software firewall

can anyone recommend a software firewall for windows 7

i currently use the new comodo firewall and am fed up with it. i liked the older one better but i cant find it

is zonealarm any good?

Windows 7 firewall isn't half bad really and it can be modified for stronger protections. Zone Alarm is fine, but just note that it works on a kind of template method. If certain templates (software packages) are not there, it will default to blocking. Comodo's Firewall is very powerful, but if you don't know a lot about firewalls or if you upgrade and mess something up, you'll have to start from scratch to correct problems.

What I recommend is buying something like Kaspersky Internet Security from Amazon and be done with it. It isn't unreasonable price wise (don't buy from local store) and it will provide better protection than any free software package. Free software is very cut and dry and if you know how to use them you probably already know a lot about network security and therefore don't need extra protection. If you are connected to a good router, say from Cisco or Apple, they already come with pretty powerful firewalls, add to that Windows' own firewall and you have a double layer of protection. What you probably need is malware, spyware and trojan protection which firewalls will not protect you from.

Hope that helps.

what i need is to block all programs from automatically having access to the internet unless i grant them permission. sort of what "Little Snitch" does on the mac.

the new comodo has been a pain in the butt to configure. ive used the old comodo firewall and it was fine for years, until i upgraded. now im a mess.

that's what i need though.

Try this... http://free.agnitum.co​m/index.php
I have read reviews about it here and there... It's free...

depends how 'deep' you want to dive

windows 7 advanced firewall, (i said advanced), will do just about what you want: block everything and allow what you want->manually though.

Chrizz wrote in post #13613902
depends how 'deep' you want to dive

windows 7 advanced firewall, (i said advanced), will do just about what you want: block everything and allow what you want->manually though.

are you talking about with the checkboxes? the option that say "allow programs to communicate through windows firewall"
or the windows settings with advanced security on local computer

not sure what you are looking at, but,

go to windows start menu
write 'firewall'
and select the option that says firewall advanced.