Check Point NGFW Reviews

I work for a systems integrator and have designed and deployed solutions over many years with Check Point components. Problems solved with Check Point NGFWs have included securing the edge, data center segregation, SWG replacement, Remote Access, and many others.

I have designed and installed Check Point deployments from a single SMB appliance to multiple highly available chassis, running numerous virtual systems. Numerous different use cases include appliance form-factors, running modules, and licenses.

I have always found that Check Point's fully integrated management provides significant improvements to organisations where I have deployed them. As management has always been integral in the Check Point deployment, all functionality and visibility is natively baked into the management platform, which provides a single point to configure and monitor every function. Alternative vendors have added centralized management functionality as a secondary feature and therefore have never been able to compete on this front.

Management integration is holistic as centralized management has been core to the solution for decades. Where other vendors have bolted management on over time, Check Point has always made it central to everything that they do.  

I find that this is one of the most significant and valuable features of Check Point. In addition to that, many new features that eventually become the standard across the industry end up being first introduced by Check Point - sometimes years ahead (such as Threat Extraction which allows active content to be stripped from files being downloaded and a "clean" copy to be provided in near real-time, while sandbox inspection is being performed).

Product-wise, I have no real complaints. 

Potential improvements could be made around simplifying VPN functionality and configuration.  

The main area that the organization can improve is around the lack of local, in-state technical support. Competitor vendors have a strong presence in the Adelaide Market, however, Check Point has always been limited with its commitment to staffing local technical resources. If this focus is made, I could see Check Point returning to the strength that it once had in the Adelaide market.

I've used the solution for 17 years.

I do like that this solution is a very robust firewall.

It's very stable. 

The product is well supported. The solution is very scalable. 

Technical support has been quite good. 

The only thing I would like to improve is the updates. Sometimes when they bring on new upgrades, they affect something else. That happens sometimes. For example, something that was working well might have a new issue after an update. It's understandable as they do have like to add innovations. When you are innovative, you face some risks. 

They have already announced that they will be adding SD-WAN as a new feature.

I've been using the solution for 18 years.

The solution is very stable. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable. That said, I would like the latest version to be more stable.

The product is very scalable. You have very good options. For example, if you start with a smaller firewall and you want to upgrade to have newer hardware, they have different options. For example, you can run a script that is going to tell you the new appliances that you need, according to your new requirements according to your network consumption. 

It did launch Maestro about two years ago. Maestro is something that allows you to stack firewalls. If your current firewalls handle the traffic anymore, you can add new firewalls to it. 

If you want to change the firewall you can do these trade-ins. You can return the old firewall and they will give you a special discount. 

Technical support has been very helpful and responsive. We've been happy with the level of support they offer. 

The product is easy to set up. I am seasoned on Check Point. For me, it's very easy. I wouldn't say it's hard. 

I'd rate the solution at a ten out of ten.

Check Point has strong security features as well as some decent monitoring and management capabilities.

My customers complain that the interface isn't user-friendly.

I have been using Check Point for eight years.

Check Point stable. I've had no problems.

Check Point is scalable.

Check Point support is good.

Check Point's setup process isn't very user-friendly.

Check Point is a little more expensive than FortiGate.

I rate Check Point nine out of 10. I work with both Check Point and FortiGate. Each has its advantages and disadvantages. Check Point is more secure than FortiGate. However, Fortigate is more affordable and user-friendly. FortiGate offers seamless solutions to customers, so If they want a solution that's easy to use, they go with FortiGate.

We primarily use the solution for security.

Check Point NGFW is a stable and user-friendly solution. It has increased the security level and stability within our organization. With the ATP solution, it works and is fully competent. It can catch many zero-day attacks and it fits NGFW well,

The most valuable features are IPS and Antivirus. 

The Blades work fine and the performance optimization is great.

In some features, it is not easy to use the Check Point firewall. 

The IPSEC VPN setup is not easy to configure. In some cases, if the VPN is not established, it is very hard to troubleshoot the configuration. It does not address the problem well. 

The upgrading process takes too much time.

I've used the solution for seven years.

The stability is very good. I would rate it at a nine out of ten.

The solution is scalable. I'd rate it at a nine out of ten.

In most cases, they answer our ticket in one day. They are willing to solve the problems at hand.

The initial setup is not easy, however, it is also not very complex. We have to use both the Gaia and smart console interface and it should be checked for some conf from the CLI.

We did and their expertise was high. We did not face many problems.

While the solution is good, we wish to have something that is a bit better, as the threats have evolved over time. We have been using Check Point for more than than eight years and are interested in a better solution. We entered a review site which ranks top security firewalls and saw that Palo Alto is ranked number one, followed by Fortinet, with Check Point in the lead. We noticed that Palo Alto was much more expensive than Fortinet, but wished to know which key features differentiated the two. 

Though we did not take issue with the price of Check Point NGFW, we felt that it was providing us with inadequate support here in Uganda. This is why we decided to switch solutions. I should note that I do not have a technical background and am responsible for procurement. 

The value we were getting for our money was an issue. I work for a bank for which security is very important, but we were not being assured of the appropriate support. The licensing fees we were paying did not equate with adequate local support. We had already had a bad experience with Check Point, so we did not bother with a quote from it and, instead, got one from several local companies that can support either Palo Alto or Fortinet. 

We do not feel that the local support given in Uganda is equitable with the pricing. 

While the pricing is okay, the local Ugandan support one gets is not commensurate with it. 

I rate Check Point NGFW as a six out of ten. 

Primarily, we implement the solution at a couple of sites around the world and have created five site VPNs across it. We are running a pretty decent policy to make sure internally our infrastructure is secure.

The product offers excellent security. How open they are with new risks and new vulnerabilities is very helpful in the task of keeping our company safe from malicious attacks.

Newer versions are much more stable.

The UI could use some improvement. It's not as clean or seamless as it could be. 

It's my understanding that the initial setup is a bit complex. There's a bit of a learning curve if you're trying to set it up for the first time and you aren't familiar with the product.

Older versions were a bit unstable. 

We've been using the solution for six or seven years so far. It's been a while. 

While this version seems to be quite stable, Check Point, in previous versions, had a lot of issues when we used to do firmware updates.

We have 200 people on the solution currently. 

I also have experience with Fortinet. I don't have too much, however. It's still very new to me, and therefore it's hard to compare the two solutions. 

While I didn't directly participate in the implementation, from the people that participated, I've heard that it's complicated if you don't know the product very well.

We hired a company to do the implementation. I don't remember the dynamics of the team. The last time it was set up, there were two people on the implementation team. 

While we don't have a direct relationship with the company, we do have business relationships with both Fortinet and Checkpoint partners.

I'd rate the solution at a seven out of ten.

Our customers primarily buy the solution to protect the network from malware at the perimeter of the Network. The next-gen firewalls help the customer to have an application-level control of the traffic.

The features that I have found most valuable are its flexibility and user interface. This is already a well-established product in the market for quite a long time, more than 20 years. They've got a huge customer base.

In terms of what could be improved, I'd like granularity where you can have all the levels of policies that are defined. 

In additional feature that could be added to this solution in the future is micro-segmentation, like Palo Alto has on the firewall itself.

I began using Check Point Next Generation Firewall very recently, about four or five months ago.

We have an internal team for maintenance.

In terms of scalability, what we have seen is that it has a big deployment right now. So it all depends on what kind of environment the customer has. If he's already a Check Point user, it is easy for them, but if it is migrating from one platform to another, it is a little complex. One more thing is that the skillset availability required for Check Point is, in terms of implementation, a little less compared to others. The resources and the technical stuff are there for implementation. You find fewer people on Check Point compared to Sophos or Fortinet or any other platform.

The installation process, if it is a greenfield opportunity, is easy. If it is a migration from one platform to another, you need to have expertise on both the technologies. Let's say for example you're migrating from Fortinet to Check Point, or from Sophos to Check Point or Check Point to any other, you need to have expertise on the platform, even though you should have good experience in terms of migrating and technologies.

In my experience, Check Point provides both in-depth experience and cost-effectiveness compared to Palo Alto. So, Check Point is good for customers already using Check Point and Palo Alto is for anybody who wants to have the latest and most advanced features and has a good budget.

On a scale of one to ten, I would rate Check Point NGFW an 8.

We use Check Point NGFW for perimeter protection of our network from the internet. We also use it for threat protection at the network level and the endpoint level.

We provide implementation, installation, and support services. We know about all types of firewalls, and we work with all types of installations. We usually use appliances, but in test environments, we use virtual appliances.

It is easy to use, and its management is the best. Check Point has a great unified management solution for firewalls and security products. 

Their technical support can be better. In addition, when we need to use it in a government environment, we face a lot of legal issues related to different types of certifications. It would be better to improve it for these issues.

Check Point doesn't have a SOAR system. They work with Siemplify, but it is an integration with another vendor. It would be great if Check Point has an integrated SOAR system.

We have been dealing with Check Point firewalls in our company for more than 20 years.

It is quite stable, but it can vary based on the version.

It is scalable. We can use the Maestro solution from Check Point for scalability. We can add new appliances as the company grows. If we need more performance and throughput, we can add additional appliances and have more performance. Check Point Maestro is the best solution for scalability.

Their technical support can be better.

Its initial setup is easy for me. The deployment duration varies. A simple deployment takes two or three days. A complex deployment that involves a cluster configuration or appliance replacement can take up to five days.

Its price is reasonable. If we compare its TCO for three years, it is more reasonable than some of the other vendors such as Fortinet, Palo Alto, etc.

I would recommend this solution. It is a great solution for endpoint protection and threat prevention. I have been working with Check Point products for a very long time. Check Point is one of our best vendors, and they make great products. 

I would advise others to learn about firewalls and other Check Point solutions. They have a lot of different solutions. If you choose their firewall, it would be useful to know more about other solutions. It would be one of the ways to improve the protection of your network with Check Point.

I would rate Check Point NGFW a ten out of ten.