Cisco RVS4000 4-port Gigabit Security Router - VPN Review

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(More customer reviews)I purchased the RVS4000 primarily due to its gigabit WAN port; very few wired firewalls have a gigabit WAN port. Not having a gigabit WAN port is a reasonable design because WAN ports in many SOHO firewall applications will likely connect to T1 (1.5 Mbps) or T3 lines (45 Mbps) at most. Since these data rates are lower than that of an ordinary 100 Mbps ethernet port, a gigabit WAN port is more than what is required of a WAN interface.
However, I wanted to use a firewall/router on the network inside of my primary NAT/SPI firewall which is primarily a gigabit network. So, a gigabit WAN port was an important feature because it needs to connect to a gigabit switch (not a WAN link).
Before my purchase, I read many customer reviews that complained about slow data rates through the WAN port. These reviews were very discouraging since the Linksys had a gigabit WAN interface. This was until I found a benchmark test that explained the negative reviews. The RVS4000 (primarily due to its industrial-grade security features) has a WAN to LAN data rate of 15.9 Mbps; very slow for a gigabit interface. However, this can be improved upon by configuring (turning off) the security features of the firewall. Unless you configure the firewall as a non-gateway device, don't expect orders of magnitude improvement in speed.
Here's the good news. The benchmark clocked the RVS4000 LAN to WAN data rate at 530 Mbps. Since many disk drive interfaces do not have a sustained data rate this high; you will not see this number when transfering files. I have a couple NAS RAID boxes with gigabit interfaces that top out at around 100-150 Mbps (individually). I can get higher network utilization numbers when doing several files transfers between different network endpoints simultaneously. Network file transfers tend to be very CPU intensive, even when using SCSI hard drives. The CPU intensive part comes from having to package up the data into IP packets and managing the data transfer.
The bottom line is that I am very satisfied with this firewall and its gigabit WAN port. But understand that it needs to be configured properly to optimize its performance and functionality. You don't need to be an engineer or rocket scientist to do this; however, you will need a bit of understanding about IP networking. If you use the RVS4000 as a primary firewall (configuring all of its security features), I suspect it will do that job rather well also.


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As broadband speeds increase most 10/100 gateways do not have the power to support those higher data rates, and thus become the bottleneck in the network. The RVS4000 10/100/1000 4-Port VPN Router works at Gigabit speeds to meet the demands of todays networks. It features Linksys proven SPI Firewall with an integrated Intrusion Detection and Prevent System (IDS/IPS). Its built-in 4-port full-duplex 10/100/1000 Ethernet switch can connect up four PCs directly, or additional hubs and switches. The QoS features provide consistent voice and video quality throughout your business. In addition the RVS4000 features a Virtual Private Network (VPN) security engine that creates encrypted IPSec tunnels through the Internet. The IPSec VPN tunnels enable remote users from at home, or on the road to easily, and securely connect to the office network through a typical wired or wireless broadband connection. When used with another RVS4000 or other Linksys VPN router, branch-to-branch connections can be established allowing users in a remote office to connect to the corporate network.

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