Firewall ???

[pennydog]

We just go signed up for DSL and wondering if we need a firewall for extra protection? Not real sure about this software, but was told we needed one.

Also, a few weeks ago we had to reformat our hard drive. We saved the bookmarks/favorites to a floppy. When we got everything installed again, we loaded the bookmarks from the floppy. Now each time we click on one, the floppy drive tries to acces the files. Is there a way to stop this without deleting all the book marks and marking them manually? we have about 45 saved. Thanks!

[104456]

Thre are a few things you can do to make yourself more secure and make it easier to surf install an upto date antivirus, firewall i.e. Zonealarm,popup blocker i.e.Proxomitron etc etc
It all depends how paranoid you wish to be

As to the latter question empty your recent documents in the start menu and it should stop searching for the A drive floppy.[under settings/ taskbar and start menu usually]

[pennydog]

Thanks for the reply. Just emptied the menu as you said and it still is trying to acces the floppy drive, even when I just click on the favorites icon in the task bar. Soooo any other suggestions on that?

Just installed an updated anti virus program. I had heard that with DSL, the line or whatever was always open and it made for easy acess to anyone trying to "hack" in. We jsut want to be able to keep anyone from easily gaining access to our computer. So what should we use, a fire wall or the zone alarm? or are they one and the same? We are not extremely paranoid, but paranoid enough to want to make it harder for anyone to get in.

[jdc2000]

If you are just planning on connecting 1 PC to the DSL connection, you can download ZoneLabs Zone Alarm and use it as your firewall software. http://www.zonelabs.com

If you are planning on connecting multiple PC's, you might want to consider a Cable/DSL router. These use Network Address Translation to hide your PC's IP addresses from internet users. They do not block outgoing traffic, so a trojan program from an e-mail attachment will not be blocked, but external users will not be able to hack into your PC.

[casper99]

I say definitely use a firewall. I like Outpost from www.agnitum.com better than ZoneAlarm, as it is easier on resources and has some plug-in features I like. It also is a excellent firewall testing perfect at the www.pcflank.com security site. Free and shareware versions.

[pennydog]

Thanks for the suggestions. Will check out the sites and get one of them.

Any suggestions on the problem of when we click on favorites it treis to access the floppy drive?

[f117nighthawk]

Rightclick each individual shortcut in your Favorites folder and check the properties to make sure the path isn't pointing to the A:\ drive. Each favorite in your Favorites folder is a shortcut to a website with the file extension .URL.

[pennydog]

Thanks. Will try that and see.

[pennydog]

Ok, we found the problem with them favorites, seems it was one bookmark. We deleted it and now it is ok. Briefly checked out the web sites for firewalls. Thanks for the help.