More Awesome Than You!

I've been using Zone Alarm, which works just fine, except that program 'updates' are in the neighborhood of 45MB.  That takes five to six hours to download on my shitty dial up connection.

Any recommendations for other free firewalls, which are reliable and, above all, small?  Or at least smaller than 45MB. I've been looking around, but opinions from people who have used other programs can be helpful.

This one from download.com is 6.68MB 
http://www.download.com/PC-Tools-Firewall-Plus-Free-Edition/3000-10435_4-10625321.html

I've used Comodo, and found it small, fast, and unobtrusive.
http://www.personalfirewall.comodo.com/

Comodo has been my choice for years. The only thing that annoys me is that it clearly has its hooks deep in the system, because even after fully shutting it down (including its service) it will continue to block certain actions (like activating stuff from giveawayoftheday.com). How it does that, I don't know, except that something must be running without showing up, which annoys me.

That would aggravate me so much.  I'm on the verge of uninstalling iTunes because every time I start it --which is rare, I only use it for ripping CDs to my computer-- it adds its services (or whatever) back to the startup.

I'm looking into the one JerseyGirl0000 mentioned, though, thanks.

Have you tried disabling it in msconfig?

I disable the services for a bunch of things I don't want to start up on their own. You can set the services on manual if you want them still available as need arises.

Yep and yep.  But I have to do it every time I start iTunes, because it adds itself right back and enables its services again.  Grr.  It seems a little more efficient at ripping CDs that Winamp, but I'm getting to the 'fuck it' point.  At least Winamp doesn't go behind my back to do sneaky shit.

Write a batch file to disable everything again?

If I knew how, I would, but alas, that is beyond my current skills.

Google is your friend.
http://www.tweakxp.com/article37566.aspx

I only looked because I've been meaning to do it for a while too.

By the way, if you use Vista, I don't know if that will work.

Just find the name of your service/s, use
NET STOP "Your service"
in a notepad file and save it as filename.bat.

You will only have to double-click it to stop your problem. You might have to google yourself to see if there's a command to take it out of the startup.

Cool. Thanks for the link, btw; I just spent all evening doing some long overdue backups and sorting out old crap to delete, so it wasn't at the top of my priority list tonight.  :)   I'll look into the startup business tomorrow and see what I can find.

iTunes = Do Not Want. There is really no need to stick to iTunes if the only feature you want is CD ripping. If I were you, I'd ditch it and find a less intrusive alternative.

Personally I use Exact Audio Copy (http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/) (THE best CD ripper) and foobar2000 (http://www.foobar2000.org/) for CD-ripping. When I want to make really exact, accurate copies of borrowed CDs, I use EAC. If I just want to rip my own CD to transfer into my MP3 player, I use foobar2000. Both support freedb.

EAC adds eBay icon on your desktop by default. Remember to uncheck it when you install.

Awesome. i've been looking for a winamp alternative. (ZOMG, bloatware anyone?)

I'll second EAC as the best thing since sliced ciabatta. Do not know how I'd live without that nifty little piece of software.