RE: IPS comparison

["Williams, Cameron" <cwilliams () virtela net>]

My two cents:

There have been several industry magazine reviews (SC Magazine,
Information Security, etc.) of both of the vendors that you are
specifically interested in.  In my opinion, both vendor's products offer
a robust signature based, as well as anomaly based protection.  

Where I think the industry mags fall short in their analysis are in the
areas of ease of deployment, throughput, hardware reliability, and
pricing.  Hardware reliability is key, since these devices will most
likely be placed in-line in your network.  Most of the vendors out in
the market have very little information with regards to this piece. 

In addition, one of the products may be better suited for deployment in
a specific segment of the network.  For instance, you may consider a
lower throughput rated IPS for your perimeter network protection, as
opposed to a GIG throughput IPS for a deep LAN deployment (at the core,
providing protection on separate VLANs).

One more usually overlooked place is in NMS features.  Most of the
products have an optional management station(usually requiring some
additional cap-ex) that you may not want to use.  The NMS features that
you may want from a standalone box would include SNMP/SYSLOG, etc.  Some
vendors fall short in this arena as well.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Cameron Williams 
Security Assurance Manager
Virtela Communications
p:  720-475-4034
f:   720-475-4035
5680 Greenwood Plaza Blvd.
Greenwood Village, CO  80111
cwilliams () virtela net


-----Original Message-----
From: bw [mailto:bjshhsjb () yahoo com] 
Sent: Monday, July 25, 2005 10:52 AM
To: pen-test () securityfocus com
Subject: IPS comparison

I have been tasked with comparing IPS appliances. I am seriously looking
at top layer's product line and tipping point. Does anyone have a
spreadsheet or know of any tool they would be willing to share for
comparing products. Im new to this so any help would be appreciated

thank you

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