OT: Software Recommendations

[Sivran]

deccan:
You don't want anything directly exposed to the internet, not even in a corporate environment. There's ALWAYS a router in front of a computer. Routers are pretty much MEANT to be border devices, though they do serve a purpose within the network as well you generally won't need to put a router anywhere but directly behind your WAN connection and won't need multiple routers.

My lan consists of five host PCs, a Linky router/switch and an Airlink 5-port switch. It looks like this:
Cable -> Router -> 3 PCs + Switch -> 2 more PCs

If I used the first configuration and run a software firewall on the first computer, do I still need to run them on every individual computer? I prefer to spend my CPU power and memory on games rather than security software, so I'd like my programs to have as little a footprint as possible and as PvK suggests, only run antivirus and spyware checking software occasionally when I need them as opposed to having them in memory all the time.

Software firewalls should be run on each individual PC, as they apply only to the PC they're running on. They can't make sure program X on PC Y doesn't talk out, because they don't know program X on PC Y is TRYING to talk out. Kerio is very light and quite powerful, definitely not bloated like other "user friendly" firewalls out there. Also, most software firewalls have a free Version which is quite sufficient, so it doesn't cost you anything.

Anti-Virus programs are another matter entirely. Real-Time Monitors vary widely between the vendors, and the detection rate of the RTM is often vastly different from the on-demand scanner. This is because to be effective, an RTM must have signatures loaded in memory. Thus, there's a direct corrolation between the memory footprint of an AV product's RTM, and that RTM's detection rate. Some AVs load a smaller subset of signatures for their RTM (in fact, probably all of them do ). If you're looking for a cheap AV for multiple computers, F-Prot by Frisk International is the way to go. For a mere $30 USD, you get to install it on every computer in your home. Compare that to the $80+ price tag of a 3 computer license from Symantec.


As for spyware protection, just switch to an alternative browser. Anything that is not just an IE front-end will do. Keep Spybot and Ad-Aware around however. You never know what's in that latest download from cnet, after all.

Atro:
Sure Norton scans downloads. If you leave the Real-Time Monitor on it scans everything it's configured to (which could be all files, or executables). Any RTM that scans on file creation, modification, or close will scan downloads real-time.