Checkpoint 4400 T-140
Upgrading an old firewall device can be a fun way to learn about these essential devices. Read along and learn a some ways to upgrade your own device!
The Check Point 4400 T-140 is a versatile firewall appliance designed for small to mid-sized enterprise environments. Here’s a breakdown of its key technical specifications:
Hardware Specifications
- CPU: Intel Celeron E3400, 2.6 GHz Dual-Core Processor
- Memory (RAM): 4GB DDR3, upgradeable up to 8GB
- Storage: 250GB HDD, with support for SSD upgrades
- Network Interfaces:
- 8 x 1GbE Copper Ports
- Optional expansion slots for additional interfaces
- USB Ports: 2 x USB 2.0
- Serial Console: 1 x RJ-45 Serial Port
Performance Specifications
- Firewall Throughput: Up to 3.2 Gbps
- VPN Throughput: Up to 300 Mbps
- Concurrent Sessions: Up to 1,000,000
- Connections per Second: 30,000
- IPsec VPN Tunnels: 250
Software Capabilities
- Security Features:
- Stateful Inspection Firewall
- VPN Support (IPsec, SSL)
- Intrusion Prevention System (IPS)
- Application Control and URL Filtering
- Threat Prevention (Antivirus, Anti-Bot, Anti-Malware)
- Management: Compatible with Check Point Security Management, SmartConsole, and WebUI
Physical and Environmental
- Form Factor: 1U Rack Mountable
- Dimensions: 436 mm x 44 mm x 368 mm (W x H x D)
- Weight: Approximately 7 kg (15 lbs)
- Power Supply: 100–240V AC, 50–60 Hz
- Operating Temperature: 0°C to 40°C (32°F to 104°F)
Upon initial inspection I can say that these devices are very well made.
The chassis is typical stamped steel, using a high gauge steel plate. It has outstanding rigidity with no flex in either the chassis or the case panels at all. The unit is covered in a textured, off white coating that appears to be quite hardy. The external markings are clear and easy to read. On the front is a small display panel that, when used in conjunction with the GaiaOS give the unit some extra functionality. There are also a few lights to indicate hard drive use, power status etc.
Internally the build quality is the same. Components are of good quality. TH heatsink is a thing of beauty, a solid copper monolith with cooing fins oriented to draw air over the CPU and ancillary components effectively.
After looking over all of the components, I have settled upon the following course of action:
Changing the Old Fans>
The factory fans had a squealing bearing which anyone who has had the experience will know, is just horrible. I choose to use Noctua Fans to reduce the noise primarily and to a lesser extent, reduce power consumption. The trade off to the silence is a reduction in airflow, however as this is for my home lab and will see only small volumes of traffic I believe that it will operate within safe parameters.
They are pretty much a plug and play affair with all mounting hardware and connections being of a standard variety. The silicone rubber mounting system provides a physical damping to help mitigate noise caused by vibration from the fans and make for a very easy mounting solution.
Upgrading the CPU>
The motherboard uses a LGA775 CPU socket housing a Intel Celeron E3400, 2.6 GHz Dual-Core Processor. this is an adequate CPu for lab work, however as I have a few older LGA775 CPUs laying around, I chose to upgrade to a Intel Core 2 Duo E7600.
Intel Core 2 Duo E7600: This processor has a clock speed of 3.06 GHz, 3 MB of L2 cache, and a TDP of 65W. It is a dual-core processor with a higher clock speed and larger cache size compared to the Celeron E3400.
Intel Celeron E3400: This processor has a clock speed of 2.6 GHz, 1 MB of L2 cache, and a TDP of 65W. It is also a dual-core processor but with a lower clock speed and smaller cache size compared to the Core 2 Duo E7600.
In terms of performance, the Core 2 Duo E7600 generally outperforms the Celeron E3400 in most benchmarks, with a performance difference of around 14-33% in favour of the E7600. This is not an upgrade I would spend money on if I didn’t already have the CPU, the juice just isn’t worth the squeeze. Its probably also worth noting that the power supply unit in this device is only rated to 250w meaning that any significant upgrade to say a Q6600 for instance, might present issues as it has a 105w TDP vs the 65W draw of the abovementioned CPUs.
The factory CPU paste has held up well over the years but as I was changing the CPU anyway I cleaned all of the surfaces thoroughly and applied Some Arctic Cooling’s MX-4 Thermal Compound. I have used this on dozens of upgrades and installations over many years now and found it to be been reliable and effective.
Upgrading the RAM>
The Factory RAM is a single stick of Waris DDR3 4GB non-EEC memory so upgrading is a simple as installing a pair of Geil Enhanced Corsa 4GB 1600C9 DDR3 sticks I had laying about. I did try a pair of Geil Enhanced Plus 1750C9 DDR3 stick I had, but they would not boot.
The issue with the chosen RAM was that the heat spreader they install on these modules are very large, too large to fit inside the 1U chassis with the lid on. So to solve the problem I carefully removed the heat sinks and viola! a perfectly good set of RAM at no extra cost.
Upgrading the Hard Drive>
As is the theme throughout this build, I have chosen an old drive I had not being used in the form of a Sandisk SSD Plus 128GB. The reasons to upgrade to an SSD include, faster performance, much higher energy efficiency, heat reduction, increased durability and reliability.
Sandisk is a highly reputable manufacturer of storage devices and from my experience with them are reliable and, relatively speaking, fast. This is the perfect storage solution for this device.
The OEM drive is a 3.5″ WD Enterprise-class platter drive and because the drive I am installing is a 2.5″ drive you do need an adapter for easy installation. Getting to the hard drive, does require a little effort, and the SATA cable and power cables are glued into place from factory to prevent movement during shipping, this will need to be carefully cut from the plug. The SATA cable on the drive end was a 90deg style and meant a little playing about with the SSD location to get it all to fit neatly.
Having upgraded all of these components we have given our old device a new lease on life. the CPU performance has been upgraded by about 15%. This should improve our throughput to a point, but it should be more noticeable when utilising IPS/IDS.
With all of this complete I will be pressing this device into service in my home lab as a router/ firewall using pfSense CE. To follow along with the build and learn how to install and why I use pfSense check out my article, Installing pfSense on a Check Point T4400 Firewall device.