Firewall advice

Hello. I thought I would talk about the basic needs for your computer which are a firewall and anti virus and free software programs to keep it running smoothly. We get our pc. and straight away people like P C World etc. and the computer manufacturers are trying to get us to part with lots of money. Now with firewalls even if you have a router with a firewall you still need a software firewall. If you are on Windows 7 or Vista windows firewall is fine providing you tick the box to make it a two way firewall. If you are on XP you can down load a free-ware firewall which will be fine, just type in a search in Google for free-ware firewalls . Don’t forget you can only run one firewall at a time so go into windows and switch that one off first. Sorry if this is a bit basic to some of you but I wish when I first started someone had been around to advise me.