Stay protected more easily than ever with the new quick-start tutorial and program wizards. Pinpoint and map the origin of would-be intrusions with new, advanced hacker tracking. Free yourself from annoying Internet ads with new, customizable ad blocking. Shield your system from intrusive cookies with powerful new cookie control. Make smart security decisions with the help of the new Security Advisor feature. Prevent e-mail-borne viruses from spreading with enhanced MailSafe protection, which guards against 46 types of suspicious attachments.

FIREWALL DRAWBACK:
The inability to access paid skill-game sites like (i.e. prizegames.com, iwin.com), I'd have to disable the firewall to enter the site, which kind of defeats the purpose, but on some sites I could raise the wall again once I'd logged in and I was still able to play the games, although, I did have problems with the sites logging me out sometimes if I raise it after entering, NOT ALWAYS, but sometimes. Don't know why its only sometimes, but the basic problem is that paid game sites need to be able to read & record your IP address for security reasons, if the IP is blocked by a firewall, you can't get in and if you do happen to make it in, somewhere along the line, the site will kick you. Its a problem but I don't think there's a fix for that, the game site and firewall are both protecting you, their purposes just happen conflict.

My favorite feature was the cookie handling settings, you could set them for EACH & EVERY SITE , decide whether you wanted to allow session cookies, persistant cookies & third party cookies. You enable the Privacy Advisor & if a cookie tries to install, a little window pops at the bottom the screen to let you know whats being blocked, you can click on it and it'll tell you whether its the site you're visiting or some adware that's trying to install a cookie, you can make your choices and get back to surfing, takes about 2 seconds. However, you don't need to deal with that then and there, you can turn off the Privacy Advisor and know you're protected. The software logs cookie placement like it does hacker attempts, so, when you have the time, you can look at the logs & edit the cookie settings for the individual sites. But I found that if you turned it Privacy advisor there were problems getting sites to work probably cuz some require the placement of cookies, so for the 1st week, I recommend leaving it on & configuring the site settings as you surf, then you can look at the logs later to edit settings for adware. If you visit iwon.com, you'll need to do it that way cuz, lots of their pages require adware cookies to load porperly, in which case you'd need to allow them all, but Zone Alarm allows you to configure it so persistant cookies expire after a certain period of time, from 1 day til whenever. You use that same page to set whether you want web bugs (they track you from page to page within a site) disabled. On that page you can also set whether you want the page/site you're leaving to send header info (your network, username, work station, IP addy, etc) to the page/site you're trying to open. If you like to sure fairly anonymous, its a neat little tool.

PRIVACY ADVISOR DRAWBACK:
You can block pop-up & banner ads, plus prevent mobile codes, java & active-X from running. But if you're on a site that uses pop-ups to relay info (such as clicking on a privacy policy link and having the info displayed in a pop-up box), you won't be able to get the info you're looking for. Some pop-ups are legit, so you need to be careful if you're blocking them. I don't use ad blocking at all cuz its a pain and slows me down.......All in all, I found the FREE TRIAL version to be a excellent, but the paid version is amother matter altogether.

My problems began after plopping down 30 bucks and downloading the updates. All of a sudden, I was having problems getting pages to load, accessing sites and at times my PC would lock up and I'd need to log off and reboot. I also had problems with downloads, I had to lower the firewall and leave it off, even after the dowload completed, the paid version seemed to fight with my Norton 2003 anti-virus software, I'd try to scan something and the firewall would interfere and I'd get error messages. The software has this "internet lock" feature locks the PC down when the firewall senses an extremely high security risk. And trying to unlock it can be a pain, twice, I've had to completely uninstall Zone Alarm and re-download it cuz of the problem. The kicker is that even though you can disable the auto-lock feature, it still happens. Calling tech support is useless, they send auto-replies that may or may not help you and getting a live person to reply is the ultimate impossible dream. Calling on the phone doesn't help, you have to go through several menus before you can be put on hold to wait for a live tech and its hit or miss whether you'll be disconnected prior to speaking with anyone. I've had to call 6 times and experienced disconnects with 4. I've never gotten a live tech in lass that 15 minutes. And when you do get a tech, they tell you one of 2 things, either its a known issue thats being worked on OR they'll tell you to go to the site to get the latest update. The problem with that is I think its the updates that are causing the problems cuz none of that happened when I was using the trial software. But just try getting the techs to admit that. When it comes to customer service, only MSN is worse. I ended up uninstalling the paid version and re-downloading the free version, $30 bucks down the drain, but my PC is back to its old self and the problems disappeared.. When you pay for the software, you're basically buying the ability to send hacker reports, Privacy Advisor AND a subscription to the updates, but if the updates are bug-ridden, you're buying a headache and who needs that. You can always opt out of downloading the updates, but they drive you nuts with reminders to do it and you have to remember the subscription needs to be renewed every year, but you won't have full use of many features you're paying for, making it a waste of money..... ALL IN ALL, THE PAID VERSION IS GARBAGE!!!!

I do miss the Privacy Advisor and individual cookie controls a small bit, but I simply set my IE cookie settings on "advanced" so that I can allow session cookies for all sites, persistant cookies for my favorite sites, but get prompted when 3rd party cookies try to install. Some will get through, but not that many and when I weigh that small thing with the hugh problems caused by the paid version of Zone Alarm, its a trade-off I'll take.

So keep your money and take the free version, your computer will still have the same level of protection from hackers, which is really all you need from a firewall.