Hey everyone! 👋 I’m pretty new to the whole network security side of things, but my team is growing and we’ve been told we need to upgrade our firewall. I mostly handle our project management and collaboration tools (we live in Asana and Slack), so this is a bit out of my usual wheelhouse.
We’re a finance firm with about 50 people, mostly remote. We deal with sensitive client data, so I know security is super important. Our IT consultant mentioned SonicWall as an option for a refresh in 2026, but I’ve also seen people talk about Palo Alto and Fortinet.
For those of you with experience, what’s the best path for a company our size? I’m especially curious about:
- How easy is it to manage day-to-day? We don’t have a huge IT team.
- Does it play nice with cloud apps and remote work setups?
- What’s the real cost like, not just the box but the ongoing subscriptions?
I want to make sure we’re comparing apples to apples. Any firsthand experiences or pitfalls to watch out for would be amazing.
Thx!