I am currious if there is a linux based firewall that can run on a windows XP x64 Operating system? or even if it is possible to run a Linux system as a firewall( Like smoothwall) in VM in windows ?

Hi -

That's kind of like asking "is there a castle moat that I can keep in the back of my wood shed?", isn't it? Maybe the answer is "yes". Maybe there are even Linux A/V scanners (like clamshell) you can run in a VM under Windows, too.

But why?

Well I Used to you Linux x64 bit but I upped my Ram Memory to 8Gb and since I have done this I Cannot get Linux to run the combination of ATI drivers and the 8GB ram at the same time so I moved to Windows xp x64 but I really like the security of Linux so I was wondering if I could just have my internet go through VM with linux running as a fire wall to be more secure

There really would be no point in this- VMs are hosted inside of a host machine *sharing* it's connection with the host machine.

You might be able to create an API that interfaces with Winsock. Perhaps you can base it on coLinux?

Hi -

I sympathize with you: ATI's Linux support definitely leaves much to be desired (I mean jeez - all they have to do is accept that "Open source" == "Open source", put a working code base out there ... and let the community do the rest!).

Anyway, even if you could get it to work (and I'm not at all sure you can), I don't think it would be practical. To be effective, your firewall really ought to be *external* to your host (or, at the very least, at the OS-level with your physical host).

IMHO .. PSM

PS:
There's another LQ thread where they're debating the usefulness of 32-bit vs 64-bit. As it sounds like you've already discovered, once you need >> 2 or 3GB RAM, you'll very definitely need a 64-bit OS. And until you hit that point, it's unlikely you'll ever notice the difference (difference in more RAM, and/or difference in 32 vs 64 bit OS).

PPS:
A couple of years ago, I, too, had dual boot Linux/64 (SusE 10.0/64, specifically), and Windows XP/64. SuSE was absolutely no problem ... and Windows/XP was a fiasco. I wound up de-installing XP/64 and installing the standard XP/32, and I've been running happily ever since.

If Windows XP/64 happens to work for you - great! If not, I would run (not walk) to either Windows 7 (freely available in Beta) or Windows Server 2008 (which might be overkill - but which uses 64-bit very effectively).

Thank you all for your posts I guess that when my New hard drive finally arrives I will start going through a bunch of Linux distros again in hopes of finding a new one that likes my setup lol