I currently have 8 mb download/768 upload cable connection. How much of that will be cut when anti-virus is enabled on the router?

The gateway doesn't "cut" your bandwidth; however it will induce latency.

Not sure how much latency occurs with anti-virus enabled since I do not have that enabled (also I haven't found any metrics on CheckPoint's support site) however the gateway does induce minimal (to noticeable) delay depending on the the number of security rules, NAT rules, VPN connections and SmartDefense settings.

For the average home user I don't think you will notice a delay (w/o anti-virus), but I have noticed under high loads of traffic (torrent downloads) the device gets "pokey" compared to my previous desktop/Linux firewall ("seat of pants measurement" since I have not formally tested).

So its safe to say that while playing online games, anti-virus should not be turned because of the "delay."

There are lots of reasons why latency, outside of the Z100, might happen. And such things do happen.

If on-line games are not designed in such a way that they cannot take latency, their programming staff should find another line of work.

Short answer I am unsure since I do not know if the gateway anti virus reviews all traffic that passes or only specific outbound port and/or protocols.

Since online gaming is generally UDP based (vector updates to the screen for movement) I would think it would not affect the traffic. Unfortunately most games utilize a combo of TCP/ICMP protocol to determine your connection quality to the game server (even though it is UDP based) and if deemed poor kick you on that basis (even though you have high FPS).

If you are having issues with latency/connection quality determined from the gaming application; play with the SmartDefense settings (disable/enable) since it will review more in depth into the actual protocol thus causing delay.


Really it is not an issue for you to test; try it with the setting enabled/disabled and hell try with a direct connection to the Internet. Granted the test will be fuzzy since you wont have definite numbers and as previously stated other issues outside your control will affect latency (any number of the hops/links or the server itself).

During your test; to eliminate possible issues outside of your home network you can perform a pathping <hostname of server> to view the actual network path and latency to/from and between your host and the server. Granted that wont provide insight into every possible issue, but it will give you something.

Pathping
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pathping

Another tool to use for testing tcping. Kinda like ping, but TCP based.
http://www.elifulkerson.com/projects/tcping.php

It might be a semantics issue, but with V7.5.xx firmware I do see a decided drop in throughput as reported by any of the speed test type sites when I have AV scanning turned on.

It could be that it is "latency" but in any event it does seem slower here at my house, and the tests bear out the result. I have heard from the V8.xx beta testers that it is much less of an issue with the new firmware. What I was seeing was drop from 5Mb to about 3Mb with AV enabled.

FWIW,
Jim