Last chance for 1‑year renewal – XG 85(w) and XG 105(w)

Sales of XG 85(w) and XG 105(w) appliances already ended on 17 August 2019. Anyone who still wants to purchase a license for these devices now has to act quickly. The hardware reaches end‑of‑life in August 2022.

Last renewal for XG 85(w) and XG 105(w)

We have already reported on the end‑of‑sale of the XG 85(w) and XG 105(w) firewall hardware. The time for the last renewal is getting closer, and with this article we want to remind all owners of an XG 85(w) or XG 105(w) that 17 August 2021 is the last opportunity to extend the license by one year. Any requests received after this date can no longer be processed.

Anyone who is still running these models today and wants to use them right up until 17 August 2021 will certainly have their reasons. The fact is, however, that these two devices can no longer run the latest SFOS version. After v17.5x, support for XG 85(w) and 105(w) ends.

For this reason, it is worth considering a move to current hardware. On its website, Sophos still lists the XG series as the designated successor.

We would strongly advise against buying another XG appliance at this point. The XG firewall hardware is already end-of-sale, and the XGS series has long been the clearly more powerful successor platform. For that reason, we recommend the following migration path:

• XG 85 → XGS 87
• XG 85w → XGS 87w
• XG 105 → XGS 107
• XG 105w → XGS 107w

Better to avoid the smallest desktop model

As a rule, we do not recommend buying the smallest firewall model. In real-world use, performance becomes a limiting factor quite quickly, even if the throughput figures in the data sheet look decent at first glance. Anyone opting for an XGS 87 or XGS 87w also has to accept limitations in several features:

• Reporting: log storage on the appliance only via Sophos Central
• Web Protection: no file scanning with two scan engines
• Webserver Protection: no antivirus scans
• Email Protection: no Message Transfer Agent (MTA)

The features listed above are not available on the smallest desktop model. The other firewall models do not have these limitations.