“For people looking to have everything in one box in a branch office, it’s a wonderful solution,” said Bill Jensen, a product and marketing manager for the company.
NGX is a software platform Check Point has been rolling out since May for its firewall and VPN products. Through it, administrators have a single application through which all Check Point products can be managed through a browser-based SmartCentre.
New is the addition of the company’s Smart Defense technology, which can stop worms and denial-of-service attacks from remote branches.
“The other big improvement that we made with this release is gateway-based anti-virus,” said Jensen.
“This is becoming a need-to-have for the branch office rather than a want-to-have.” By having AV security at the edge of the network it’s less crucial to have laptops with the latest anti-virus signatures, he said.
Check Point uses streaming AV technology, which is faster than cache-based scanning, he said.
The result of these improvement means “the customer is getting more of an appliance for their money,” Jensen said.
The price of the VPN-1 Edge, which starts at US$599 and goes up depending on the model, remains the same. “From a reseller perspective, they’re going to be able to meet the customer’s needs,” said Jensen.
