Panda Security for Enterprise is another suite of products designed to protect the endpoint. It fits in the category of network traffic protection and uses a tiered architecture. This seems very confusing at first, but becomes easier to understand over time.
The lack of understanding of the architecture made the initial installation difficult, but we finally realised that there were just two primary components: the adminsecure and the communications client.
The adminsecure is the heart of the offering. There are several subcomponents, including the console, agent, repository, administration server and the database.
Early in the install, we were trying to locate each of these features as separate pieces of software, but eventually we found that this was just part of the adminsecure software. Each feature above performs a discrete function. Without covering each component in detail, the most critical function appeared to be the console, which created the policy and distributed it among other key tasks.
Once the adminsecure server is set up we distributed the installation packages to the clients.
A unique component of the Panda offering was the fact that Novell and Linux clients can also be protected. These can be installed automatically on newer Microsoft operating systems, as well as Novell servers. Older Microsoft clients and Linux machines require either a package installed as part of the login script or from a command line.
The communications client uses TruPrevent technology. While Panda does not document in great detail how this technology works, it performed quite well when we tested the client's effectiveness against malware.
The documentation from Panda was slightly below average. One way to offset this is to offer great support and that is what Panda does. It offers phone, email and web access 24/7, which is included in the purchase price of the product.
Panda Security for Enterprise has a list price of £8.70 per device, which puts it at the very low end of the price spectrum.