[SOLVED] Windows 8 Firewall - randomly green/yellow/red icon

[yeah515072]

Hi there,

I've read and tried a lot, I know I'm not the only one having this problem, but never saw a "solved" topic to this issue.

I'm runnig Win8 with it's built in firewall, fw-exeptions are made (by the client and also tried it manually for incoming and outgoing conncetions), have forwarded the port (UnPnP), run utorrent as an administrator but the icon rarely turns green. But it does sometimes. Up- and down speeds seem ok, connection check states my port is forwarded.

If I run the Windows firewall troubleshooter (it has an extra troubleshooter for µtorrent connections, it states that "it might be blocked by Windows firewall" but doesn't solve anything.

I assume the error is related to the windows firewall which keeps the UnPnP confirmation signal notifying the client that the port was opened from reaching the client. If I disable the firewall the icon turns green immediately. Also when I enter one of the exeption rules, play around, like setting the protocol from TCP to ALL, and switch back to TCP (so that NOTHING EVER IS actually CANGED) and klick ok it turns green. That is bug-like behavior to me.

Is there any firewall out there which is known to work together with Win8 and µtorrent?

I tried Commodo firewall but had the same problem. I don't want to try too much software of that kind, cause of the remains in the system.

Thanks for reading.

[yeah515072]

Ok, I do this for the fellows who have similar problems:

After some more research and testing I've found that Windows 7 Firewall Control does a pretty good job. It is often wrongly described as an extension of the built in Firewall of Windows. But it is a stand alone firewall which only uses the Windows-Firewall drivers. In case of trouble with the built in firewall it is recommended to turn the built in firewall off and let W7FC do the job solely.

The connection status icon immediately turns green after enabling traffic for the application and stays green all the time. That's what I wanted. So, it's proven that something must be wrong with the built in firewall, at least when it comes to runnig internet accessing apps from an removable drive. It seems, firewall rules have to be regenerated every time you run µT from an external or removable drive after dismounting.

I can recommend this little prog to solve this kind of problems, cause it's lightweight and available as a portable version without installing and cluttering your system. Now you have control of applications and you're able to allow or disallow internet access for each app in a popup. You can allow traffic for all time (<only installer version handles this correct for removable media) or allow it only once. This is what I expect from an additional software firewall, otherwise it's not worth running it.

The windows firewall doesn't re-check paths of apps saved on removable media or create one-off rules at least. So every time you mount your drive, you'd had to manually delete and recreate the rules. If you don't, it ends up in connection troubles.

W7FC (maybe there are similar other progs out there) now can take care of this process.

I recommend the installer version; it handles the removable media issues pretty well. The portable version doesn't, but you can creat one-off enabling rules...works as well.

Everyone who will give it a try should look into the manual and FAQ first to avoid running into problems.

Greets