Review on 🔒 Zyxel ZyWALL 2.0 Gbps VPN Firewall/SD-WAN: Up to 100 Users, One-Year License Included [VPN100] by Brad Schillings

I switched from used redundant server hardware on eBay running either pfsense or a byte order firewall to this ZyWALL 310 firewall. I couldn't be happier with what I've accomplished. Actually, I should have done it much earlier. Even with the three fans on the back of the unit running at full speed during boot, it's still much quieter than my Sun V20z or V60x servers, which used to be my firewalls. It's like day and night. The fans drop to half speed under load and while I can still hear it, they don't bother me. As other reviewers have said, it sounds like a laptop fan under stress, that's all. In my opinion quite tolerable and important because I don't have a server cabinet. I commute to work from my home office and have a half height server rack in my home office. There are three Cisco SGP200-26 switches in this rack along with this zywall 310 firewall right next to my desk. With this device I can work comfortably in my office. This firewall software is a little different than what I'm used to, and while I already have some experience setting firewall rules, I'm by no means a network engineer. Nevertheless, I was able to get this firewall up and running in a basic configuration in a short time. The default rules they provide basically allow all outbound traffic from all LANs and DMZ to the WAN port. So just need to add few rules to block some services like ftp, telnet, pop3 and smtp that use clear text passwords. I also updated the device's firmware by registering it on the Zywall website. Updating the firmware is very easy, there is a video on YouTube showing how to do it. Finally, the performance I get is phenomenal. With my pfsense or Endian firewalls, I could not exceed download speeds of 100 Mbit/s. With this device, I broke through immediately and downloaded at a full 240 Mb/s, which my service allows. For me the advantages were clear. Less noise in my office (except when I need to run my development solar servers)2. Less heat in my office3. Faster Download Speed4. Fits nicely and neatly in my server rack. I'm glad I bought this device and would recommend it to anyone who just wants to get their job done without too much hassle.