Overkill

My old P1 200mhz is loaded with ZA firewall, AV7 antivirus and Adaware.
Attached is an old 56k dial up modem.
Do I really need all that protection as it seems to take a while to boot up.
My OS is Win 98 SE.

Bren

On 13 Apr 2005 07:05:24 -0700, (Bren) wrote:

>My old P1 200mhz is loaded with ZA firewall, AV7 antivirus and Adaware.
>Attached is an old 56k dial up modem.
>Do I really need all that protection as it seems to take a while to boot up.
>My OS is Win 98 SE.

I run a laptop of similar spec, and found that ZA consumed a lot of
resources. I tried Outpost, but found issues with it slowing the
machine down - so I now use Kerio 2.15 and things seem to zip along
nicely.
The AV shouldn't be a problem unless you have it switched on all the
time. I do a manual scan as and when I have the time.
Haven't bothered with adaware for some time - I use a limited number
of apps and have Proxomitron filtering out most of the web junk ( I
really recommend this app for dialup, really speeds web pages up ).

With a dialup connection, you should be just fine running Kerio ( with
a Sponge ruleset perhaps ).

Regards,



--
Stephen Howard - Woodwind repairs & period restorations
www.shwoodwind.co.uk
Emails to: showard{whoisat}shwoodwind{dot}co{dot}uk

>
> I run a laptop of similar spec, and found that ZA consumed a lot of
> resources. I tried Outpost, but found issues with it slowing the
> machine down - so I now use Kerio 2.15 and things seem to zip along
> nicely.
> The AV shouldn't be a problem unless you have it switched on all the
> time. I do a manual scan as and when I have the time.
> Haven't bothered with adaware for some time - I use a limited number
> of apps and have Proxomitron filtering out most of the web junk ( I
> really recommend this app for dialup, really speeds web pages up ).
>
> With a dialup connection, you should be just fine running Kerio ( with
> a Sponge ruleset perhaps ).
>
> Regards,


Thanks for your insightful reply!

Stephen Howard wrote:
> On 13 Apr 2005 07:05:24 -0700, (Bren) wrote:
>
>
>>My old P1 200mhz is loaded with ZA firewall, AV7 antivirus and Adaware.
>>Attached is an old 56k dial up modem.
>>Do I really need all that protection as it seems to take a while to boot up.
>>My OS is Win 98 SE.
>
>
> I run a laptop of similar spec, and found that ZA consumed a lot of
> resources. I tried Outpost, but found issues with it slowing the
> machine down - so I now use Kerio 2.15 and things seem to zip along
> nicely.
> The AV shouldn't be a problem unless you have it switched on all the
> time. I do a manual scan as and when I have the time.
> Haven't bothered with adaware for some time - I use a limited number
> of apps and have Proxomitron filtering out most of the web junk ( I
> really recommend this app for dialup, really speeds web pages up ).
>
> With a dialup connection, you should be just fine running Kerio ( with
> a Sponge ruleset perhaps ).
>
> Regards,
>
>
>
With dialup, you could probably get by just fine by unbinding TCP/IP
from Client for Microsoft Network on your dial-up adapter. A personal
firewall is merely optional.

http://www.grc.com/su-bondage.htm

Bren wrote:
> My old P1 200mhz is loaded with ZA firewall, AV7 antivirus and Adaware.
> Attached is an old 56k dial up modem.
> Do I really need all that protection as it seems to take a while to boot up.
> My OS is Win 98 SE.

With win98 SE you better practice real safe computing, avoid risky
behaviors, run anything but OE and IE by default (I still prefer
Firefox). Win98 is an accident waiting to happen. At 200MHZ in todays
environment LINUX might be a sounder configuration (there again, it does
take time to learn to configure securely). There are a number of ways
to compromise the box in spite of your current protections. While you
may, if taking all precautions, be able to avoid compromise, I wouldn't
use the box for my Internet banking, but then again I don't do Internet
banking on a secure box....

If it has been a long time since the box was rebuilt, you may find
MRU-Blaster to significantly speed up the system, which is available
here: http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/products.html

It may do more than reducing your current protections to speed up your
system, I have had good luck with an older version of the product that
lives in my toolbox. It cleans out a lot of clutter that accumulate
over time, slowing systems down.

While Ad-Aware is a good product, it is important to remember that the
parent company is an Internet Advertising company. Spybot Search and
destroy is a good companion to Ad-Aware (periodically run both) and will
find stuff that Ad-Aware misses (and vise versa). I have tried
spysweeper (commercial product) however I can't say it ever found
anything though it is highly rated. I suspect it's lack of success
might not have been a product issue in my case. I was impressed with
the tools ease of use. I didn't go looking for spyware to test it with....

If your system is configured properly spyware is not much of an issue,
especially if you use the immunization functions of Spybot which
prohibits a number of known IE exploits. However if you use a non-MS
browser you avoid ActiveX exploits in general which is one of the larger
vulnerability issues.

Let me know if the MRU-Blaster helps. Just curious.

Winged

On 13 Apr 2005 23:07:00 EDT, winged <> wrote:

>Bren wrote:
>> My old P1 200mhz is loaded with ZA firewall, AV7 antivirus and Adaware.
>> Attached is an old 56k dial up modem.
>> Do I really need all that protection as it seems to take a while to boot up.
>> My OS is Win 98 SE.
>
>With win98 SE you better practice real safe computing, avoid risky
>behaviors, run anything but OE and IE by default (I still prefer
>Firefox). Win98 is an accident waiting to happen. At 200MHZ in todays
>environment LINUX might be a sounder configuration (there again, it does
>take time to learn to configure securely). There are a number of ways
>to compromise the box in spite of your current protections. While you
>may, if taking all precautions, be able to avoid compromise, I wouldn't
>use the box for my Internet banking, but then again I don't do Internet
>banking on a secure box....

I think it's possible to be a tad paranoid.
I've been running 98SE for years now ( 95 OSR2 before that ) - and the
one time I had a virus, or anything like it, was when I deliberately
clicked on the exe file to see what would happen ( ah, the joy of
Norton Ghost ).
I've always avoided OE in favour of Pegasus, kept my IE settings nice
and tight and used a web filter to knock out some of the more
suspicious stuff ( auto page redirects etc ).
My surfing habits are pretty safe - every once in a while I follow a
link that Proxomitron swallows ( which perhaps confirms your opening
sentence! ).

Of course, if your browsing habits are little more risque, or you
haven't tweaked your setting ( unbinding TCP/IPfor example ), then
you'll probably need a few extras.
And you can't assume that Firefox is immune from exploits.

Linux sounds nice on paper - I've tried it a few times now ( using
Slackware and Mandrake distros ), but I always got knobbled with
driver issues or hardware problems..and to be frank, an OS that won't
install and run on an IBM laptop out of the box just doesn't cut the
old mustard with me yet. Shame really, as most of the apps I use look
as though they might run under WINE etc.
>
>If it has been a long time since the box was rebuilt, you may find
>MRU-Blaster to significantly speed up the system, which is available
>here: http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/products.html
>
>It may do more than reducing your current protections to speed up your
>system, I have had good luck with an older version of the product that
>lives in my toolbox. It cleans out a lot of clutter that accumulate
>over time, slowing systems down.
>
>While Ad-Aware is a good product, it is important to remember that the
>parent company is an Internet Advertising company. Spybot Search and
>destroy is a good companion to Ad-Aware (periodically run both) and will
>find stuff that Ad-Aware misses (and vise versa). I have tried
>spysweeper (commercial product) however I can't say it ever found
>anything though it is highly rated. I suspect it's lack of success
>might not have been a product issue in my case. I was impressed with
>the tools ease of use. I didn't go looking for spyware to test it with....

I used to run both, but eventually took them off when I got bored with
not finding anything.
I keep them on the kids computers - but as I use kerio and proxomitron
on those machines too, they've yet to find any work to do. Ditto the
AV scanner.

Regards,



--
Stephen Howard - Woodwind repairs & period restorations
www.shwoodwind.co.uk
Emails to: showard{whoisat}shwoodwind{dot}co{dot}uk

winged <> wrote in message news:<d3kmok$>...
> Bren wrote:
> > My old P1 200mhz is loaded with ZA firewall, AV7 antivirus and Adaware.
> > Attached is an old 56k dial up modem.
> > Do I really need all that protection as it seems to take a while to boot up.
> > My OS is Win 98 SE.
>
> If it has been a long time since the box was rebuilt, you may find
> MRU-Blaster to significantly speed up the system, which is available
> here: http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/products.html
>
> It may do more than reducing your current protections to speed up your
> system, I have had good luck with an older version of the product that
> lives in my toolbox. It cleans out a lot of clutter that accumulate
> over time, slowing systems down.
>
> If your system is configured properly spyware is not much of an issue,
> especially if you use the immunization functions of Spybot which
> prohibits a number of known IE exploits. However if you use a non-MS
> browser you avoid ActiveX exploits in general which is one of the larger
> vulnerability issues.
>
> Let me know if the MRU-Blaster helps. Just curious.
>
> Winged

Hi Winged,

Thanks for your comments.
I like Stephen's suggestions as well and propose to try Proxomitron
first; then MRU Blaster. Speed is vital as well as safety, as I am
right on the edge of successfully downstreaming video. The images
still jerk (slideshow) and that bit extra might just do the trick.

Cheers.

On 14 Apr 2005 05:56:29 -0700, (Bren) wrote:

> I am right on the edge of successfully downstreaming video.

With a modem you are some way off it !

The advantage of ZA is that it shows you which applications are
trying to call home as it gives you control of outgoing connections

A lot of websites now do not consider people with modem connections,
some are uphill with ADSL ...


--
Jim Watt
http://www.gibnet.com

Jim Watt wrote:
> On 14 Apr 2005 05:56:29 -0700, (Bren) wrote:
>
>
>>I am right on the edge of successfully downstreaming video.
>
>
> With a modem you are some way off it !
>
> The advantage of ZA is that it shows you which applications are
> trying to call home as it gives you control of outgoing connections
>
> A lot of websites now do not consider people with modem connections,
> some are uphill with ADSL ...
>
>
> --
> Jim Watt
> http://www.gibnet.com

I am a dinosaur. My modem meets my requirements, sigh. I have uploaded
training vids via modem, they usually go all night. But streaming video
on a 200MHZ gen machine should be a fun objective.

One thing that might help is to ensure your TCP IP windows size by
default matches the window size of the first router hop of your
connection. You may want to increase the default TTL somewhat. There
is a package called I Speed that I have used long ago for tuning the win
9x winsock. You will need someplace to FTP to hopefully you have an ftp
file server or web server available to you at your ISP. When I was in
Win98 I was able to get about a 20-25% throughput boost on modem
connection by tuning the winsock to match my ISP. The reason this boost
occurs is because windows by default uses a non-standard packet window
size. That said, some ISPs may make changes trying to optimize the
throughput, none of my current connectors do, but doesn't mean some
haven't. You can call your ISP helpline and get your gateway default IP
window size (for starting point)(or you can figure it out with the tool).

By tuning the winsock in 98 to match first hop (gateway) setting you
reduce packet fragmentation processing (this processing can cause pauses
in streaming video (when packet is reassembled especially in an older
configurations). I used the ISpeed product, which allows you to tune
various aspects of your winsock to maximize winsock throughput over your
connection. When selecting your FTP upload site for testing try to make
it "near" (fewest hops) from your computer. It needs (and probably has)
plenty of bandwidth to support testing (slow servers/connectors can skew
results). While "some" routing equipment can auto adjust the packet
window size this can cause ms (millisecond) delays. You can get ISpeed at:

http://www.snapfiles.com/Freeware/system/fwsyspeed.html

You can make these adjustments yourself in the registry if you desire
however the GUI tool made the changing/testing much easier. Be sure to
disconnect then reconnect after each change you make when tuning.
Reboot isn't required if I remember right. You may want to make a backup
of your registry before you do this as stuff happens however I never had
any issues using that tool. There are others on the net that do the
same thing, but this one met my requirements for ease of use. I had to
make a number of adjustments/tests to get the tweak right, so ease of
use was a factor for tool. For streaming video you will probably want
to maximize the throughput for large files on the ftp transfer you use
for streaming media.

If you are using either a US robotics or Zoom modem of that generation
you may also be able to boost dial up throughput by tuning your modem to
your phone line. I was never able to see more than a 2 or 3 $
improvement, but every little bit helps. Those sites may still have the
modem commands (zoom used to have an automated program to do it
automated mode).

http://www.tcpipguide.com/free/t_TCP...lowControl.htm

is an article that discusses doing this and how it works. These sockets
are fully exposed through win2K and will make a throughput difference
not only to dial up connections but broadband and wireless as well. I
haven't honestly looked at XP since they have tried to bury the settings
but somebody probably has addressed it. I haven't even tried tweaking XP
modem speed, someday, I probably need to do some research on this...

I wish you luck in your venture.

Winged

winged <> wrote in message news:<d3nao3$>...
> Jim Watt wrote:
> > On 14 Apr 2005 05:56:29 -0700, (Bren) wrote:
> >
> >
> >>I am right on the edge of successfully downstreaming video.
> >
> >
> > With a modem you are some way off it !
> >
> > The advantage of ZA is that it shows you which applications are
> > trying to call home as it gives you control of outgoing connections
> >
> > A lot of websites now do not consider people with modem connections,
> > some are uphill with ADSL ...
> >
> >
> > --
> > Jim Watt
> > http://www.gibnet.com
>
> I am a dinosaur. My modem meets my requirements, sigh. I have uploaded
> training vids via modem, they usually go all night. But streaming video
> on a 200MHZ gen machine should be a fun objective.
>
> I wish you luck in your venture.
>
> Winged

Hi Winged,

Thanks for the sugestions. Some things to try out on a wet Sunday
afternoon. (Not that we get many wet Sundays in the land of plenty)


I get the feeling that even with some improvement, streaming video on
a P1 would be only partially successful and from very few download
sites.
The obvious thing to do would be to abandon the idea and stick with my
P4 on broadband. Perhaps the P1 would make a good boat anchor!!!

Cheers,

Bren.