Zone Alarm Free Vs. Zone Alarm Pro

[mr. nails]

i had zone alarm pro installed some time back and i just didn't like it. gave me problems. probably due to the fact that it wasn't legit. it wouldn't allow me to use irc and it would make my online gaming a complete disaster. so, now i'm useing zone alarm free version and EVERYTHING works great. besides the spyware blocker, antivirus and the other crap pro cumz with. what is the difference between zafree & zapro in means of their firewall protection?

[fino963]

From pcworld.about.com (http://pcworld.about.com/magazine/2003p085id80443.htm)

"Choose ZoneAlarm if you want protection for no more than a few Internet-connected PCs, you don't know all that much about firewalls, and you want to save money.

Choose ZoneAlarm Pro if you need advanced network protection, or you want to safeguard PCs that use a virtual private network or Internet Connection Sharing."

Thats just the intro. There's a little more on the site comparing the two. (Scroll down to see it!)

Hope this helps:dabs:

[mr. nails]

that pretty much says the free version is good for home and the pro is good for large networks. meh, seeing how i'm just @ home and don't have a network guess this free version is good enough. thx for link.

[peat moss]

I just found neither were very good , paid or not . If new to computers the free one is fine , till you learn a little or experiment then look for something better .

ZA is a resource pig ,terrible start time (on my set up ) just found better ones that let me share with P2P programs right out of the box .Look N Stop was a good one but terrible for Chat or filesharing programs so good for mom and dad .


I like Kaspersky or F-Secure for ease of set up and works for most Torrent programs . To be honest I'm using Vista's Windows Firewall with no ill affects .

[mr. nails]

i stand corrected. i've tried both now and both are just fucking retarded programs. pro being the worst. free at least let me use irc, but kept lagging out my css and like said both had TERRIBLE boot times with pc. /uninstalled. firewalls are shit.

[Aaron_T]

Believe it or not but i actually find Norton firewall the best. never gives any problems.

but where antivirus is concerned norton would be at the very bottom of the pile.

[peat moss]

i stand corrected. i've tried both now and both are just fucking retarded programs. pro being the worst. free at least let me use irc, but kept lagging out my css and like said both had TERRIBLE boot times with pc. /uninstalled. firewalls are shit.



CCS ? I use to come home and find my young boy had turned off my Symantec Security as it buggered his game . :lol: Try one of the ones I suggested or just enable the Windows one .

[mr. nails]

i stand corrected. i've tried both now and both are just fucking retarded programs. pro being the worst. free at least let me use irc, but kept lagging out my css and like said both had TERRIBLE boot times with pc. /uninstalled. firewalls are shit.



CCS ? I use to come home and find my young boy had turned off my Symantec Security as it buggered his game . :lol: Try one of the ones I suggested or just enable the Windows one .

yes, CSS lags when i play with zone alarm installed. why would i want to disable my firewall while i play games? seems retarded to have to do that. i just uninstalled za and i'll let windows firewall do what it has to do even if it doesn't really work or isnt' that good of a prog. at least i don't have to disable/enable all the time. that's dumb. why would a prog lag u even when u tell it to accept the appz? za needs some work.

[mr. nails]

does anyone know if u have zone alarm installed and u right click on the icon in the sys tray and close it out (that's disabling it?) does windows firewall take over or is there no firewall enabled at this time? can someone try that out to see or not? don't guess plz. try this and see. i don't have zone alarm installed atm so i can't test this out, but if this is the case i mite install again.

also, peat or someone who has tested mass quantities of software firewall which is best 4 me? i do p2p, games, internet browsing and like my pc to boot in a quickly manner opposed to what zone alarm does. peat said certain firewalls allow certain things to work properly or what not. i'm gonna need ALL my progs to work. thx.

windows vista firewall maybe better than that of winxp's?

[grchl3]

I think Zone Alarm Free just has less bloatware than Zone Alarm Pro but still has most of the same functionality. That said, Zone Alarm Free can still be considered bloatware. It's a shame really. I remember when ZoneAlarm was the cat's meow. Now its just a hog.

Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall is a good alternative. Its got a lot smaller memory footprint and it gets the job done. The demo starts off as the full version, and after 30 days falls back to the free version, which I think is good enough.

You can find it at sunbelt-software.com

[catalyst05]

i use kaspersky antivirus only. it works fine .. My pc is not down after it use.

Firewall is not required.. if u use bi torrent and emule u can use peerguardian or ipfilter.. or netlimiter provides to see your network activity (download and upload) u can block or limit unwanted programs and connection by netlimiter

[Skillz808]

LOl zone alarm is not a friendly user program in order to get it to work properly you need to actually go in and mess with settings and configure them, after that has been done it works like a charm i have never had issues with it at all all games work and software and filesharing. just need to be alittle more advanced or not lazy and expect a program to be a one click solution.

my 2 cents

[parking_jedi]

outpost or sygate for resource friendly bit torrent friendly firewalls.

[mr. nails]

just need to be alittle more advanced or not lazy and expect a program to be a one click solution.

my 2 cents

u can take ur money back. i've played around with all the settings they provide and this prog is buggy and/or just not optimized for the home user and aimed more so for the network user. if i'm not the only one having these issues, maybe the appz u use are simplimatic and za bypasses them. as for my probs i've listed more that just myself have issues with it.

[mr. nails]

does anyone know if u have zone alarm installed and u right click on the icon in the sys tray and close it out (that's disabling it?) does windows firewall take over or is there no firewall enabled at this time?

can someone confirm plz?