Features

• Block all Internet threats outside, before they reach your PC
• Hide your PC from Internet Hackers
• Boost your PC’s performance
• Dual Flash memory mechanism constitutes an “Untouchable Operating System” barrier for complete physical isolation of your PC from threats
• Protection from known, as well as unknown, attacks
• Plug and Forget easy installation and operation with no special technical knowledge required
• Security software updates accumulate on the Yoggie’s external mini-server, instead of draining your PC’s resources

Being able to block threats before they get on your computer is the best way to keep your system clean. The Gatekeeper sits in between your computer and the internet to protect you from all the bad things. By physically separating your data and the internet you are getting the best possible protection.

One of the ways to keep hackers and viruses off your computer is to keep them from finding your computer. Hiding the PC from the internet is the best way to keep them from finding it. This is done by hiding and closing ports that are not being used.

By offloading the tasks of scanning for virus’, spyware, hackers, and everything else, you can free up a lot of resources that will help your computer run faster.

While the Gatekeeper Pico is busy protecting your computer it also has to protect itself. The Pico uses a very unique Dual Flash memory mechanism to keep hackers from compromising the Gatekeeper’s operating system.

No matter how good the Gatekeeper Pico is, if it is not kept up to date it will not be able to block new threats. So The Gatekeeper has to keep itself up to date.

Design

The design of the Gatekeeper Pico is very simple. It is slightly larger than a USB thumb drive, and it has several lights at the far end of the device. Other than those two things there is nothing else significant about the design.

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The Gatekeeper is actually a mini computer. Inside the case is a XScale-PXA270 520MHz processor and 128MB of RAM. The operating system that runs on the Gatekeeper is a version of Linux.

Before you start the Gatekeeper Pico for the first time you need to install the software that comes on a separate CD. It would have been nicer if the software were included on the USB stick.

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The software consists of the drivers and admin programs that are required to run the Gatekeeper. As you can see it even installs a new RNDIS driver. You can also install Kaspersky anti-virus from the CD, this will help to keep your desktop protected from threats that get past the Gatekeeper or get loaded on your computer some other way. This is very important because the Gatekeeper will only protect a computer from outside threats.

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After installing the software on a computer you will be required to login. The default username and password can be found in the user guide. Once you have logged in it requires you to change the default password, unfortunately the password can only be 8 characters long. This is not nearly long enough for me, I like my passwords to be around 12 characters long.

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The first screen you seen when you log in, and after the setup, is a dashboard that shows an overview of the current security status. The big dial on the top shows the current risk level that your computer is experiencing. This is determined by how many things the Gatekeeper has had to block. The bottom three dials indicate what types of activities are being blocked. As the risk level increases the numbers go up.

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When I first installed the software it was version 1.3.7, but I went on to the website and found a newer version. I always like to make sure my software is up-to-date. The latest version was 1.3.9, but this update was released back in March of 2008. This worries me a bit because since then there have probably been many new viruses and hacking methods developed that the Gatekeeper is not protected from. I would personally like to see updates happen more often. Also, if you check the images below you will see that the virus definitions that are in the Gatekeeper are from January 24, 2008. This is also a big concern for me for the same reasons.

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There are a few advanced features that are a bit hidden in the settings screen. Down at the bottom of the screen is a button labeled Advanced. Clicking this button opens a new screen with a few more options. The most notable is the web filtering. This allows the Gatekeeper to block websites based on categories that you would find objectionable. Again, becuase the latest update was back in March the categories are really out of date and will not block newer sites.

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The built-in diagnostics can be very helpful if the Gatekeeper is not functioning properly. On this screen you are able to test most aspects of the device to make sure everything is running properly.

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Performance

To test the effectiveness of the Gatekeeper Pico I ran it though some tests. The website PC Flank offers a battery of tests that can give a good evaluation of how secure a system is. The first test is a leak test. This will see if a firewall is able to block programs from sending out potentially personal information. As you can see from the picture, the Gatekeeper Pico failed this test.

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The next test is the stealth test. This tests to see if your computer is visible to the internet. The best way to keep bad people off your computer is to make it so they cannot see it. As you can see from the image, the Gatekeeper passed this test.

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The third test checks for open ports. This is similar to the stealth scan because ports are an easy way for hackers to find computers and get into them. Once again, the Gatekeeper was able to keep the computer secure against this attack.

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The last test is an exploit test. This checks to see if your system is protected against many common exploits. The site does not mention which ones, but as you can see from the picture the Gatekeeper Pico passed the test.

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Another test I performed was to try and download a virus. The website www.eicar.org hosts several files that can be used for testing virus blocking. The viruses come in four different formats, a .com, .txt, .zip, and a double .zip file. The website also offers the same files over an HTTP or HTTPS connection. Most firewalls and virus scanners have a hard time scanning HTTPS connections. The Gatekeeper Pico did a great job blocking all the viruses on an HTTP connection, but it failed miserably when they were on an HTTPS connection.

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During all this the Gatekeeper is fairly invisible to the user. In fact, the only time I knew it was doing anything was when it would block a website and display a message telling me so. For example, I tried to access a well know website that has objectionable content. As you can see from this image the Gatekeeper Pico blocked the site and displayed a message.

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Fortunately, the software that comes with the Gatekeeper has a suite of reports that can be viewed to see what the Gatekeeper has been blocking.

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I also noticed that after a while the Gatekeeper gets very warm to the touch. Because the Gatekeeper is a computer this is absolutely normal. It never got really hot, so I don’t think this will be a problem.

You can disable the Gatekeeper at any time so that you can do things that would normally be blocked. To do this you need to enter a password. This part gets a little confusing because the password to disable the GateKeeper is not the same password you use to access the menus. Because of this it must be set separately and if you are not aware of this, someone could access your computer and use the default password to disable it. A new password is created by right clicking the taskbar icon and choosing the Change Password option.

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Warranty and Support

I could not find out much about a warranty except that it is for only one year. I imagine that it, like most others, only covers manufacturers defects.  I also discovered that the Gatekeeper only comes with one year of updates and that each additional year of updates will cost $30. However, if you just want to know how to use the device or what it can do, then you can go to the website and read all about it. You can also get help from the website from their customer support.

The site has an update for the firmware, however it is really old. The date on it is March 18, 2008. This puts into doubt how good the support will be for the future. In addition the Anti virus is also quite old. I sure hope the Yoggie will offer more updates, a security device is no good if it has vulnerabilities and if the virus definitions are out of date. In addition, I don’t know anyone that would pay $30 for a year of updates if those updates only happen once or twice a year.

Conclusion

The Gatekeeper has a lot of great features and it has a lot of potential. However, it is not for those that are cost conscience. With an initial cost of $149.00 and a yearly subscription of $30 you could spend a lot of money. If on the other hand you are more concerned about performance than about cost, then this would be a great way to help out your computer. Keep an eye on the ipdates to know if the company is taking this product seriously. If they do not, then you should spend your money elsewhere. As always compare prices before purchasing.

Features

• 99 memory presets
• Remote control
• Alarm clock
• Ethernet port
• WiFi

The CC WiFi Internet Radio can access thousands of radio stations from across the globe. The radio can store up to 99 presets, because there are so many stations it can take a while to find a station. So when you find a good one, it is important to make a preset.

The remote that comes with the radio is basic and small, but it has enough buttons to accomplish the task.

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There is an alarm clock and you can set it to either play a buzzer or a radio station.

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For connectivity you have a choice, you can use either a wired Ethernet port or you can use an 802.11b or g signal.

The music that the CC WiFi Internet Radio plays does not have to come from the Internet. The radio is capable of connecting to any share on a network and playing the audio files that are shared.

Design

The radio is entirely black. The front consists of a large knob, 6 buttons, a single speaker and a small screen. Starting on the left, the top button is the power button, then there are back and replay buttons. The right side has another 3 buttons, the top one is Play/Pause and stop. Next are the fast forward and rewind buttons.

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The back has an Ethernet port, headphone jack, line out port, and a power plug.

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The menu system on the CC WiFi Internet Radio is full of features, but not really that easy to navigate, thanks to the small screen.

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Performance

Setting up the CC WiFi Internet Radio is not very difficult. When you first turn it on you need to decide if you want to use a wired or wireless connection. If you choose to use a wireless connection you need to have a wireless b or g network available. For some reason the radio would not connect to my wireless router while I had WPA encryption enabled. I was only able to get it to work with WPA2, WEP, or with encryption turned off. I tried it on two different wireless routers and I had the same results, WPA did not work. It worked every time without any trouble when using an Ethernet cable.

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The nicest thing about Internet Radio is that the signal strength is not dependent on how far away from the radio tower you are. The signal came in strong no matter what station I tuned into and no matter where it was located around the world. However, not all stations broadcast 24 hours a day, so you may need to change which stations you listen to throughout the day.

When you are ready to select a station you have several options, you can search by location (country), genre, or My Stuff. The first two options give you access to all the radio stations, however the last option gives you more. The My Stuff option works directly with the website www.reciva.com. Through the website you are able to setup lists of stations and streams and then access them through the radio menu.

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With all the different ways of listening to music and the wide variety of content it would be nice if there was a way to record the audio. However, since there is no record option, recording could be done by an external device like the CC Witness using the line out port.

Playing media from a shared directory ended up being a lot more trouble than it needed. There are several options for finding music, but since all of my computers are Windows machines, I chose to search for “Windows Shares.” This selection scanned my network for all the computers that had shares. From there I choose the computer I wanted, and then the folder that had my music. The folder that I selected was only the top level folder. The radio would not let me go any deeper. After I selected the folder it started a music scan. The folder that I was scanning had about 8000 files in it so I expected it to take a long time. However, the radio would scan for about a minute and then stop. I never could get it to do a complete scan, so I created a folder with only a dozen files. The scan completed much more quickly, and I was able to play the songs. Once the scan is complete you have access to some additional features — you can setup a queue of songs, search your music by album or artist, and play the music. The only thing they need to fix is scanning large folders of music.

The built-in alarm clock is useful if you are going to use this on your night stand as an alarm clock radio. Since I don’t have an Ethernet port near my night stand and I could not get the radio to work with my WPA encryption (I could have switched to WPA2, but then my laptop would not connect) so it would not work as an alarm clock radio for me.  A nice feature of the alarm clock is that if you have it set to play a radio station and the station is not available, it will revert back to using the buzzer.

Power usage is extremely low. While playing on a wired connection the radio only took up 6 watts of power. I got it to max out at 7 watts by turning the volume all the way up. When it is turned off it uses up about 5 watts of power, not a huge difference, but since it uses such a small amount of electricity to begin with, the fact that it does not power down all the way does not matter.

Warranty and Support

The warranty on the CC WiFi Internet Radio is a small one year parts and labor.  However, I have never had a problem with any of the C.Crane products that I have owned, so it should last a lot longer. Support is also a little on the low side as well. To their benefit, each product web page has its own FAQ which should answer most of your questions. If the FAQ does not answer your question the only way to get help is to call them on the phone or email them. If your product is broken you can send your product back for repair, but if it is out of warranty then it will cost you some money. It would be nice if there was a forum or something where you could interact with the C.Crane support team and other customers, and then search through those questions to find answers. A live chat feature would also be nice if you just had a quick question.

Conclusion

The CC WiFi worked great when I could get a connection. It would be nice if it worked with a WPA network, but WPA2 will work for me. I switched all my routers to use WPA2 and now I don’t have any trouble. I am really happy with this radio and it serves it purpose perfectly. I am giving this our Silver award because it is a great product with very little wrong with it. If they manage to get WPA working then I will gladly give it our Gold award. The CC WiFi radio can be purchased directly from either C.Crane or Amazon.