Content

Celestix Networks WSA

The Celestix WSA SSL VPN is run with Microsoft Forefront Unified Access Gateway 2010 as its backbone. This product features the ability to create and publish applications to a web-based portal so users can access them remotely. Applications integrate with single sign-on authentication and users can access applications such as Microsoft Remote Desktop, Citrix applications, as well as web-based applications, such as Microsoft SharePoint and Outlook Web Access.

We found this tool to be a bit confusing to configure and manage. Management is done through a web-based console, but certain aspects are managed by launching a remote desktop session directly with the server and working with Microsoft Management Console in Server 2008. We found ourselves going in circles many times trying to figure out how to configure the appliance and publish applications to the portals. With that said, we found as we navigated around the console more and more that we did start to become familiar with the layout and were able to better understand how to configure the appliance.

This product integrates well into the environment and offers quite a bit of application-publishing features that are highly customizable. Users and groups can be pulled directly from Active Directory for easy deployment of resource access.

Documentation consisted of a PDF quick-start guide, which outlined how to get the product up and running with many simple step-by-step instructions, as well as the steps to access the setup wizard. No other formal documentation was provided, but the appliance has some fairly good built-in help.
Celestix offers customers both eight-hours-a-day/five-days-a-week and 24/7 support plans as part of one-, two-, or three-year support agreements. Support offered includes both phone and email technical support, as well as training and professional services. Customers also can access a free online knowledge base and short FAQ section via the website.

At a price of just about $7,500, we find this solution to be an average value for the money. We found that while the WSA offered many good features it was difficult to manage and the lack of solid documentation made it even more difficult to configure.
Product title
Celestix Networks WSA
Product info
Name: Celestix Networks WSA Description: Price:
Strength
Full, web-based SSL VPN with a lot of good features.
Weakness
Difficult to configure and manage.
Verdict
Feature-rich, but a bit difficult to manage, this one certainly is worth a good look for many types of applications.

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