Hardware Firewall

[Noise]

Does anyone have any suggestions for a good Hardware Firewall which can work with a gigabit network ?

 

Thanks

 

N

[DarinClifton]

Firewall for what? gigabit has no impact on an external web traffic unless you have a massive pipe (multiple t1's or oc3) and I'm not sure why you would separate internal network with a hardware firewall, windows server is very good at this. That said the best prosumer grade firewall I have seen is the "firebox" from a company called "watchguard". I have had many consumer grade products linksys, netgear and such, all were crap.

 

We recently had a request from one of our customers to have our network test for external attacks, we used a national service provider (Qualys) to conduct the testing, we had to actually reduce our firewall settings before they could even see my network and after that all they could tell, was who was serving as our ISP. We use a "firebox x edge 15w" it is also a great VPN router. I can probably help more if you describe what you are trying to do in more detail.

Good Luck!

D

[Noise]

In our office building there is one patch panel which serves all the companies in the building.

 

The up shot of this is that all the companies networks and files can be seen by everyone else which isn't good.

 

So, I have been told by the building manager that the way around this is to have our own hardware firewall installed in the patch panel to keep our information safe and secret.

 

I have noticed that some firewalls are advertised as gigabits so, thats why I asked.

 

I am now researching which firewall to go for. The one you suggested looks excellent, I am however unsure to go for a wired or wireless version.

[DarinClifton]

I am a little confused, Is the patch panel secured? typically they are in a secured closet. If it is secured then is would be easy to just install your own switch to patch to...that with a good server setup would do the trick and a switch would be a lot cheaper. The only way someone could "see" your network is if they actually connect a hardware to your switch. How many nodes are you talking about? (computers, printers, servers...)

 

If your landlord is not confusing terms, a patch panel is typically a terminus for each networking run. Until you "patch" these connections into some kind of switch or router they can't see anything. Still need more information to help, is the building providing internet access as well, that would change things? You can get a simple gigabit switch for $100-200 a comparable hardware firewall will cost much more!

 

BTW, go wireless it doesn't cost any more and it gives you more flexibility