8. Logging and Other Features

• U.S. Robotics Secure...
• • ElectronicsPLUS
  • $151.99
• • CompUPlus
  • $153.00
• • Limited Goods PG East
  • $334.95

Given everything that the 8200 can do, its logging features pale by comparison. There are separate Security and System log screens, which can be cleared, but not saved, and don't appear to allow capture of multiple screens of log information. Most of the interesting stuff goes to the System log, including plenty of Linux system console-type messages. But this stream also suffers from useless information overload, like the Byte-by-Byte reports generated by my test PPTP connection.

There's also no syslog or SNMP trap capability for capturing log streams, but logs can be emailed if you enable the feature and enter your SMTP server and email address. I tried this out and logs did show up in my Inbox, but the contents weren't that useful.

In general, this area needs lots more work to allow better control over logged information and the addition of website traffic logging.

The list of miscellaneous features is long and I kept discovering links to things that didn't have useful explanations in the documentation. Some of the more easily understood features are:

you can set and unlimited number static routes RIP 1 and 2 dynamic routing protocols and multicasting are supported you can have the 8200 automatically check for firmware upgrades and either upgrade automatically or send an email advising you of the upgrade

And, of course, this doesn't include the 8200's file serving features, which I'll cover next.