NetResults

Cisco Secure IDS 2.21 ISS RealSecure 6.0 4.25 Rating Company: Cisco, (408) 526-4000, www.cisco.com Price: (as tested) $21,000 (includes sensor appliance and Secure Policy Manager). Pros: Excellent event management; flexible creation of custom signatures; very good per-formance. Cons: Bulky 4-U (7 inches high) appliance; ease of use compli-cated by depth of features; available as hardware only.   4.25 Rating Company: Internet Security Systems, (404) 236-2600, www.iss.net Price: (as tested) $13,188 (plus about $5,000 per server for event collector and sensor). Pros: Most logical and intuitive GUI; easiest product to scale; excellent management of multiple sen-sors. Cons: Tedious software installation; nonintuitive com-mand-line interface; wizards need to be more targeted.   IDS Dragon 5.0 eTrust Intrusion Detection Engine 1.5 3.85 Rating Company: Enterasys Networks, (603) 332-9400, www.enterasys.com Price: (as tested) $24,500 (includes sensors and manager). Pros: Outstanding performance; easy to install; excellent advanced forensic analysis. Cons: Management interface hard to navigate; weak man-agement of multiple sensors; integration of management applications needs improve-ment.   3.45 Rating Company: Computer Associates, (631) 342-6000, www.ca.com Price: (as tested) $3,300 (plus about $5,000 per server for sensors). Pros: Most feature-rich GUI; good man-agement of multiple sensors; low minimum system require-ments. Cons: Too many soft-ware components; requires higher-horsepower platforms for higher-bandwidth monitor-ing, available as software only.   SecureNet PDS 5545 3.30 Rating Company: Intrusion.com (972) 234-6400, www.intrusion.com Price: (as tested) $43,985 (includes both Unix and Windows 2000 management applications). Pros: Easiest installation; excellent reporting from Win 2000; well-designed LEDs. Cons: Requires multiple applications for full function-ality; needs better integration of features; no automatic signature updates.

Cisco Secure IDS ISS RealSecure IDS Dragon eTrust Intrusion Detection Engine SecureNet PDS Performance 25% 4 4 5 3 2 Management & administration 25% 5 5 4 4 4 Installation & ease of use 20% 4 4 2 3 4 Features 20% 4 4 4 4 3 Configuration 10% 4 4 4 3 4 TOTAL SCORE 4.25 4.25 3.85 3.45 3.30

Individual category scores are based on a scale of 1 to 5. Percentages are the weight given each category in determining the total score. Scoring Key: 5: Exceptional showing in this category. Defines the standard of excellence; 4: Very good showing. Although there may be room for improvement, this product was much better than the average; 3: Average showing in this category. Product was neither especially good nor exceptionally bad; 2: Below average. Lacked some features or lower performance than other products or than expected; 1: Consistently subpar, or lacking features being reviewed.