EXCLUSIVE: Opteq i.Q. OP1400

There's certainly no shortage of network traffic management solutions currently available but Opteq's i.Q. steps off the beaten path as it delivers a range of features that makes it quite unusual. In this exclusive review we take a look at the OP1400 which represents the entry-point of this family of nine appliance-based solutions.

Opteq offers enterprise level traffic analysis and packet capture capabilities plus network bandwidth management but augments these with a wealth of other functions including web caching, anti-spam and anti-virus measures along with a number of firewall options. The smart bit is that you can pick and choose which components you fancy so you're not tied in to buying a base configuration with features you may not want. If you only require web caching then you just purchase that component but you can mix and match any other of the modules as well.

At the OP1400's foundation lies a basic Supermicro combo of 1U low profile chassis and motherboard but there's enough grunt here to handle up 150Mbps of network traffic. For testing we dropped the appliance in between our LAN and WAN and configured it to operate in bridging mode. The main web interface is well designed and intuitive and opens with a row of chunky icons providing quick access to each installed module.

The appliances all come with the Singular i.Q. module which provides a web interface from where you can access and manage all installed components from a single screen. This includes a User Administration module where you decide who has administrative access to the appliance and a System Tools module which provides options for configuring bridging and gateway functions, SNMP and license management. Along with these you get Report i.Q. which offers a centralized location with full access to each individual module's reporting facilities.

The Real Time i.Q. module handles all traffic analysis and packet capture and the LAN Monitor provides a rundown on the top hosts and a full summary of all network traffic broken down into graphs and tables showing distributions of packet sizes and protocols plus a handy view of the amount of traffic each TCP and UDP port is generating. Entries have options to drill down deeper for more information where you can even see what traffic each host was generating on an hourly basis. Packet capture can be started manually where you pick the interface, the number of packets and a capture file name. Usefully, you can filter by host, address range, protocol, port, VLAN and even ToS and capture in one or both directions as well. Hosts on the WAN port can be monitored for their general availability and the Service Monitor tool provides more packet capture options.

Opteq advised us that its Bandwidth i.Q. module is the most popular and allows it to compete with established vendors such as Packeteer and Allot Network. It certainly offers a strong alternative as it can manage all inbound and outbound protocols and includes the centralized management of inbound UDP. This enables inbound VoIP traffic management for both H.323 and SIP protocols - a feature which Opteq reckons makes it unique. Rulesets are used to manage traffic and you can apply them to applications, protocols, port ranges and hosts and set bandwidth limitations. You can also apply one of ten priorities to traffic that matches a rule or block it completely and thresholds can be used to stop a rule being activated until they have been breached. Global bandwidth quotas and profiles make rule creation even easier - we certainly had no problems and didn't even need to resort to the manual.

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