- Comodo Firewall 7 - latest build available as of 9/7/14 at 11 PM but without the junk of Geekbuddy, Comodo Dragon, and PrivDog (despite the link for a custom install option is nearly hidden in the installer screen), only Comodo Firewall alone was installed.
- Avast Free 2014 9.0.2021
- Windows 7 Home Premium x64, UAC enabled
Problem: Windows Photo Viewer (“%ProgramFiles%\Windows Photo Viewer\PhotoViewer.dll”) reports pic files are inuse when not true.
Note: This is a report only post as Comodo has been uninstalled. Comodo will remain absent from my system (yet another trial that failed).
Comodo Firewall was installed last night, went to bed, and found this problem almost immediately today. New problem in a new install. Comodo Firewall installed using the default security preset of “Firewall Security” which seems really limp. I changed the security profile to “Proactive Security”. Still, any interrogation of interprocess messaging should not so delay or interfere with it to make an application think a file is inuse when it is not. I figured that I’d have to answer more prompts for a few days but wanted full protection. I didn’t bother trying the “Internet Security” profile. The proactive profile should not be corruptive to operation of the OS.
When opening a photo in a folder, I can use the Forward and Back arrow buttons to navigate and view through the other photos in the same folder. I had no problem using this slide view function before the install of Comodo Firewall. Now after installing Comodo Firewall, I am often greeted with:
Windows Photo Viewer can't open this picture because the picture is being edited in another program.
Wrong! No program has the file open for editing. Unlocker shows that no process even has a handle on this file. The error shows sporadically after clicking the Forward button anywhere from 1 to 6 times. I have to click a few times to move forward to view other pics and then click back to see the pic that was previously reported as inuse (but wasn’t).
So Comodo Firewall has caused a timing issue in Windows Photo Viewer that makes it think something else has the file open. If Comodo is so intrusive as to cause problems with a simple image viewer application, I dread what problems it will wreak havoc upon other and more robust applications.
I right-clicked on the Comodo Firewall tray icon and selected “Exit”. I don’t know if this truly unloads all of Comodo Firewall. There is still a Comodo service in running state. I still get the sporadic errors in Windows Photo Viewer. I uninstall Comodo Firewall and do the reboot to complete the uninstallation. Now I can click through over 300 photos in the folder without a single “picture is being edited in another program” error.
With Comodo Firewall installed, there are errors in Windows Photo Viewer claiming another process has an open handle on a file. Within Comodo Firewall uninstalled, no such error and I can click through pics as fast as I want. Comodo = errors and, conversely, no Comodo = no errors.
I trialed Comodo Firewall over 2 years ago and had to discard it because it caused problems back then. Still has problems today. Sending a file to a viewer app is such a simple task that it bodes of even worse problems with the product. To make sure that Comodo Firewall was completely absent from my computer, I restored from an image backup made just prior to installing Comodo Firewall. Uninstalls are never clean simply because the installer cannot log changes made after the installation completed. Sorry, but I just don’t have the time anymore to debug yet another security program.