ClearOS vs. pfSense

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
ClearOS
Score 9.3 out of 10
N/A
ClearCenter, an HPE partner headquartered in Orem, offers ClearOS, an open source operating system that supports the ProLiant line of small business servers, and other systems.N/A
pfSense
Score 9.2 out of 10
N/A
pfSense is a firewall and load management product available through the open source pfSense Community Edition, as well as a the licensed edition, pfSense Plus (formerly known as pfSense Enterprise). The solution provides combined firewall, VPN, and router functionality, and can be deployed through the cloud (AWS or Azure), or on-premises with a Netgate appliance. It as scalable capacities, with functionality for SMBs. As a firewall, pfSense offers Stateful packet inspection, concurrent…
$179
per appliance
Pricing
ClearOSpfSense
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
SG-1100
$179
per appliance
SG-2100
$229
per appliance
SG-3100
$399
per appliance
SG-5100
$699
per appliance
XG-7100-DT
$899
per appliance
XG-7100-1U
$999
per appliance
XG-1537
$1,949
per appliance
XG-1541
$2,649
per appliance
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
ClearOSpfSense
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
ClearOSpfSense
Top Pros

No answers on this topic

Top Cons

No answers on this topic

Features
ClearOSpfSense
Firewall
Comparison of Firewall features of Product A and Product B
ClearOS
-
Ratings
pfSense
7.6
11 Ratings
11% below category average
Identification Technologies00 Ratings5.110 Ratings
Visualization Tools00 Ratings7.08 Ratings
Content Inspection00 Ratings4.111 Ratings
Policy-based Controls00 Ratings10.011 Ratings
Active Directory and LDAP00 Ratings7.09 Ratings
Firewall Management Console00 Ratings9.510 Ratings
Reporting and Logging00 Ratings8.011 Ratings
VPN00 Ratings10.011 Ratings
High Availability00 Ratings10.011 Ratings
Stateful Inspection00 Ratings7.011 Ratings
Proxy Server00 Ratings6.011 Ratings
Best Alternatives
ClearOSpfSense
Small Businesses
Ubuntu
Ubuntu
Score 9.0 out of 10
WatchGuard Network Security
WatchGuard Network Security
Score 8.9 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Score 9.2 out of 10
Next-Generation Firewalls - PA Series
Next-Generation Firewalls - PA Series
Score 9.3 out of 10
Enterprises
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Score 9.2 out of 10
Next-Generation Firewalls - PA Series
Next-Generation Firewalls - PA Series
Score 9.3 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
ClearOSpfSense
Likelihood to Recommend
-
(0 ratings)
9.7
(24 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
ClearOSpfSense
Likelihood to Recommend
ClearCenter
No answers on this topic
Netgate (Rubicon Communications, LLC)
Because pfSense is built around open source software, it is very convenient to be able to deploy in the event of hardware failure. We once had a client with a proprietary router that failed. While the router was under warranty, the expected time for the new router to arrive was about 2 weeks. We decided to implement pfSense for the client as a stop gap and ultimately ended up deploying the full enterprise appliance. Being able to get up and running using commodity hardware was a huge win for the client. We've also had a great amount of success deploying pfSense hardware at apartment complexes. The DNS resolver works great and we've had no issues handling multiple VLANs with various DHCP scopes on it. Finally, we've had clients that require having a failover cluster. Utilizing the built in CARP capabilities, we've been able to provide a very robust failover system that requires little maintenance and no downtime in the event of equipment failure.
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Pros
ClearCenter
No answers on this topic
Netgate (Rubicon Communications, LLC)
  • Easy to use. Good user interface design! Easy to understand and easy to set up.
  • Lower hardware requirement. 3 years ago, we used an old PC to run it. Now, we have changed to a router device with Celeron CPU and 8GB RAM. It runs smoothly with a 1000G commercial broadband.
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Cons
ClearCenter
No answers on this topic
Netgate (Rubicon Communications, LLC)
  • I did kind of mention a Con in the Pro section with OpenVPN.
  • When I create a config for an employee other employees are able to login to that config.
  • I could be doing something wrong when I am making it - I am not afraid to admit that as I am pretty new to all of this, but it seems like it builds a key and I would think the key would be unique in some way to each employee, but I could be wrong.
  • I actually do not have a lot of Con's for this software - I did not get to set this up on our work network so I am not sure of any downfalls when installing.
  • I installed this on my personal machine in a Hyper-V environment to get a feel for it before I started working on it at work and it seemed pretty smooth. I didn't run into any issues.
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Usability
ClearCenter
No answers on this topic
Netgate (Rubicon Communications, LLC)
The interface is simple, has sane defaults, and is consistent throughout.
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Alternatives Considered
ClearCenter
No answers on this topic
Netgate (Rubicon Communications, LLC)
While you can get the performance out of other products, pfSense offers the unique ability to put other services on the same device. Products such as Untagle's NG Firewall and SonicWall's TZ series offer cost effective options for firewall and VPN services, having incoming load balancing and connection proxies on the same device as the firewall offers extremely easy configuration and day to day management of network services
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Return on Investment
ClearCenter
No answers on this topic
Netgate (Rubicon Communications, LLC)
  • Using pfSense has allowed us to build a professional network in our small office without needing a lot of proprietary hardware, saving thousands of dollars in IT infrastructure investment.
  • The cost for using pfSense is free, so it's a great option for those who don't have a large IT budget
  • pfSense utilizes all of the industry standard services to provide all of it's functionality, so support for service-level issues is readily available
  • Because of how much work has been put into pfSense to make it rock solid and reliable, we're able to support our network with minimal IT staffing, saving us thousands of dollars/year in personnel alone.
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