- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
Hm. A few things. Ditch all that included stuff that comes with your computer. With Dells especially, they probably had a bunch of preinstalled stuff that you should've gotten rid of if not already. This includes trial versions Norton AV/Firewall, etc, etc.
Windows Firewall is protective, sure, and is good for a basic firewall, but it doesn't monitor outbound traffic. In other words, any spyware or adware that's retrieving personal information will have no problem relaying all your personal information to the outside world.
Most, if not all modern routers come with built in firewalls, meaning you likely won't even need a software firewall. One by Linksys should have a pretty strong firewall built-in. But just in case...
Zone Alarm is a pretty good firewall...you can config it to allow Halo, and even has a Game Mode that allows most games to communicate with the internet. This does a better job than Windows because it monitors in and outbound traffic, and asks you each time a program tries to access the internet, no exceptions, until you set it to constantly allow/deny it access.
As for viruses/malware, use AVG free. It's a free service that also gets updates to its virus database at no cost and no skimping of features. Ad Aware is good for all things spy and adware, and also receives free updates.
As for Xfire, try downloading it from Xfire.com itself. It certainly doesn't have spy/ad/malware, since it hasn't shown up on AVG or on AdAware.
[Edited on 8/6/2006]