Stories by Joel Snyder

Cisco impresses with UCS

If you're tempted to think of Cisco's Unified Computing System (UCS) as just another blade server — don't. In fact, if you just want a bunch of blades for your computer room, don't call Cisco — Dell, HP, and IBM all offer simpler and more cost-effective options.

Cisco UCS pricing: It's complicated

As with any server product, there are lots of ways to configure UCS, including different levels of CPU, memory and storage. Cisco has a 29-page document to help you get it right, and 29 pages are not overkill. To get an idea of what this might cost, we configured two separate systems: one with 40 dual-socket blades, and another with 80 of the same blades.

Network access control in a nutshell

Twelve leading NAC products put to the test

Cisco's NAC goes off track, customers taken aback

As the most important supplier of network infrastructure to enterprises, Cisco's NAC products are a natural point of curiosity for network managers. Unfortunately, though, Cisco's approach to NAC has been riddled with in-fighting, false starts, delayed product releases, and a good dose of chaos and confusion.

Internet radio appliances roundup

Web-based applications and products like Apple's iTunes have made it easy to turn a laptop or a desktop into a music player. At the same time, thousands of radio stations are re-broadcasting their audio over the Internet to anyone who wants to listen. But what if you want to listen to, say, modern jazz from Mali or pop from Paris without dragging around a laptop? Enter the Internet radio: an appliance that looks like a radio and has an antenna -- but connects over Wi-Fi to the Internet, and streams audio to speakers.

Five great Wi-Fi Internet Radios

While Web-based music offerings from Apple (iTunes) and others have made it easy to turn a laptop or desktop into a music player, what if you want to listen without dragging around your PC? Enter the stand-alone Internet radio, which looks like a radio and has an antenna, but connects via Wi-Fi to the Internet and streams audio to speakers. We recently tried out five such devices. Check the slides to see what we thought.

Can ACLs and NAC mix for security success?

Most network equipment vendors are ready to up the ante in terms of how their gear can control access in a NAC deployment.

Interop Labs: Microsoft gets NAC act together

The world of network access control is being drawn, irresistibly, into Microsoft's orbit now that the Redmond giant's full repertoire of Network Access Protection client, server and policy components are out there in the real world.

SonicWall smashes speed records

Last month, SonicWall rolled out its next-generation unified threat management firewall appliance geared for the enterprise. In our exclusive test of the Network Security Appliance E7500, results show that SonicWall has, indeed, crashed through the speed barrier.

Testing All-in-one Firewalls

Are there unified threat management (UTM) firewalls with the chops to provide the perimeter security functions that an enterprise needs?

AV's place is not in the all-in-one security box

There is no real agreement about whether antivirus software is required in or even a good idea for an enterprise-class firewall.

Watts up with power consumption?

The data center may seem a big place, but watts are watts: Every one you use costs you money. Two firewalls in a high-availability pair may not be the biggest power expense in a computer room, but that's no excuse to waste wattage.

UTMs require routing for flexibility's sake

We tested the OSPF-routing capabilities of the UTM devices in order to simulate the kind of multiple-exit network (two Internet gateways) that might be common in a large network.

A closer look at UTM hardware architecture

One of the appliances we received was simply an off-the-shelf server (IBM's System x3650). Other devices ranged from very lightly customized (Secure Computing put an IPS accelerator board and a customized BIOS in a Dell box to yield its Sidewinder 2150D) to the heavily engineered chassis found in the Juniper ISG-1000 and the Fortinet FortiGate 3600A.

Tracking UTM high availability

The high-availability (HA) and scalability features in the enterprise UTM firewalls we tested range from very fancy to dead simple.