OutPost Pro Firewall 2009 (v6.7) reviewed

I was fortunate to receive a gift of this latest version of  OP Pro (including lifetime updates!) and have been using it for about a week.

Having been very pleased with OP Free as a user-friendly firewall, I thought a brief review of my experience with OP Pro by comparison might be interesting. I haven't reviewed any paid security products before (mostly because I find the free alternatives sufficient, and I am cheap) but I wasn't going to look this gift horse in the face, and not report what I saw!

Much as I like OP Free, I see in it a few notable shortcomings: 
- the need to upgrade to new Free versions manually is a bit of a nuisance
- my perception that not a lot of work is being invested in developing OP Free (only 2 versions to date, unlike the early  competitive development of OA Free and Comodo a year or 2 ago).
- While there is excellent help in the OP forums, most questions and discussions seem focussed on the paid version.
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Supported platforms for OP Pro:
32- and 64-bit Windows (Vista, WIndows XP, Windows Server 2003, 2008), Windows 2000 (SP3 and above),  Windows 7 (beta support).

My system:
- WinXP/sp3, currently running  only NOD32 v4 and Windows Defender in real time, behind a NAT router hardware firewall. Fast cable connection, IE8, and a 4 year old Dell Dimension 9100 desktop.

Download/Installation:
- A 27 MB download (compared to 17 MB for OP Free, or 13 MB for OA Free)
- No bundled toolbars or other unnecessary junk
- Installation was a snap, with very few options to choose from. I chose the defaults, including the "normal" rather than "advanced" option. Elected to allow feed-back to agnitum.  Reboot required.
- I instructed it to stay in auto-learning mode for a day, realising this effectively allows any program to access the internet. (Avoided any web surfing during this period).
- Whole process, including registration of license, took about an hour, without any problems.
- One minor glitch: after fully installing and rebooting, my Windows Security Center stubbornly insisted I had no firewall installed at all! Having seen this before after installing other firewalls, I ignored it. After a few subsequent reboots, WSC finally gave in, and admitted that OP Pro FW was indeed installed.

User Interface:
- Similar to OP Free but with more options; clean and easy to navigate.
- Available in Simple or Expert View (the latter for those that like to "tweak" the firewall a bit more)
- Includes a small but somewhat annoying "News" panel, which updates periodically on latest OP products/offers. There is a workaround to disable this which I haven't yet bothered to try.
- When I tried the Anti-Spyware module (a feature not found in the free version) I found its real-time protection was grayed out- ie disabled. Turns out that during installation, OP Pro detected my AV which already has considerable integrated real-time anti-spyware; running both in real-time might lead to conflicts. So OP correctly concluded I would not likely disable my AV just to have OP's real-time AS, and therefor disabled its own. (I can still run it as an on-demand scan). I suspect this would be true for users of other AVs with significant anti-spyware detection. It's a nice touch!)

Conflicts/Problems:
- None of any significance that I could find. All my browsers, applications, and especially all my resident defenses and on-demand scanners, worked normally with OP Pro running, with no slowdown seen.
- One minor conflict was that the on-demand Anti-Spyware scanner detected several entries in my MVPS hosts file. Since none of my other AS scanners detected this, I told OP Pro to exclude my hosts file from future scans.

Efficacy in outbound protection:
- Difficult for me to assess; I will leave this to matousec.com et. al.
- This current version of OP Pro (6.7.x) has yet to be evaluated at motousec, but previous versions got top marks there in 2008 (from 89-99% in leak-testing). Then again, so does the free version.

Configuring OP Pro:
- As an average user, I couldn't begin to address this topic in a brief review. Suffice it to say that the default configuration is a good place to start, and to tweak from there (if desired) as one becomes more knowledgable.

Screenshots:

 

(Potential) Advantages over the Free version:
- Highly configurable, for those that like to do that
- Paid tech support, for those that need to do that
- More "bells and whistles" without any apparent performance hit in CPU/memory:
  Antispyware
  Personal data safe storage (ID block)
  Unsafe websites restrictions (URL blacklist)
  Banner, ads, pop-up and referrer block
  Automatic network rules
  Automatic HIPS policies
- Ability to upgrade internally, rather than manually
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Summary and Comments:

1) Like the free version, OP Pro is a quality product. Based on my previous experiences with other paid firewall trials, I was concerned about added bloat, complexity, and potential for conflicts. I see none of that so far with OP Pro, and will continue to use it.

2) This FW can be as simple or as complex as you want to configure/tweak it. Most members here I think want simplicity, with as few alerts as possible. Like the Free version, if you give it a brief leaning period, then let its "Rules Wizard" decide for you, you will be happy with it.

3) I remain unconvinced that the paid version adds enough value to justify the cost for many. Would I buy it? I must confess I was ready to trial it, and that lifetime license offer was very tempting. I was however very satisfied with the free version.

4) That said, for those for whom cost is not an issue, and have average computer skills, I would recomend this as one of the best  third party FWs I have tried (paid or free), in terms of ease of use, simplicity, and potentially useful features.
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Notes on pricing:

- OP Pro currently costs $39.95 for a license for 3 computers; a free trial is available.
- For a limited time, one can purchase a single lifetime license for the same price.
- Download site: http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/download.php
- As always, "caveat emptor"!

Disclaimer: I have no affiliation with Agnitum or OutPost products.