Virus protection and Firewall

[Jim E]

So this year I decided to dump the resource hog McAfee and go with some freeware. I went with PC Tools and Zone Alarm. So far they seem fine and the email spam filter seems to work better than the McAfee. The boot up is quicker and over all I am pleased so far.

 

[RootesRacer]

So this year I decided to dump the resource hog McAfee and go with some freeware. I went with PC Tools and Zone Alarm. So far they seem fine and the email spam filter seems to work better than the McAfee. The boot up is quicker and over all I am pleased so far.

Ive been using zone alarm for years.

Works pretty good, and allows me to prevent most of microsloths crappy SW from phoning home if I dont want it to.

Be sure to setup windows media player NOT to allow it access to the internet.
This can prevent a whole slew of infections.

 

[Jim E]

I was wondering why it keeps trying to acess, I keep saying no.

 

[RootesRacer]

I was wondering why it keeps trying to acess, I keep saying no.

Well one such reason that windows media player wants to connect to the internet is because it sends info out on what you are listening to or watching, and sends it off to big brother, who reminds you that you can "buy" that media from napster or some crap like that.

Another thing it does is to go our and look for applicable codecs (typically for the video). This is usually where you get into trouble because this is actually a software installation, sometimes of dubious origin.
Scenario: (dubious video requiring a "special" codec that installs some malware on your PC).