Opinions wanted: Norton Core Wireless Router - Too costly?

Norton announced it's own wireless router which comes with deep packet inspection for SOHO. It was a little pricey, but I was okay with it, until saw this:


https://us.norton.com/core-secure-router-technology

Annual Subscription
Comes standard with 1-year complimentary subscription to Norton Core Security Plus ($120 value). After your first year, subscription renewals are $9.99 per month with an annual commitment.*​

Click to expand...

That's a bit of an @$$ reaming if you ask me.

It depends on the security capabilities that it provides. Enterprise-level security like that costs way more. They aren't very clear if it has full IPS-level prevention - all they say is "packet inspection". They're the first "big guy" trying to crack the home security market (beyond anti-virus and desktop stuff) so this will be interesting to watch.

Norton/Symantec don't have a lot of cred in the network security space versus others, although their Blue Coat acquisition helps there. Maybe that's what is on that thing - a proxy server on crack and a light IPS.

EDIT: I stand corrected - an article on it didn't say much but they list these capabilities on their page:

"Security- DPI, IDS, IPS, Secure DNS, Encrypted user & data communication
Networking- WPA2, DHCP, NAT, UPnP, Automatic Device Discovery"

I wonder if it's the Intel Atom C2000 platform? Could even be the new C3000 platform seeing as it was just announced and Norton has clout...https://www.servethehome.com/intel-denverton-socs-somewhat/ -

EDIT2: yeah probably Atom C3000 since it ships in Summer 2017...cool!

I want to say no, too late to the game, there are already plenty of other reliable vendors already out there and with Norton's track record of security and poor performance, i would be looking at other vendors.

Any vendor will stick it to you with annual renewals/signature updates, that's where the real money is. I'm a little leery about how they could provide all that on a home-type device without having dismal throughput. Not the actual networking stuff (dns/dhcp/upnp, etc) but the security packet dis-assembly/inspection. Plus, would the "typical" home user know HOW to set up a box with all those features? I have to admit, wireless & firewall in one box does appeal to me, though, a little. I'm still a modular kind of guy, I like to upgrade one piece at a time on my own schedule.

DPI means diddly shit without SSL MITM these days. Ready to install that Norton (lol) CA on your computer? The malware will use its own stuff anyways though, so you'll have to block anything that tries to bypass a proxy.