Thanks everyone for your suggestions.

With my current xp, Pentium 4 computer and the mcafee firewall, I stop traffic maybe 8-10 times a day.

I only unlock the firewall to go on the internet as needed. Otherwise I have it locked down.

This setup has never given me a problem with recording in BIAB or Sonar. When It's locked down I've never been interrupted once by the firewall announcing that a program tried to connect to the internet, etc. It's worked quite well.

My new windows 7, i7 computer is coming to me with Microsoft Security Essentials installed. I've read that many of you are happy with it.

I was just hoping there might be an easy way to duplicate the ability I have now to stop all traffic with one click.

Mac:
I definitely can see the benefits to your suggestion. It's just that the unlock/lockdown is something I do many times a day. I might look at your suggestion for situations where I will be doing nothing but recording for a long time.

I was hoping there might be a quick solution that is compatible with microsoft security essentials. What would be the best way to do that?

Thanks.

John