the XP DNS update that broke it was the final straw.

Is that the one which broke the internet on machines running ZA???

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Is that the one which broke the internet on machines running ZA???

Yup, that's the one. It was a silly mistake about 2 months ago IIRC and MS fixed it relatively quickly, but after my interwebs died and I went through a lot of unnecessary troubleshooting I decided it wasn't worth risking it again. ZA had been bugging me anyway by locking off perfectly valid connections for no obvious reason, and Xbox Live is a pig through it unless you unlock so many ports you leave the firewall like swiss cheese. Comodo has the sort of features comparable to some of the hardware firewalls in various networks I've looked after, and is great to use once you get over the no-nonsense interface - fortunately for most, the auto setup is extremely good at matching the protection to your usage patterns.

I got rid of ZA after it broke my desktop, and soon realised our router has a firewall built in anyway ( ). Good for the Wii, a bit like Interpahse said about his Egg-box! Both laptop and PC use AVG 8, however the PC is pretty old PIII/500, and struggles a bit these days. May give Avast a whirl on that, although TBH the PC is only really an MP3 and printer station these days anyway - most other stuff is done on the laptop.

Another vote for Avast

i use advast on all my and swmbo's machines. its free and doesnt use as much resources on the pc like AVG does and seems to do a good job. only ever had one virus and it caught it before it even had chance to download.

.. and soon realised our router has a firewall built in anyway ( ).

Most do, and work pretty well out of the box - this is a huge benefit given how many people don't really understand the issues you can face with internet security and aren't really told by their ISPs how to cover their backs.

My preference for local firewalls is because good ones allow control of access to the medium by applications, and will also log events that can help you to trace virus-like behaviour.. often before the virus checker has got a handle on it. Many early router firewalls just guarded against ingress attaqcks,l meaning that sneaky, password grabbing malware could reach out with impunity.

his Egg-box!

My egg-box, your remote control egg-whisk.. what a team

Avast or AVG. Personally, I use Avast.

I use AVG.

I used to use avg, but found the new avg8 very intensive. I now use Avira its a free download from computeractive.

Another AVG user here, although my brother sorts it all out for me, as I'm not technically minded in these things.