Check Point 4000 Appliances vs. SonicWall TZ

Well suited for small to medium business with less than 1000 users. Good edge device, NAT is easy to work with. The anti-malware, anti-spyware are worthwhile paid add-ons. Anti-spoofing is built in, and required to be put in. The split of management between Gaia and secure platform applications is painful, but nothing that can't be gotten around.

Incentivized

Based on my experience, this is a solid platform for a small to mid sized company, especially when there is someone who has IT experience, or can get outsourced IT help. I would not recommend for someone who is a technology novice. Also, this is a competent device for someone who is looking to add VPN services for remote workers.

Incentivized

• If you have critical data then you can use this firewall for secure your organization
• You can also use for cloud security
• If you want the deep packet inspection then this is one of the best firewall for you.

• If you have multiple sites and you want the connect the sites through secure medium this is best firewall for you.
• There are very advanced features helps you to connect the device easily and securely.
• Easy to connect the sites through advanced routing protocols.

Incentivized

• Steep learning curve for admins
• No packet tracer application like the ASA to test flows prior to putting in new rules, etc.
• Policy packages are all or nothing. I cannot uninstall or turn off a piece of the overall policy, it's all or nothing.

Incentivized

• management is confusing has many items that could be improved to facilitate the work to the network administrator
• in the diagnostic tool I would improve the response times, that is, if a ping test is required, it should be quick, since in cases of failures it is sought to minimize the impact as much as possible.
• each function has a different license item, I would place a single license package for all team functions

I have used the SonicWall TZ 350 for years and I can say that it is an excellent and complete firewall. It is easy to configure and administer because it has a friendly interface. It is safe, it offers several types of security features, VPN, and also protection against malware. Support and warranty also recommended. It's fast and the problem was solved in less than 1 day.

Incentivized

We were using the Cisco ASA 5525 but this firewall was not fully secure. Lots of advanced features were missing so we installed the Check Point 4000 Appliances and we are really happy with the features, advanced IPS and web filtering help us to protect our organization and also more control our user traffic.

SonicWall and WatchGuard are both fine appliances, but I am accustomed to the Barracuda NG. The Barracuda Control Center is so powerful and useful that it beats out the other two. SonicWall does a great job of dividing up firewall rules and NAT policies, but this is a preference among engineers.

• We have not seen a zero-day exploit since implementing the anti-spyware, anti-malware, and URL filtering functionality
• We have not seen a successful intrusion into our systems since the implementation of our checkpoint 4000
• We have had this firewall for 5+ years, and it still has much life left in it.

Incentivized

• VPN access allowed employees to be more flexible and being able to get internal resources from anywhere.
• Lower licensing price compared to competitors saved some money.
• Protecting from unnecessary connections increased performance and uptime.
• One of the firmware versions caused CPU performance degradation that slowed down the Internet speed which caused issues in the call center.

Incentivized