once you have Zonealarm installed & working, then you can see about uninstalling the old.