Table of contents
1. Introduction
| Hawking Dual WAN Firewall Router w/4-Port Switch | |
|---|---|
| Summary | Dual Ethernet WAN SPI-based router. Inexpensive alternative to Symantec VPN 200, but without dialup/ISDN backup ports, and less sophisticated load balancing and failover. |
| Update | 8/12/2003
- New firmware available that improves dual-WAN load balancing features. - Nexland purchased by Symantec and pro800Turbo no longer available |
| Pros | • Dual 10/100 WAN ports with auto-failover and load balancing
• Supports 16 WAN IP addresses • High throughput |
| Cons | • No Web traffic logging
• Poor documentation |
Although the number of people with multiple broadband Internet connections is small, it must be growing enough to attract a second entrant to the market. Hawking's FR24 Dual WAN Broadband 4 Port Firewall Router is the first consumer-level router to take on Nexland's pro800Turbo (now the Symantec Firewall/VPN 200) on the dual WAN battlefield. Can a box that costs less than $100 really compete with an established product that costs almost five times (make that almost 20 times with Symantec's pricing) as much? You may be surprised at the answer!