Symantec Endpoint Protection 11.0 vs. Microsoft Forefront Client Security

Dear Prachand

      Thanks for the post however as you can see ,this Comparion is very Old .I was able to get a latest version of this from Symantec but even that one did not seem right .I am posting that one here. For your information,I was able to make my own comparison however I don't want to post that one here as It might not be 100% right .However I strongly feel that Forefront Client Security Or even the latest FEP (Forfront endpiont protection based on System Configuration Manager ) is mainly Antivirus/Antispyware solution and nothing more than that .

Here is the battlercard which I got from symantec locally  however I don't think that is an accurate document . Please see if you can find an updated copy of it .

Thanks Subhani, for the latest sheet. I can use this sheet during our client meetings and create positive impact on Symantec products.

Prachand & Subhani can we get some more data sheets comparing Mcafee, Trend Mirco..etc also if we can compare Symantec backup products with other vendors..

Thanks in advance :)

Hope this helps

http://anti-virus-software-review.toptenreviews.com/v2/

http://www.av-comparatives.org/

http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/collection/1986/top_paid_antivirus_2010.html

Even I would appreciate the updated information

Prachand I owe you a big thanks :)

I was looking something like your intial Product-Battlecard---Symantec-En[1].pdf file. These are good too, but in one of them they have rated Symantec as No.2, which i can't show to my clients.

As a Symantec user and administrator over the year I always would like that even our clients to use Symantec product.

Cheers

Hay Guys,

@ Prachand: Thanks for sharing such a wonderful document.

But dont you think we are comparing apples and oranges? FCS is a consumer product. And SEP is an enterprise product. That could also be a contributing factor for the huge differences.

Regards,

Aniket

This is an interesting, yet relatively honest review. At least none of the information lies to you, which I appreciate when reading product comparisons from vendors with vested interest.

Unfortunately, this never does seem to tell the whole picture.

For example, Microsoft's SCCM/SCOM/FCS solutions is not all that different from the Altiris/Altiris Monitoring Component/SEP products that Symantec offers.

In fact, many of Symantec's products are being integrated into the Altiris web console. So while a direct comparison of SEP to Forefront is technically truthful, don't hide the fact that so far Symantec is going that way with all of its products. And no offense, but the Altiris Console is pretty damn clunky and slow, and non-standards supporting. No official support for Chrome, which has the fastest Javascript engine available. And it took ages for Altiris to even support IE8 officially. I don't even want to know what it will take to support IE9.

On the flip side, Microsoft offers native applications (and web consoles with limited visibility) to each of their products. Understanding that speed and performance of the UI is imperative. There are some very current harsh limitations on Web GUIs. While I think the future is the web, it certainly won't be until after modern browsers (IE9, Chrome 8, Firefox 4) become the dominant mainstream platforms.

The big differentiator is pricing. If you are actually looking at comparing the TCO of your security solutions, you need to consider a lot of things. Since this is just regarding Malware protection, we can start there. Antivirus and Malware protection is *not* the only thing you should be using in your arsenal of security.

You should have a proper environment where updates are applied regularly. After this, you should review reports to determine how many infections that your particular AV solution caught and blocked. Determine on an individual level of that user what the cost to the business would have been had they been infected. This is the hardest thing to cover since there are many, many factors at play. If it's an executive, there's potential for corporate espionage. If it's a call center user, it's probably not a huge deal. But all of these factors should be considered.

Finally, after you review this information--does it make the cost of the licensing worth it? Who gives the better deal financially speaking? I mean, if you have only 2 infections or reported security incidents in a 6 month period, what is that worth to protect the business? Did you have only 2 because of the product? Or were more not seen because the product actually let those through?

I'd probably actually do a limited rollout of both solutions across specific departments. For example, if you have a large call center or generic office employees, roll out 1/2 as a particular vendor and the other half as a particular vendor. In a few months, switch the 2 vendors around between those groups.

All of this costs money, of course--but there's really no accurate way to tell otherwise.

All things being equal, however, Symantec at the end of the day is a security-focused company. Their business is security. They have a vested interest in providing a wde range of protection technologies to its customers and to engage actively in their environments. While Microsoft has some very talented security and management engineers, and they are very good at what they do--Microsoft is an operating system company first and foremost. And their sales reps and sales engineers are going to be limited on their knowledge of the security area.

The real reason I began looking ay FEP and other products is because quite frankly Symantec was not catching viruses and spyware. In the end I went with FEP because I felt things could not get much worse in terms of virus and spyware protection and it came to us discounted because of our existing EA agreement. Once I began implementing Microsoft Forfront Endpoint Protection, I began seeing all the virus and spyware missed by Symantec. FEP used less resources and found more bad software than symantec. As mentioned above WSUS is useful for updating, but the client can update itself to the Internet. The only real downside is the management. You have to have the full System Center (not just essentials) to manage the FEP. However it is possible to defiine update settings in group policy and use System Center Essentials and WSUS to manage updating and report the threat level.

This is a good article on the options available for those who need to manage FEP without system center

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/FCSNext/thread/b78e9d43-fb91-470a-9450-d5fa7e0e4a69/

There is also a third party tool to manage without SSC

http://www.truesec.se/LMS/lms/LMS.html

Anyone have a battlecard document newer than two years old?  Would be interesting to see what's changed.

It appears this is a common discussion among executives. "Why are we paying for third party Anti Virus, when we already own ForeFront?" Microsoft has done well to market an in for a penny in for a pound license agreements.

In any case I now find my self in a position where i have to justify SEP against FEP.

Most of the comparisons are between SEP and FCS.  Can anyone provide a SEP 11 comparison with ForeFront 2010?

Are  there any ROI numbers that justifies SEP vs FEP?

This would be greatly appreaciated.

Thanks in advance