SPI Firewall Question

25-09-2009, 01:24

Im having problems with corrupt downloads which i think is due to my routers firewall.

Is it safe to disable it permenatly?

Mick Fisher · 25-09-2009, 04:15

No it is not safe!

I suggest installing a software firewall before you disable the NAT device.

I have two machines networked behind a router with an additional software firewall installed on each.

Try Outpost Free http://free.agnitum.com/
Absolutely painless to install and use. Auto detects AV and any networks you may be running. The only thing I had to sort out was that it wouldn't let my XP Home Desktop communicate with my Vista Home Notebook while allowing the vice versa. The fix was to make the network 'Trusted".

Welshchris · 25-09-2009, 12:14

although not an advisable thing to do if u think it is the cause of whatever problems u seem to be getting then why not, i use Comodo firewall as my software based one, install a software one and see how u get on then.

Raistlin · 25-09-2009, 12:38

What makes you think it's the router's firewall?

I'd ber very surprised if that were the case TBH.

AbyssUnderground · 25-09-2009, 12:56

The SPI firewall will not cause corruption. Most likely it is the server you're downloading from that is causing it, or your connection isn't quite running properly.

Run

ping www.bbc.co.uk -n 50

and post the results to see if you have any packet loss. That could cause corruption.

25-09-2009, 14:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rob M

What makes you think it's the router's firewall?

I'd ber very surprised if that were the case TBH.

i was getting CRC errors on some files especially Zip and rar files, i looked this up and it said on the net that sometimes the SPI firewall can be overloadsed and then it starts to drop data packets and either slows down the download or corrupts.

I disabled the firewall and since no problems yet.

Raistlin · 25-09-2009, 14:30

What protocol are you downloading over?

Also, if you're downloading enough to be overloading the firewall then you don't need to turn it off, you need to get a different one.

haydnwalker · 25-09-2009, 22:48

I sometimes get timeouts using FireFox have you tried your download from a different browser?

Also - if you are downloading from a mirror service (such as sourceforge) then try one of the other mirrors

26-09-2009, 00:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rob M

What protocol are you downloading over?

Also, if you're downloading enough to be overloading the firewall then you don't need to turn it off, you need to get a different one.

Tried over both HTTP and FTP.

I use flashget also to download from rapidshare and from both FTP and HTTP.

I disabled the SPI one and am now using Comodo and all the problems have cleared up that i was getting.

Raistlin · 26-09-2009, 08:08

Suppose it could be a problem with the SPI firewall implementation in that box then, odd but not impossible I guess.

You could try upgrading the firmware to the latest version - they might have improved it since it was released.

Welshchris · 26-09-2009, 14:37

Rob M i have also read about this, a friend of mine on Virgin 10mb has a 2 year old Wireless Linksys router and almost from the word go he would get corrupt downloads, he had the router changed twice and still the same but inthe end the place he bought it from went bust so he was stuck with it. After i read about it and he disabled the firewall and installed Zonealarm back then not only did his download slightly improve even on such small things as free downloads from Sendspace from an average of 90kb/s to around 130kb/s but he didnt get corruptions in Zip and Rar files anymore.

26-09-2009, 14:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by AbyssUnderground

The SPI firewall will not cause corruption. Most likely it is the server you're downloading from that is causing it, or your connection isn't quite running properly.

Run

ping www.bbc.co.uk -n 50

and post the results to see if you have any packet loss. That could cause corruption.

SPI firewall can cause corruption from what i have read. What happens is that the firewall gets overloaded and starts to drop data packets and it can cause 2 things to happen. Either the download will slow to a crawl or the download will corrupt.

haydnwalker · 26-09-2009, 17:19

Then its not an issue with SPI firewalls perse, but more a problem with some Router Chipsets/CPUs as from what's been said its more a bottleneck which wouldn't be the SPI itself but the chipset causing it.