Zone Alarm Pro not so "Pro"

I recently bought Zone Alarm Pro ver. 6 (CD version) and installed it on my
machine, running XP. Once it was installed it gave me a "System Error:
Please Reboot" message in the upper right corner of the ZA window. Rebooting
serveral times did no good, and parts of the program were not starting. I
finally got sick of the screwing around and decided to uninstall the whole
thing and ship it back to Zone Labs. Even using the "clean" uninstall option
the blasted crap won't completely uninstall. Due to its security "features"
it has hijacked my web browser and won't let it go - some sort of security
precaution that prevents hackers from grabbing ZA and attacking the machine
it's "protecting." The only web page "VSMON" lets me access is the Zone
Alarm page that tells me I've got a problem - gee, what a surprise! I've
gone through all of the manual uninstall options on their web page and their
schlock software still won't turn loose of my browser.

Anybody have a register hack, or other method to get this thing off my
machine?

 

why not just perform a system restore?

 

Ol' One-Eye blabbered in 24hoursupport.helpdesk:

Back to a restore point or format/reinstall would be the fastest options.

 

I found that *and* other ZA issues to be solved by the use of Kerio
Personal Firewall.

 

<snip>

or format/reinstall would be the fastest options.
worst advice i've seen in a week!!!!

 

philo blabbered in 24hoursupport.helpdesk:

Thank you.

 

Why in the hell should someone have to perform a system restore from
installing software that is supposed to be safe and is hyped all over the
'Net?

 

One shouldn't. But remember the foundation on which that software rests:
Windows.

 

Exactly - Earlier versions of ZA Pro were good software and worked fine.
This newest version had some sort of brain fart over the remnants of the
"TrueVector Security Service" that was installed by the older version (ver.
4.0 I think). Without that service running the software does virtually
nothing as a firewall, except for keeping me out of cyberspace. I might be
paranoid, but it might even be providing a hole in my hardware firewall for
unauthorized access!

I was finally able to send an email to Zone Labs, but so far they haven't
responded. My web browser still isn't working and since Saturday I still
haven't been able to get this crap off my computer!