Windows Firewall Question

[securityinsured]

Hi, do I disable windows firewall before installation of avast please?

Does anyone know how to go about purchasing the avast home edition aswell please.

What is people's feedback in regards to this software?

Thankyou

[alanrf]

No, you do not disable the Windows firewall before installation of avast.

The avast Home edition is free, avast Professional is the "paid for" version. 

[securityinsured]

What's the lisence key information required then?

[news]

Before I decided to use avast!  I did some extensive reading at their website.

You may want to do the same to get the answers to a lot of questions you may have about the software.

It's a great website packed with information. www.avast.com
Information on the purpose of the license key is also there as well. Worth the time to take a look.

I personally love this software. I have been using it on my laptop and my desktop at home which is a test machine. I'm still in the learning stages of it. The people in this forum are really very helpful.

Good Luck.

[Lisandro]

What's the lisence key information required then?

A free registration that must be renewed yearly (https://secure.avast.com/scripts/register.php?lang=ENG)

See the tutorial:  http://www.avast.com/files/tutorials/insert_key.htm
Please take a look here: http://www.avast.com/eng/faq-invalid-license-number.html

[DavidR]

What's the lisence key information required then?

I believe this helps in knowing the number of active users there are so that adequate server resources are available for updates, etc. That I believe is why the annual (14 months actually) renewal is there so you can continue to receive free program and signature updates. It takes a very short time to do and well worth it for the avast anti-virus.

[securityinsured]

Thanks for your help everyone

I don't like the sounds of ZoneAlarm with the issues its been having, if I was too enable Windows Firewall again with Avast up and running, will that be alright?

[oldman]

Yes, windows firewall is okay. But be aware that it does not provide outbound protection. There are othe firewalls availible, comodo, sygate, outpost, jettico etc.

[nweissma]

• take notice that sygate was purchased by symantec in october, and they stopped its free distribution as of november, on the grounds that it was competing with its own product. iow, sygate firewall is no longer free - as i understand things.
• windows firewall can be configured to function 2-way, but the method escapes me at the moment.

[DavidR]

• windows firewall can be configured to function 2-way, but the method escapes me at the moment.

I think that this reason escapes you is that on the XP firewall it isn't available, the only thing in XP's firewall are exceptions

To help provide security for your computer, Windows Firewall blocks unsolicited requests to connect to your computer.

The important part is 'unsolicited requests to connect 'to your computer' this is inbound protection.


There is an outbound capability on the Vista firewall, which I believe if off by default and if enabled you have to set the rules.

[Spiritsongs]

   Hi all :

     The FREE ver of Sygate Personal Firewall is available at

     www.filehippo.com/download_sygate_personal_firewall/  ;

     There is a "SetUp Guide" at

     www.kotiposti.net/string/SPF_eng/SPFGuide.html  .