SP2 Firewall turned off by default

[John C]

Hello all,

I seem to be having a problem with the new firewall
features that come with SP2. What happens is that I enable
the firewall on all my connections, but when I restart my
computer, all the firewalls are off. In essence, I cannot
keep my firewalls set to ON. Does anybody know what I can
do to keep my firewalls permanently on, even after I
restart my computer? Thank you.

-John

 

[Keith]

, all the firewalls are off.
Just out of interest , how many firewalls have you got?

 

[Guest]

Just out of interest , how many firewalls have you got?

I use the free version of Zone Alarm, which I don't think
would interfere with the Windows firewall. I try to use
the Windows firewall on both my wireless and LAN network
connections. When I look at these network connections,
they show the gold lock on them after I enable the
firewalls, but after I restart, the locks are gone and the
firewalls are set to off. Why they do not stay on when the
computer is turned off, I do not know. Hopefully, someone
here does!

 

[Keith]

I use the free version of Zone Alarm, which I don't think
would interfere with the Windows firewall. I try to use
the Windows firewall on both my wireless and LAN network
connections. When I look at these network connections,
they show the gold lock on them after I enable the
firewalls, but after I restart, the locks are gone and the
firewalls are set to off. Why they do not stay on when the
computer is turned off, I do not know. Hopefully, someone
here does!

Have you looked in
Start>Control Panel>Windows firewall
and turn firewall on from there?

 

[John]

Have you looked in
Start>Control Panel>Windows firewall
and turn firewall on from there?

When I go through that, the firewall is set to "off". I
switched it to "on", and did a test restart. I went back
through the control panel, and the button is set back
to "off". I turned off Zone Alarm's "load at startup"
setting, restarted again, then checked the Windows
firewall settings through the control panel, and the
Windows firewall was "on". It looks like the Zone Alarm
and Windows firewalls are not getting along. Any way I can
still run both and avoid a conflict? Is it even worth
running both? Thanks so much for your help so far

-John

 

[Sooner Al]

I would not even use the SP2 Windows Firewall if your satisfied with ZA.

Here is guidance from Microsoft on this issue...

http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/protect/firewall.mspx

Q. Should I use a non-Microsoft personal firewall instead of the built-in Internet Connection
Firewall?

A. If you already have a non-Microsoft firewall on your computer, you should continue to use it. If
you do not have a firewall, then you have a choice. If you want a simple firewall that is very easy
to configure, then you should use the Windows XP Internet Connection Firewall. If you want more
advanced control over the traffic that passes through your computer and you also want to block
outgoing traffic (that is the traffic from your computer out to the Internet) then choose a personal
firewall from another company.

--
Al Jarvi (MS-MVP Windows Networking)

Please post *ALL* questions and replies to the news group for the mutual benefit of all of us...
The MS-MVP Program - http://mvp.support.microsoft.com
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights...

 

[Pat \(MSFT\)]

Chances are the issue you are hitting is that some third party firewall
applications will shut down the Windows Firewall by simply stopping or
disabling the service at boot. This is why when you go into the control
panel applet for the firewall, you are seeing it being set to off. In other
words, some application (most likely your firewall) that is running with
administrative priveleges is the one that is stopping the firewall service.

I hope this helps...

 

[Hans-Georg Michna]

Chances are the issue you are hitting is that some third party firewall
applications will shut down the Windows Firewall by simply stopping or
disabling the service at boot ...

.... which isn't actually such a bad idea, because it isn't very
good to run more than one software firewall at a time.

So maybe all is well, in fact.

Hans-Georg