Greetings,

I had the same problem you are describing. I also have Zone Alarm. In Programs I set the Java program to ALLOW internet access. I noticed on start up that the Java program was also asking to "Act As Server". Everything worked fine for awhile then it froze up after a 10 minutes or so.
I am not a computer guru but I got thinking about my machine acting as a server with Zone Alarm and Norton running in the background. After freezing up for the 3rd time I went into Zone Alarm and BLOCKED the server rights for the Java program.
Not another problem !!
We can still share files but the computer, P4 3.0, doesn't freeze up any longer.
Hope this helps !!

Best Regards,
Ron