Antimalware, firewall, and other security programs for Windows XP working in 2023 and hopefully beyond

[AstroSkipper]

19 minutes ago, Dave-H said:

When I first said that I'd installed Panda Dome 21, and you mentioned HTTPSProxy as being necessary for it to connect on XP, the first thing I did was to look at the proxy console.
There were no entries for Panda servers at all, and the program seemed to be working perfectly, connected to my account and activated.
How it worked without it, I have no idea. The Panda Dome proxy settings were still on their defaults, whatever they are.
I have the proxy set to work system-wide, but it would surely have recorded something in the console if Panda Dome had used it.
I have never emptied my Certs folder, or updated cacert.pem, and I've been using the proxy now for several years, as you know!
It seems to still be working perfectly.
What would be the symptoms if it wasn't because I hadn't done all that.
My Certs folder has 4,145 files in it BTW!

Here is a quotation from my main article:

On 2/20/2022 at 4:09 PM, AstroSkipper said:

6.5. Maintenance of ProxHTTPSProxy and HTTPSProxy for future use:

We have to carry out a bit of maintenance to ensure that these proxies are working properly. First of all, the system's root certificates should be updated every three months. If you have not done that yet, you can use one of the root certificate updater in the section 11.2.4. Downloads related to Root Certificate Updates where different online and offline versions can be downloaded from. Then you should check following list:

• Regular update of the file 'cacert.pem'.
• Maintenance and check of the file config.ini according to your needs.
• Checking the validity of the proxy's root certificate.
• Deleting of all certificates in the folder 'Certs' if the proxy isn't working properly.
• Checking the state of the Proxy in IE or in your system.

And I should add that it is very important to delete all dummy cerificates in the Certs folder when the cacert.pem file has been updated. And you won't lose anything. The dummy certificates will be generated the next time when connecting to servers. BTW, you are using the proxy system-wide. That was what I asked you in an earlier post. I personally do not.  

[Dave-H]

13 minutes ago, NotHereToPlayGames said:

I can't get it to ACTIVATE on 100% Native XP+POS.  The ACTIVATION may be where HTTPSProxy becomes a must.

I'm pretty sure that my Panda Dome 21 did activate without using HTTPSProxy, even though I have it installed, and it accessed my Panda account fine too.
Version 22 again activated fine as a free version, and updated fine when my Essentials activation code was put in.
The only thing it would not do until I put the proxy settings into it was access my Panda account, which 21 had done fine apparently without the proxy.

[AstroSkipper]

18 minutes ago, NotHereToPlayGames said:

I can report that Panda Dome 21 does indeed install on a 100% Native XP+POSReady2009 (ie, *no* HTTPSProxy, *no* ProxHTTPSProxy, *no* Proxomitron, *no* Cert Updates of any kind, IE never even launched until the Panda installer launched it!).

You must have misunderstood something. Panda only needs ProxHTTPSProxy to activate the Panda account. After that, the proxy settings in Panda can be deleted and the proxy closed.

[NotHereToPlayGames]

Okay, that explains it.

I *never* use a REAL email address for these types of things.  *NEVER*

v23 would CONNECT (through HTTPSProxy) but then fail account creation saying the email account was unreachable.

I tried EIGHT different "temporary email" services, Panda could not "reach" any of them.

ie, has them all blacklisted, not uncommon [MSFN accounts can also not be created with temp emails, something that *ticks me off* but "is what it is"]).

v21 would not even try to connect to the "temporary email" services [direct, no proxy] (which is inline with your statements).

Just the way I do things, Panda will *NOT* get my email address.  But I could create a "throwaway" Gmail and activate that way if I opt to keep Panda.