Dear sir,
Sophos Firewall firmware version upgradation has been done.
New features
This section contains the new features for 18.5 GA.
Flexibility and performance enhancements
Version 18.0 delivered a data plane with a Virtual FastPath (VFP) to allow the offloading of trusted and previously security-verified traffic, using the same x86 CPU for the offloaded traffic. On the XGS Series, after inspecting the initial packets in a flow, the x86 CPU offloads trusted traffic to the Xstream FastPath, which runs on the Xstream Flow Processor and is specifically designed for FastPath operations.
The Xstream Flow Processor delivers and retrieves packets directly to and from the DPI engine's main memory. These enhancements deliver a significant increase in the overall network performance with a 5x improvement in latency with the zero-copy operation and up to a 5x increase in SSL/TLS decryption performance versus the previous hardware models.
The Xstream architecture saves cycles of the x86 clock by lowering memory bandwidth usage and allowing both processors to update the cache.
Port density and diversity: XGS Series appliances offer an increased number of fixed ports and include some new port connectivity, such as Power over Ethernet (PoE), which is now built-in on some desktop models. They also offer a broad range of Flexi Port modules and add-on options to adapt and extend connectivity.
