I removed Zone Alarm by the Add Remove Programs in Control Panel. After I did that, a new icon suddenly appeared on my desktop that was to "Continue Installation". WTF! When I attempted to delete the Icon Windows said that deleting it would have no effect on the program and to use Add Remove Programs. Only the CheckPoint/Zone Alarm folder was gone from Programs, and there was no program in Add Remove Programs.
So I went into the registry and manually deleted every single reference to CheckPoint and Zone Alarm. I cannot tell you how much I despise companies that have software that will not do a clean uninstall. I'll never use them again. I just hope that I haven't screwed up the computer, but I was careful in what I deleted in the registry.
Before I did that, but after I uninstalled from Control Panel and restarted the computer, I got another 8E Blue Screen with the same location in Parameter 2. The two drivers in the stack that crashed (per Blue Screen view) were Avast modules--AswSnx.sys and aswSP.sys, along with ntoskrnl.exe
I've also disabled all the privacy add-ons in Firefox.
For another firewall, I'm looking at Private Firewall. Would it be a good alternative for XP Pro, SP3.
Now I shall reboot again and just see if the conflicts continue.
I did all that and another 8E BSOD appeared. Same Parameter 2. Blue Screen View gives the same two Avast Files in the stack.
I'm considering uninstalling Avast, which would be terrible since I've been using it for many years with no problems at all. And I'm scared to update to Avast 8 after reading the titles in this forum.