The RadWare DefensePro is an appliance-based product that requires
the RadWare InSite appliance for configuration and management. Together
these two products are feature-rich and offer the most comprehensive
functionality we’ve found. However, without the two products together,
the DefensePro is quite limited in its analysis capability.
We found this product extremely difficult to set up and use. We
finally were forced to spend well over an hour on the phone with the
manufacturer in Israel going through the configuration in detail. We
believe that once the product is configured it is relatively easy to
use, but the configuration is difficult for several reasons.
First, the products both must be set up initially using a console
device over an RS232 port. In some cases, we found that making an error
meant starting over from a reboot. Second, the two devices are finicky
about connecting to each other. We had set up the management ports
through a hub, but the devices did not work correctly until we replaced
the hub with a switch.
However, on the plus side, adding new policies is simple and the choices are comprehensive.
Performance is solid and the product captured almost all our scan,
probe and penetration events smoothly and cleanly. Reporting is
somewhat limited, consisting of listings or graphs that can be pie
charts, bar graphs or line graphs. The screen requires refreshing in
order to see new data. We would have preferred near real-time updates
of the report display.
Documentation is limited, not well organized and not complete. The
user guides give no examples, making initial configuration difficult.
However, there is a separate manual that consists largely of scenarios
and that is useful. Had the documentation been stronger, we would have
had much less trouble with deployment.
Support is available at several levels as an extra cost option.
However, without a customer password details about the support
offerings — some of which are location dependent — are mostly
unavailable.
This is a relatively expensive product given that the DefensePro
starts at $12,500 and the InSite appliance is an extra cost item
($2,000 for software-only version or $10,000 for the appliance).