Norton Personal Firewall 2004

List Price: $49.95 Discount Price: $5.99

Features:

• Hides your PCs on the Internet so hackers can¿t see them
• Norton Intrusion Detection automatically blocks Internet attacks
• Norton Privacy Control prevents data from being sent without your knowledge
• Program Control determines which applications can safely connect to the Internet
• LiveUpdate automatically checks for new protection updates when you¿re online

Customer Reviews:

Very difficult to install [Posted on 2004-06-09]
Bad uninstalls of previous Norton products can cause this one to hang and not install. No customer support (they promise to email you in 3-5 days.....). No easy was to self-troubleshoot the problem (even though there are lots potential causes listed on the Customer Support web site).
I've used and recommended Norton products for ten years, and will now switch to another brand. This was obviously released before it was fully developed.

Why did you do it - Norton? [Posted on 2004-07-08]
Recently bought new computer preloaded with Personal Firewall 2003 - had problems accessing some website features but was able to fix following excellent advice from ATT. Received message from Symantec saying my version should be upgraded to 2004 version - BIG mistake - cannot access ANY website (including Symantec) with Firewall enabled - no matter what! - no advice available from Symantec website (unless I pay $29.95 per call) - very unprofessional< Symantec - expected much better from you. Hope I can uninstall. Star rating - minus two.

Doesn't work [Posted on 2004-09-28]
I upgraded from Norton Personal Firewall 2003, which was working fine. Now I cannot access the Internet without disabling my firewall.

Zone Alarm is free, and Windows XP comes with a firewall. I'm tired of having my computer corrupted by Norton Utilities and my Internet disabled by Norton Personal Firewall. I will not purchase any more Symantec products.

Windows 95 and NT are not supported....read the directions! [Posted on 2005-01-31]
Read the directions. Read the "before installation" page to prepare your computer. If you installed this in windows 95 or NT or if you didn't disable the Windows XP firewall first you need to go to control panel and add or remove programs and remove Norton Firewall 2004. It doesn't support Windows 95 or NT. Now follow the rest of the directions and include the product key. If you don't follow the directions, don't expect success with software.

8-months of Great Experiences ( Unlike Most Others) [Posted on 2005-02-10]
Unlike everyone else on Amazon.com I've thankfully (knock on desk) only had good experiences with both Norton Personal Firewall 2004 & Noron AntiVirus 2004.

It does take PERSISTANCE to train the Firewall properly and to get comfortable with the IE security and Cookie settings, but after about 2 weeks of teaching the software its been gravy... and I thankfully haven't had any major intrusions, file corruptions or viruses that I'm aware of in the past 8-months.

Downloading updates is seamless, I don't have memory hog issues on my AMD 3200+ w/512 MB Ram, Windows XP SP2 and my high speed DSL connection that's always on. I've turned off Symantec's Popup Blocker and configured the built in one with XP SP2. I set IE to prompt each time a website asks to install cookies. I've set the Firewall security setting to "High-Block Everything Until I approve it". Other than that, I manage Java Applet & Active X security within IE. I did try setting these to "Medium - ask me each time" and it worked as well. Really, the first 2-weeks in which you visit most of your key banking, finance, news, gaming and other websites is the important period which REQUIRES PATIENCE. The trick again is teaching the firewall which sites you approve and which you don't. According to various studies, the average internet user spends 80% of their online time on less than 10 websites. After the first 2-weeks, its the 20% you just have to teach yourself and other users of your computer to be smart about.

If you're not very comfortable with computers and are only a basic user of e-mail, news & regular websites... this is a great program as long as you have a techno-savvy son/daughter, friend or colleague who can help you set it up the first time. If you're a pretty advanced technology buff you'll appreciate the integrated management console between all Norton Programs and will like most of the features. Overall.. it's 4 stars in my book.

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