What's a good firewall

I haven't connected my XP Home machine to the internet and I probably won't as
long as my Win95 machine keeps working but if the time ever comes I'm sure I'll
have to use a firewall to prevent all the nasties from messing with my
computer. I've read several messages from people saying one brand of firewall
causes this conflict or this firewall prevents a certain application from
working right. Is there a firewall out there that will only turn on when you
connect to the internet and then turn itself off when you disconnect from the
internet? Since you only need a firewall when you're connected to the internet
or a network I see no reason to have one running all the time. It would be
nice to a firewall that's available when it's needed but then goes completely
away when it's not.

 > I haven't connected my XP Home machine to the internet and I probably
won't as
 > long as my Win95 machine keeps working but if the time ever comes I'm sure
I'll
 > have to use a firewall to prevent all the nasties from messing with my
 > computer. I've read several messages from people saying one brand of
firewall
 > causes this conflict or this firewall prevents a certain application from
 > working right. Is there a firewall out there that will only turn on when
you
 > connect to the internet and then turn itself off when you disconnect from
the
 > internet? Since you only need a firewall when you're connected to the
internet
 > or a network I see no reason to have one running all the time. It would
be
 > nice to a firewall that's available when it's needed but then goes
completely
 > away when it's not.

Do you use dial-up or broadband? If dial-up, XP's built-in firewall is not
bad. It won't interfere with anything you're running, and won't stop you
from using standard internet services like e-mail.

If broadband, you're *always* connected to the internet (for most set-ups),
so you need one running all the time. You can use XP's firewall but I'd
recommend connecting a router between your computer(s) and your cable/DSL
modem. They are easy to set up.

Again, it won't stop you from doing anything. The only times I've had to
specify to my router to open ports is for hosting online games and p2p file
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