PCTools firewall 7 & Oolite - disappointed!

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Kaks
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PCTools firewall 7 & Oolite - disappointed!

Post by Kaks »

In windows 7 (64 bit), PCTools firewall 7.0 (free version) causes a major slowdown of Oolite & debug.oxp.

The framerate drop I experienced was from 60 fps to 4 fps. While PCTools' firewall 7 was installed, Oolite's CPU usage was between 97 & 100% - at all times - and disabling the firewall didn't make any difference to either the slow framerate or the high cpu usage, the only thing that restored 60 fps - and a 40% / 60% cpu usage - was uninstalling PCTools firewall 7.

I used other versions of that firewall before, and it didn't seem to cause any problems. Version 7, however, is not very Oolite dev friendly, to say the least.
I didn't wait and see what would happen when removing debug.oxp. It might well be that PCTools firewall 7 doesn't break anything if Oolite doesn't try to connect to the debug console... however, since I'm not planning to reinstall that buggy firewall any time soon, someone else will have to test that theory! ;)

I might be biased, but I believe that disabling a firewall should stop that firewall from interfering with any other program, and PCTools firewall 7 fails miserably there.
I've replaced PCTools' firewall with windows firewall control, which seems to do the same job using windows' integrated firewall, and as a bonus doesn't seem to try to slow down other applications!


I just thought I'd report this problem, in case someone else experiences the same puzzling behaviour.

Wonders never cease! :)
Hey, free OXPs: farsun v1.05 & tty v0.5! :0)
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