Firewall: Windows XP or McAfee?

[Mr_Yoda]

I need a bit of help regarding the firewall on my PC. I've just realised that i'm running two of them, Windows XP Firewall and the one in McAfee security centre.

Is this likely to cause any problems? Which one should I turn off?

[Paul Komski]

Usually running a 3rd Party plus WinXP's doesnt produce noticeable problems but it is not recommended to ever run two software firewalls at the same time. I would turn off WinXP's firewall and install not McAfee but AVG antivirus plus Kerio/Sunbelt or ZoneAlarm personal firewall in place of McAfee.

[Budfred]

Windows firewall is supposed to shut itself off when you install another firewall... Do you have SP2 and the latest security updates installed?? If you do and it is still running the Windows firewall, it suggests that something is wrong with your firewall install... You can use the McAfee firewall if you wish, but I agree that Kerio or even ZoneAlarm are better options...

[Variable]

I have never heard that XP's firewall shuts itself off if you install a third party software firewall. I have seen users with two firewalls running many times. But I have also seen machines running two AV's and three anti spyware applications at the same time too. Is this part of a patch in the last few months?

[Budfred]

I am not sure when it was set up that way, but I heard about it at SWI and checked it out on my computer... It seemed to be true... Of course, that doesn't mean it works every time, so it is a good idea to check...

[Fred_Flintstone]

I uninstalled Z/Alarm and used win firewall until I put Kerio on my system and then the windows firewall did shut itself off.
It is "supposed" to do that if you have another firewall installed I believe!

McAfee / Norton??... where's that spitoon!!!..:eek: :eek:

[Paul Komski]

Windows doesn't recognise all firewalls. In my experience it has never recognised kerio (up to 4.0.14 anyway) or sygate and thus cant monitor them. In that situation it depends how you have set Windows Firewall because it will constantly complain and want you to turn it on. One needs to then go to the Security Center and enable the "I have a firewall solution I will monitor myself ...".

With ZA and NIS it has always been different, in my experience, because Windows does recognise them and can thus monitor how to alert you. I cant remember it turning itself off automatically when a third-party firewall (that it does recognise) is installed - but that may depend how you have the security centre settings.

[Budfred]

I suspect that it only recognizes the most recent versions that are designed to be recognized... I use Kerio and it recognized it without pause...

[Paul Komski]

Recognition is of course part 1 for without it part 2, auto-disablement, wouldn't be possible. I suspect auto-disablement could only proceed if you had unchecked "I have a firewall solution that I will monitor myself". So presumably if you let Windows do the monitoring and you add a 3rdParty Firewall that it recognises then Windows can do as it pleases.

http://i18.tinypic.com/339mz2e.jpg

You would think that Windows would know when any firewall "was sniffing at the ports" but perhaps because a software firewall is so low down in the order that services get loaded that it has "to declare itself" in some other way. If anyone knows a definitive answer that would be most interesting.

Personally I wouldn't trust the Windows Firewall at all because I have DEFINITELY had it configured such that the Windows Firewall can be set to Off but despite that, when one looks in Security Center, it displays Firewall ON, and in the drop down states that one of my software firewalls is ON.

Go Figure.

[Fruss Tray Ted]

I cannot find any screen that looks like the one posted above AND I am using the last version of the free Sygate loaded onto XP PRO with no recognition problems whatsoever.

Another 'Go Figure'...

[Paul Komski]

I cannot find any screen that looks like the one posted above

I am using the same version of Sygate.

With Windows firewall off go to Control Panel >> Security Centre

http://i15.tinypic.com/2zfnwo7.jpg

[Fruss Tray Ted]

I sometimes don't know what I'm doing but using the general rule:
If it ain't broke, don't fix it applies here

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/M99ER/sygatepaul.jpg?t=1174182768

[Paul Komski]

FTT, your pic is very similar to mine but then WinXP doesn't detect my version (5.5) of sygate so I have to monitor the situation myself or the Windows firewall will want to run simultaneously. I'm also behind NAT and a hardware firewall so I think that should suffice.

[classicsoftware]

FTT, your pic is very similar to mine but then WinXP doesn't detect my version (5.5) of sygate so I have to monitor the situation myself or the Windows firewall will want to run simultaneously. I'm also behind NAT and a hardware firewall so I think that should suffice.

The latest and last version was 5.6. I think if you upgrade to 5.6 XP will recognize it. All of my clients with XP and Sygate look like FTT's setup.

Also, I think the confusion about Windows firewall is this:

Some firewalls (Kerio for example) will shut off the Windows firewall during the installation process. There is (to the best of my limited knowledge) no process or ability for Windows to shut the firewall off if it recognizes another Firewall is present.