For some years now, I’ve been connected (at home) to the web from a single PC. OS is Win XP Pro; connection type is ADSL; and, I’ve been using Sygate Personal Pro 5.5 (yes, very old – but working for me).
Lately, I got two more PC’s I wanted to hook up. So, I installed a wireless router (AirLive WT-2000R, which was actually supplied and installed by my ISP). This router seems to be conflicting with the firewall.
The problem is that I am unable to surf the web when the firewall is on. If I set the firewall to “allow all” traffic, I can surf without problem, but if I set it to “normal”, surfing is blocked. I do not get a popup asking for permission – only timeouts.
I added an “advanced rule” to allow all traffic from the relevant IP range, and even from all addresses, but to no avail. I should also mention that I am able to ping sites even with the firewall on.
I googled for this problem, and it seems wireless router - firewall (and Sygate specifically) conflicts are not uncommon. However, I have not managed to find a solution.
Well, if you have XP sp2 and a router, unless you are holding on to some serious secret data on your machine, you should be set for firewalls. Use the XP built-in firewall under START - SETTINGS - CONTROL PANEL - WINDOWS FIREWALL.
Turn that on and turn off Sygate, see if your connection works and consider sticking with that setup.
Thanks. The thing is, I don’t trust the built-in firewall. Besides the low ratings it gets in comperative testings, it has one major flaw: by design, it only monitors incoming trafic! Meaning, for example, that if somehow a maleware managed to get into my system, nothing stops it from phoning home!
[edit]However, it does work with the internal firewall. I just prefer not to leave it like that.[/edit]
I’d uninstall then reinstall the firewall. That’s a sure way to get it back into the default configuration that will prompt you for permission whenever a program tries to access the Internet.
If you want a different free one, Zone Alarm works better than the Windows built-in firewall.
I did try the uninstall-reinstall procedure, but it didn’t help.
Is ZA really free? I thought it was only a limited 30-days demo.
And how much of a resource hog is it? Some sites on the web seem to be complaining a lot about that.
Yeah, it’s still free for home users but they will try to con you into the paid version at every corner so be careful where you click.
I’ve never found the free one to be a resource hog, but I can’t speak for the full bells and whistles version (which is more a suite of tools like Norton).
I’ve never used Sygate Personal firewall, but it sounds like it leaves it’s config settings somewhere if uninstalling didn’t reset it.
I’ve used the same installation of the Sygate firewall with four different routers now and it has never had a problem.(neither has Zone Alarm, on a different machine).
Perhaps the problem is with the router?
Racer1, thanks, I’ll keep ZA as a fallback in case I won’t be able to solve the problem with sygate. I think I’ll try to hunt for traces of the installation in the registry.
Myglaren, the problem may indeed be on the router side. However, due an oversight on my behalf, I had let my ISP choose and install this specific router for me. I “signed” for it, and will be paying for it in any case. So, it will probably be easier to replace the firewall. OTOH, I did find references to other routers having problems with Sygate.