Aaron Adams’s Blowhard Blog

I’ve been setting up more network-to-network VPNs recently to make life easier. My firewall of choice is the Netgear FVS318, which has an excellent cost-to-features ratio. Admittedly, my needs are small-scale, but I have yet to find a serious competitor to the FVS318.

Firewalls are only half of the equation. Frequently, I have a need to connect to a network as a VPN client. There are two good options, one of which is free.

When I started my search for a VPN client, the first software package I tried was
VPNTracker . VPN Tracker is available for a trial period of 30 days (with a 3 minute timeout feature - connections will be terminated at the 3 minute mark) and tech support will help you with whatever issues you may have during that time. The reviews I had read and received personally from other network admins had been very positive, and with good reason. I e-mailed tech support several times over the trial period and they were always prompt, helpful, and polite. Big points go to VPN Tracker for their tech support.

When the trial period was over, I decided that VPN Tracker Professional was the version that would meet my needs. The drawback was, they wanted $199.90 for it. I’m all about capitalism, but frankly that amount of money wasn’t what I wanted to pay for what seemed like a nice wrapper around OS X’s built-in VPN abilities. Surely some shareware or freeware author must have written something similar that was less expensive.

It took a little bit of digging over several days, but I finally came across a hidden gem named IPSecuritas. It lacks some of the polish of VPN Tracker, but it includes all the functionality I need to connect to multiple FVS318 firewalls at the same time. And the best part… it’s FREE. Equal functionality (for my purposes) at a $200 savings… can’t beat that.

I’m probably a little more knowledgeable about VPN than most computer users. If you’re one of those VPN ignorant types, then the cost of VPN Tracker may be worth the expense. As I stated above, their service to a non-paying customer during the trial period was excellent, and I would expect it to be at least as good after purchasing the software. However, if you know what’ you’re doing, IPSecuritas is definitely worth the time it takes to download and set it up.