We performed a comparison between SonicWall NSa and SonicWall TZ based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: SonicWall TZ has an edge in this comparison. Unlike SonicWall NSa, its reviewers mention seeing an ROI.
"The SD-WAN is the most valuable feature."
"The scalability is good in Fortinet FortiGate."
"Anti-Spam web content filterinG."
"The CLI and GUI do a good job of putting a lot at your fingertips."
"Easy to implement, and it is also reliable."
"It blocks the vulnerabilities that can negatively impact us."
"FortiGate is on the cheaper end, and it offers good value."
"The most important feature, normally for small business customers, is link load balancing."
"The most valuable features are the VPN, SSL VPN, and IPSec VPN."
"It has good reporting, the reporting is marvelous."
"It's very simple to use and the support is great."
"SonicWall NSa has a user-friendly firmware"
"I like that SonicWall NSa is a stable product. It's also a scalable product."
"Easy to scale solution that provides advanced threat protection. Their technical support is very good, very knowledgeable, and easy to reach."
"The most valuable feature of SonicWall NSa is the control aspect of the solution."
"The firewall feature is most valuable since my work is to analyze if there is any potential attack. SonicWall NSa gives the perfect analysis."
"Access restriction and IP whitelisting are the most valuable features."
"No negative impression of the scalability."
"Good VPN connection."
"It does exactly what it says on the tin. It is good for protecting the business from being compromised. Its port protection is very good."
"They give good protection to my network and support it."
"The VPN is quite useful for us, as well as the ATP."
"I have found this solution to be easier to use when compared to other products, such as those offered by Cisco."
"We are very much happy with the support."
"Fortinet FortiGate is a firewall solution and once it's deployed, you can rest assured that your system is secure."
"One area for improvement is the performance on bandwidth demands for smaller devices, as well as better web filtering."
"The initial setup is complex."
"FortiLink is the interface on the firewall that allows you to extend switch management across all of your switches in the network. The problem with it is that you can't use multiple interfaces unless you set them up in a lag. Only then you can run them. So, it forces you to use a core type of switch to propagate that management out to the rest of the switches, and then it is running the case at 200. It leaves you with 18 ports on the firewall because it is also a layer-three router that could also be used as a switch, but as soon as you do that, you can't really use them. They could do a little bit more clean up in the way the stacking interface works. Some use cases and the documentation on the FortiLink checking interface are a little outdated. I can find stuff on version 5 or more, but it is hard to find information on some of the newer firmware. The biggest thing I would like to see is some improvement in the switch management feature. I would like to be able to relegate some of the ports, which are on the firewall itself, to act as a switch to take advantage of those ports. Some of these firewalls have clarity ports on them. If I can use those, it would mean that I need to buy two less switches, which saves time. I get why they don't, but I would still like to see it because it would save a little bit of space in the server rack."
"Cisco Meraki products are rising very quickly in the cloud and the connected era. Meraki products offer much better ROI, upgradability, and manageability."
"The web-cache feature which was previously on the FortiGate device, but was deleted with the recent upgrade should be returned. It was a very valuable feature for us."
"The routing capability on the FortiGate devices has room for improvement."
"Due to its higher cost, Fortinet FortiGate can lead to increased operational expenses."
"In terms of improvement, features like App Control do not work properly"
"The anti-spam requires a specific Java version on the server side (do not update it, otherwise it will break)."
"The dashboard must be improved."
"Needs a more detailed reporting feature."
"SonicWall NSa needs to make their product more user-friendly."
"When it comes to security I think all of the features are currently open to improvement."
"The only thing that we would want would be single-pane management, which it has, but the GMS is not very good. It's purely the management of multiple devices for multiple customers, that's the only thing that it's lacking."
"The user interface could be better."
"I would like to see a SonicWall integration with the DLP tool, this would be interesting. Data Loss Prevention integration."
"The user support could be improved because you have to go outside to get that kind of support."
"The dashboard needs to be improved."
"I'd like to have cloud management at no additional cost. Unfortunately, leveraging SonicWall's cloud management capabilities is cost-prohibitive, so we don't use it. They should have a reasonable subscription or offer it to us at no cost as an MSP."
"The areas we would like to see improvement include more features available similar to the equivalent FortiGate appliance, e.g. SSL encryption and inspection. Two-factor authentication capability would be another additional feature that could be included in the next release."
"Sonic Analyzer could be improved. It's difficult to manage and not very intuitive."
"It needs more robust self-help documentation along with examples and things to watch out for."
"SonicWall TZ can improve the UI application and when you create any net policies or any new policy, it will not sync or work properly."
SonicWall NSa is ranked 19th in Firewalls with 80 reviews while SonicWall TZ is ranked 12th in Firewalls with 78 reviews. SonicWall NSa is rated 7.8, while SonicWall TZ is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of SonicWall NSa writes "Great performance and security with reasonable pricing". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SonicWall TZ writes "Has efficient user access control feature and good technical support services ". SonicWall NSa is most compared with Meraki MX, Sophos XG, Cisco Secure Firewall, Netgate pfSense and WatchGuard Firebox, whereas SonicWall TZ is most compared with Sophos XG, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX, WatchGuard Firebox and Cisco Secure Firewall. See our SonicWall NSa vs. SonicWall TZ report.
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Basically, the main difference is that the TZ series is intended for a Branch office since it has fewer ports and the speed is around 1 GB.
The NSA series has more processor power and more port where you can create subnets and zones (like DMZ). Also, it has ports with 10 Gb and a processor to support the demand.
I have read that an approximate number of users in the highest TZ series (TZ 670) is around 150 to 200 but that is just an estimate.
Hope this helps. You can get more details in SonicWall datasheets where you will find the speed, throughput and more technical specifications to select the one that fits your requirements.
In simple words,
TZ is for small businesses (less than 100, maximum 150 users).
TZ has fewer ports.
NSA is for medium and large enterprises: > 150 Users,
NSA has many ports to support large networks