Quote - XENOPHONZ, thanks for the link to Shields up. :) I checked it out and found that my computer has a good defense except for 2 ports. So I checked my firewall and found it had been disabled. Must have done that while installing AT&T's AV Suite and forgot to turn it back on. Had I not checked this site out I wouldn't have caught that.

You are certainly welcome, blue!

As a general rule: anyone who browses the internet in the clear these days likes to live dangerously.  Software firewalls are helpful: but a software firewall operating underneath a hardware firewall is better.  And as has already been discussed -- not all software firewalls are created equal.

And a firewall is only one aspect of protection against the various threats that are out there.  It's really too bad that ZoneLabs can't seem to get their act together when it comes to anti-virus / anti-spyware (a LOT of apps are full of leaky holes when it comes to anti-spyware).  Zone Alarm's firewall is superb -- but their anti-virus is scraping the bottom of the barrel.

That's why I decided to go with Panda -- for the sake of the balance.  Although I've also pondered the possibility of using the Zone Alarm firewall, with Panda's anti-virus and anti-spyware running underneath.  However: I'm not 100% certain that such an arrangement would work correctly.  One of the first things that Panda's internet protection suite does upon install is to tell you that you need to get rid of the competition.......uh.......that this other program over here migh "interfere" with correct functionality, so you need to remove it.  And I have to admit that differing firewalls might actually interfere with one another.  Which is where the difficulty comes in when one company makes the best firewall, but they also make a lousy anti-virus / anti-spyware -- while another company makes "one of the best firewalls", but has a much better anti-virus / anti-spyware suite along with it.

So you pays your money and you takes your choice.

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