Can anyone recommend a good firewall. I am currently running around 70 + users and we have two internet connections. I have been looking at the Baracuda, but I wanted to get some opinions first on what is out there. I must state that I am looking for a hardware device, not software. This is a growing company so I need something that will give us growing room.

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Here's a free one for you.

http://www.download.com/ZoneAlarm/3000-104...tml?tag=lst-0-5

Other than that, there's Norton, Mcafee, and a few other companies out there. Just try doing a search with google.

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Thank you for the suggestion. I have used Zone alarm for my personal computer at home. Works very well. However, I am looking for more of a system wide hardware solution that provides a little more for a network environment. :-)

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I think Firewalls are very useful, especially when you surf many many sites. But I just have to say a thing about Norton Personal Firewall:

- Your computer slows down after you install Norton. This is mentioned by me and by many testers of this product.

- It isn't extremely better than ZoneAlarm. I recommend ZoneAlarm because I use it, too. But you say that you need more than ZoneAlarm. I think that McAffee Firewall will be the best software for you

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I would suggest Netgear as they are very reliable and easy to set up and maintain. I have only had good experience with them. I can't suggest a specific one as I don't know the exact circumstances, but have a look anyway.

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I have never run an enterprise type of hardware firewall, but I think I have some experience using hardware firewalls that may worth sharing here. I am using a wireless router for my home which has 5 computers in the LAN. There is a built in firewall in the device. There was absolutely no problem with the firewall in the Old Stone Age, which was about 2 years ago before BT gets really popular. However, ever since I got into Bit Torrent, I often have to open 1300+ sockets with about 100+ half open sockets. With this number of connection, my firewall starts to drag. At the beginning, I didn’t realize that it was the problem with the firewall. However, after some investigations, I think the problem lies in the so-called stateful firewall. The firewall analyses into the protocols and so it has to put data in its built-in memory. With a lot of connections, the firewall simply runs out of memory and CPU resources and so the connection gets stunningly slow. So if you really want to buy a firewall, I would suggest that you buy one with a lot of memory and a sound CPU. Otherwise, the bottleneck will be at the firewall.

 

 

 

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T100:
This is the problem we are currently having with our firewall now. It seems to peak the cpu out to around 98 % causing the network to slow drasticly. The only solution is to reset it once a week. All the configurations stay the same, so that is a good thing, but come Friday I am back in the server closet with a pen to reset it. It gets aggravating after awhile. I have looked at Baracuda, and it seems that it will do what I am looking for. It has a built in Spam and Antivirus functionality which would greatly help on the protective end. However, it states that it carries the load so the e-mail server, or machines in general do not have to take the load. This is good in theory, but I am worried that perhaps its CPU will over load as well, and then I am back to resetting it once a week.
I like netgear myself, and in fact I use it at home, but I am not sure if it can handle the load of 70 + people and 6 servers. The firewall we use now was not my decision to use to begin with, and I really wish there were some more research done before the decision was handed down to me to purchase the firewall we have now. I would suggest that the firewall is good for a small setup such as 10 to 15 users with 1 or maybe 2 servers top.
We are a growing comapany and I need something that can produce, and handle our system. I am almost tempted to set up another Linux box as a Firewall, but I feel that I would invest to much time, and money in resources to go this route. I am very proficient in Linux so that would not be the problem. The problem once again goes back to, can the hardware support the load.
We have spent $400.00 on the current firewall, which made me leary to begin with. However, the Baracuda runs around $3000.00 and that includes replacement and updates. Our current firewall seems to have been discontinued, and has never had any updates available which is very aggravating, and unsatisfactory.
So, before I even present this option to the Tech Committee, I need to have all my ducks in a row, and different solutions to look over and compare.

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