Comodo Free Firewall any good?

Which is the best FREE firewall and why? Is Comondo any good?

Thanks,
Rusty

Re: Comodo Free Firewall any good?

Rusty James wrote:
> Which is the best FREE firewall and why? Is Comondo any good?

Dear marketing people of Comodo, could you please stop this nonsense?
It's much too obvious, that you're doing Undercover Marketing:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undercover_marketing

Undercover Marketing means spamming usenet.

People, please don't use Comodo's products, until they stop this
Spam.

Yours,
VB.
--
"Pornography is an abstract phenomenon. It cannot exist without a medium
to propagate it, and it has very little (if anything at all) to do with sex."
Tina Lorenz

Re: Comodo Free Firewall any good?

"Rusty James" wrote in message
news:0u8vt2p57plfn6pcmi5pr8s6m3brifvbqu@4ax.com...
> Which is the best FREE firewall and why? Is Comondo any good?


No, Rusty, same answer in all the other newsgroups to which you
MULTIposted your same post.

I gave up on it. Firewalls with application rules will flood the user
when they start using it with prompts to permit an application to make a
network connection. Some reduce that by providing "smart" lists of
known apps (usually by matching with a hash signature to ensure the
program is what it says it is). Okay, that was expected, but Comodo
eventually forgets that you allowed an app to have network access and
begins asking you over and over each time you load the app. It isn't
that an update to the .exe occurred. Comodo just forgets. You may find
that deleting the app or network rule and then redefining it gets it
working again.

You may eventually find that your Internet access goes completely belly
up until you disable their firewall whereupon you can ping, telnet, web
browse, e-mail, and do everything again. Obviously there is not point
in wasting resources on a firewall that you always have to disable, so
you'll end up uninstalling it (and doing remnant file/dir and registry
cleanup) and then reinstall it which is a nuisance. Having Comodo
eventually die (after 3 fresh installs on freshly reimaged hosts) after
about 2 weeks eliminated me bothering with it anymore.

Some users thought their hard drives were dying because of the repeated
clicking noise from them when the drive should normally be quiescent.
To some, it was like a heartbeat where every 1.5 seconds they would hear
their drive spin faster. Turns out their logging is over zealous.
Users had to change their network rules from Block & Log to just Block
to eliminate the repetitive wear on their drives, even where there was
apparently nothing to log for that event.

One is that they really, r-e-a-l-l-y, REALLY want to their users to
promote their "free" product (i.e., they want unpaid associates to
advertise for them). Their need to advertise is so strong and pervasive
that it indicates a product-in-progress where its users are unaware they
are unpaid alpha testers and then the product goes eventually commercial
whereupon all those loyal users then have to buy it to continue using
it. They desparately seek users to "spread the word", but why bother
for a free product unless their intent is to engender awareness (i.e.,
free advertising) along with enlarging their prospective customerbase
and hope some of the suckers, er, prior customers decide to buy it when
it is no longer free. They are also desparately seeking OEMers to
bundle their products on pre-built boxes to further penetrate the
market. The product may turn out to remain free but it smacks too much
of an alpha product foisted on uninformed users to be used as unpaid
alpha testers that then get abandoned when the product goes commercial.
I have to wonder why a "free" product requires activation (i.e., shades
of functionality incorporated for an eventually commercial product so it
also gets tested by those unpaid and uninformed alpha testers).

Two, their firewall is the only remaining one of their "free" products
that doesn't require using their all-in-one loader program which results
in advertising their commercial products. In other words, it is adware
(for their own products). You get stuck with their Launchpad bannerware
for their other products. I was told but haven't bothered to verify
(since I don't bother with any of their products anymore) that they were
going to abandon their Launchpad. Hopefully that has become the case.
If not and it is the other way around, rolling their firewall into their
Launchpad loader would be an immediate cause for abandoning that
product.

Three, they won't let you search their forums until you register. It is
a nuisance that someone who wants to check out complaints by their users
has to register before they can search. Also, negative posts have a way
of disappearing prematurely from their forums. You are required to not
discuss or compare against other firewalls; else, those posts will
disappear. They can't take the heat of comparison, even if to request
enhancements or to contrast against alternatives from other sources.
Obviously they don't want their own forums to become negative
advertising of their products but they should be able to take some heat
and posts that report severe bugs or inappropriate behavior should be
tolerated. Again, this would only taint their forums for their "free"
products if there was intent to sell those products, but even other
already-commercial products tolerate far worse complaints than does
Comodo. Forget about searching for all posts by a particular author
since their search function refuses to hunt without something in the
"Search for" field (i.e., you cannot search alone by the author). It
won't let you search on "the" or other words it considers insignificant,
so forget looking for you own old posts. Oh, don't use your real e-mail
address, or instead use a disposable one or alias to register. Someone
yanked out the e-mail addresses of their forum users and started sending
out porn mails.

Four, they only support 32-bit Windows. Version 3 of their firewall for
Windows 64 Vista was supposedly planned for March or May. I just looked
at it's not out yet (although maybe there is a beta version somewhere).
Even if they come out in time, decide if you really want to be using the
first version of a new code branch of a product (i.e., do YOU want to be
the one bleeding on the bleeding edge?).

Go read their forum on their firewall. Remember that you will only see
complaints there. Users don't normally go to forums to extol or laud a
product but go there to get help on problems with the product. So the
bias will be slanted against a product if you go by the forum posts
asking for help, but it will give you an idea of the magnitude of
problems or the severity of a few problems. It's free and you could
trial it for awhile to see if YOU like it and if it *continue* working
for you. If it doesn't work right, uninstall it.

Re: Comodo Free Firewall any good?

In message , Vanguard writes
>"Rusty James" wrote in message
>news:0u8vt2p57plfn6pcmi5pr8s6m3brifvbqu@4ax.com...
>> Which is the best FREE firewall and why? Is Comondo any good?
>
>
>No, Rusty, same answer in all the other newsgroups to which you
>MULTIposted your same post.
>
>I gave up on it. Firewalls with application rules will flood the user
>when they start using it with prompts to permit an application to make a
>network connection. Some reduce that by providing "smart" lists of
>known apps (usually by matching with a hash signature to ensure the
>program is what it says it is). Okay, that was expected, but Comodo
>eventually forgets that you allowed an app to have network access and
>begins asking you over and over each time you load the app. It isn't
>that an update to the .exe occurred. Comodo just forgets. You may find
>that deleting the app or network rule and then redefining it gets it
>working again.

I'm glad I found this post! I've been trying Comodo and like you, got
pissed off with telling it what to do again and again. I thought it was
my memory playing up but no, it was Comodo. how the heck does a program
forget? I surely can't be deliberate can it?
>
>You may eventually find that your Internet access goes completely belly
>up until you disable their firewall whereupon you can ping, telnet, web
>browse, e-mail, and do everything again. Obviously there is not point
>in wasting resources on a firewall that you always have to disable, so
>you'll end up uninstalling it (and doing remnant file/dir and registry
>cleanup) and then reinstall it which is a nuisance. Having Comodo
>eventually die (after 3 fresh installs on freshly reimaged hosts) after
>about 2 weeks eliminated me bothering with it anymore.
>
Same here again!

>Some users thought their hard drives were dying because of the repeated
>clicking noise from them when the drive should normally be quiescent.
>To some, it was like a heartbeat where every 1.5 seconds they would hear
>their drive spin faster. Turns out their logging is over zealous.
>Users had to change their network rules from Block & Log to just Block
>to eliminate the repetitive wear on their drives, even where there was
>apparently nothing to log for that event.
>
Don't
think I noticed that.
>One is that they really, r-e-a-l-l-y, REALLY want to their users to
>promote their "free" product (i.e., they want unpaid associates to
>advertise for them). Their need to advertise is so strong and pervasive
>that it indicates a product-in-progress where its users are unaware they
>are unpaid alpha testers and then the product goes eventually commercial
>whereupon all those loyal users then have to buy it to continue using
>it. They desparately seek users to "spread the word", but why bother
>for a free product unless their intent is to engender awareness (i.e.,
>free advertising) along with enlarging their prospective customerbase
>and hope some of the suckers, er, prior customers decide to buy it when
>it is no longer free. They are also desparately seeking OEMers to
>bundle their products on pre-built boxes to further penetrate the
>market. The product may turn out to remain free but it smacks too much
>of an alpha product foisted on uninformed users to be used as unpaid
>alpha testers that then get abandoned when the product goes commercial.
>I have to wonder why a "free" product requires activation (i.e., shades
>of functionality incorporated for an eventually commercial product so it
>also gets tested by those unpaid and uninformed alpha testers).
>
That hadn't occured to me as I was wrapped up trying to find a firewall
that myself and my wife could use on our two machines that she would be
able to manage. I see what you're saying though.

>Two, their firewall is the only remaining one of their "free" products
>that doesn't require using their all-in-one loader program which results
>in advertising their commercial products. In other words, it is adware
>(for their own products). You get stuck with their Launchpad bannerware
>for their other products. I was told but haven't bothered to verify
>(since I don't bother with any of their products anymore) that they were
>going to abandon their Launchpad. Hopefully that has become the case.
>If not and it is the other way around, rolling their firewall into their
>Launchpad loader would be an immediate cause for abandoning that
>product.

Not seen Launchpad, won't bother.
>
>Three, they won't let you search their forums until you register. It is
>a nuisance that someone who wants to check out complaints by their users
>has to register before they can search. Also, negative posts have a way
>of disappearing prematurely from their forums. You are required to not
>discuss or compare against other firewalls; else, those posts will
>disappear. They can't take the heat of comparison, even if to request
>enhancements or to contrast against alternatives from other sources.
>Obviously they don't want their own forums to become negative
>advertising of their products but they should be able to take some heat
>and posts that report severe bugs or inappropriate behavior should be
>tolerated. Again, this would only taint their forums for their "free"
>products if there was intent to sell those products, but even other
>already-commercial products tolerate far worse complaints than does
>Comodo. Forget about searching for all posts by a particular author
>since their search function refuses to hunt without something in the
>"Search for" field (i.e., you cannot search alone by the author). It
>won't let you search on "the" or other words it considers insignificant,
>so forget looking for you own old posts. Oh, don't use your real e-mail
>address, or instead use a disposable one or alias to register. Someone
>yanked out the e-mail addresses of their forum users and started sending
>out porn mails.
>
Hardly going to endear them to a prospective user base.

>Four, they only support 32-bit Windows. Version 3 of their firewall for
>Windows 64 Vista was supposedly planned for March or May. I just looked
>at it's not out yet (although maybe there is a beta version somewhere).
>Even if they come out in time, decide if you really want to be using the
>first version of a new code branch of a product (i.e., do YOU want to be
>the one bleeding on the bleeding edge?).
>
>Go read their forum on their firewall. Remember that you will only see
>complaints there. Users don't normally go to forums to extol or laud a
>product but go there to get help on problems with the product. So the
>bias will be slanted against a product if you go by the forum posts
>asking for help, but it will give you an idea of the magnitude of
>problems or the severity of a few problems. It's free and you could
>trial it for awhile to see if YOU like it and if it *continue* working
>for you. If it doesn't work right, uninstall it.

Exactly right! Some folk will think Cor, I like this. OK. fine if they
are happy. Me, I'm going back to Bit Defender Internet Security, we both
like it and are used to it. I wanted to save £40 but It does slow our
systems down when it applies updates.
Thanks for a very succinct analysis, I wish I'd seen this _before_ I
wasted so much time on Commode (might be a better name for it!)

--
bertieboy