Sunbelt Firewall - How share directories on network

I had a Malware infection a month or so ago. Farbar helped me clean it out. As part of the clean-up process I installed Sunbelt Personal Firewall 4. At the time I had a home network with 3 computers on it, all with Windows XP. The one with the Malware infection is wired (we'll call it WIRED) and the other two were wireless.

We got a new computer for Christmas (we'll call it NEW), also with Windows XP. I tried to set it up as wireless with all the protection that I had on WIRED, including Sunbelt Personal Firewall. My intent is to move one of the users (including Documents, Pictures, Music, etc) from WIRED to NEW. NEW was able to see the internet and one of my other wireless computers, but was not able to see WIRED. I tried to ping WIRED from NEW and NEW from WIRED but everything timed out.

I looked around the Sunbelt settings and found Trusted area under Network Security.
I added Home network with an IP range to include all of my PCs (and my router) on both WIRED and NEW. I left the Adapter at "any" (I figured once I got what I needed working, I could come back and see if I could tighten the security a little more). At that point ping started to work, so I hoped I was in business.

I tried to enter WIRED's IP address in Windows Explorer from NEW to see WIRED's shared directories. It failed (I believe the message was "Windows cannot find '<IP address>'. I also tried to create a Network Place, but it didn't recognize WIRED by name, or by IP address. I tried the same thing going from WIRED to NEW, but got the same errors.

Next I turned off Sunbelt Firewall on WIRED (and turned Windows Firewall ON, to leave me with some protection). At that point I was able to see WIRED's shared directories from NEW. I shared <account> under Documents and Settings on WIRED, then tried to access it from NEW. NEW could see Shared Directories that had been set up previously, but couldn't see any new ones. I tried to share My Documents under Documents and Settings\<account> and that failed as well.

Does anyone know how I can set this up to work? I've looked through Sunbelt's Help, but I can't find anything.

Thanks!

Kelvin

Are the wireless connections encrypted?

For some reason Sunbelt Firewall cannot protect an encrypted connection. Instead of protecting it, Sunbelt blocks it. This tactic is known as Added encryption. Most likely, if you do not have a strong router or if your router is a bit older, then you should lower the protection level on the router.

I don't believe they're encrypted. I have an Actiontec router. I use WEP security. Besides that I haven't configured anything other than what came out of the box.

How would I determine if the connection is encrypted? If it is, and I need to "lower the protection level on the router", how do I do that?

It would seem that what I'm trying to do is fairly basic. I have a home network. I want to have firewall protection on the computers and I want to be able to create Network Places that work, and be able to share the printer that is hanging off of my WIRED computer with my other computers. If Sunbelt doesn't support this very well, does any one know of a better free firewall that I can do this with?

Thanks!!!

Kelvin

Hello again, and Welcome back!

I recommend Comodo Internet Security (built-in firewall).

There is no question that file and printer sharing works in Sunbelt Kerio. Wired or wireless combinations. The latest version is 4.6.1861.

On the Network Security, Applications, is netbios listed and permitted for the trusted zone?
Do you have any packet rules that might be denying connections?
Is Windows Explorer permitted for the trusted zone?
Is DHCP permitted?
Is DNS permitted?
Are ICMP protocols permitted either in the packet rules or on the predefined?
What do the logs say? If nothing, make sure to log everything to see what's being blocked. At least make it log the "Any application" because then the log will tell exactly what is being blocked.
You may need to lower the NIPS protection - permit the low level pings.

Perhaps manual addition of the "any" adapter is the problem.
I'd uncheck the adapters and let Sunbelt discover them and ask you and you can that agree to use it.
Behind every adapter name should be words about a Sunbelt NDIS miniport. Can you see it there?

One other thing to try is instead of trying to force that Network neighborhood thing, try mapping the drives to the other computer. It might then work through windows explorer, so long as you permit netBIOS in the wireless TCP/IP properties, and of course limit them to the local LAN inside Sunbelt firewall.

You may need to enter individual IPs, call them MyTrusted group or something like that, and set up some packet filter rules to permit all traffic, especially netBios traffic, but limit it to your LAN. (I'd be surprised if in Comodo you would not have to do that).

Finally, there's always Sunbelt tech support. Maybe if you point them to this thread, they'll help you.

I think the WEP or WPA encryption the Actiontech router is doing is on the other side of the firewall and I doubt that it would have any impact on the LAN transactions. Just my opinion.

OK, I kept messing around and I got this to work (before I saw the last post).

As far as I recall, when I installed, I left everything at the defaults. When I created my trusted area, I left the defaults there as well.

In poking around, I looked at the Network Security> Applications tab. I saw that my Trusted Area was set to Deny for all applications, including Microsoft File and Printer sharing. I changed that to Permit and I was able to access the WIRED printer and old shared directories from my NEW PC. I still couldn't get to new shared directories, but I'm guessing that might have something to do with the directories themselves and how I shared them (since I can't access them when the SPF is turned off either).

Does that sound right and reasonable, or should I still answer the questions above?

My other question was what adapter I should use. Initially I had any. I checked the list and there were only 2 available, my VPN connection to work and "NVIDIA nForce MCP Networking Adapter - Packet Scheduler Miniport". From the notes above, it sounds like that's the one I should use, so I've selected that one now and it seems to work. Does that make sense?

Thanks for your help!!!

Kelvin

Good job. You're getting there and WILL get there, because it works with Sunbelt/Kerio. Always did, always will Enjoy.
Everybody's setup is different, so while you can get some advice and hints, such as mine, on the forum, there's no substituting for your own research.

"Does that sound right and reasonable, or should I still answer the questions above?" - yes, sounds reasonable to me and heavens no, don't answer anything, you're on the right path investigating yourself. Just use the logs, use the logs, use the logs, use the logs they'll tell you everything

Sorry, this does not really help. Some of your 8:53 references do not quite match up with my SFP windows, and I have not changed anything in my settings except to turn off Web and to check the Trusted boxes under my network connections under Network Security -> Trusted Areas.

First of all, I have used many firewalls and none of them before SFP required any such tuning to simply work with wired or wireless behind my router.

Second, and more specific to SFP which I just purchased a couple of days ago, when I try to turn on my wireless connection, I get flips between on and off and between secured and unsecured nonsense. In my logs I see lots of:
ICMP PATH MTU denial of service
In the default settings, ICMP is denied across both Trusted and Internet., In and Out (4 settings) I have no problems with my wired connection, but which of these 4 settings might be changed for wireless?

Thanks.

Lester

Problem with your message tacked onto someone else's is we have no clue what you're talking about.

What is it that doesn't help?
What is 8:53?
Some firewalls are setup so they don't bother you. Some might be full of holes
This one (and many other good ones of course) permits you to setup things correctly with the aid of an excellent User guide and alerts.

Just FYI, when I installed, the only 4 "X" blocks were on "Other ICMP" which is as it should be.
Make sure you permit ping and tracert, they're needed. Justy deny in from the internet as it's pointless.
Permit what you need.

Do you trust your wireless section of the router? if yes, tell SPF so.
If not, Make sure the router is secured with a password, MAC address filtering is on, WPA is setup to encryption. Then tell SPF you trust it.
SPF should add netbios for you on the Applications list once trusted zones are ok. Just deny internet in and out, permit trusted.

Given that you can log every event in the SPF, perhaps if you post few entries, the exact ones pertaining to the one problem you have (whatever it is, not described here), someone might be able to help.
The logs are in the Logs directory under program files and Sunbelt. Use the Network log to find what to paste here.

I assume you trialed this firewall before buying. Did it work? Did it stopped working after you bought it?