[tlug] VPN appliance and network connection suggestions?

[Sven Simon <sven@example.com>]

Hi all,

I've been looking at some Watchguard and Netscreen devices to form
VPN connections between our sites and I can't really make up my
mind as to which one to choose. 

Does anyone have experience with eighter of these products? 
Suggestions? I expect some of you will praise Watchguard, since it's
Linux based ;). One criteria would be how easy it is to hook up 
to those boxes from home using FreeS/WAN or Racoon (FreeBSD), but
I'd assume it should work equally well with eighter. Just depends
how good I am in configuring my box at home, right?

All  this IPSec and tunneling stuff is still new to me and I'm in the 
progress of reading up on it, but if someone on the list has tried 
things out like this before, I'd be happy if  they could share their 
experience and tell me what to watch out for.

First step, though, is getting a connection. In the states Cogent is
offering 100Mbps fiber for a mere $1000/mo and that's with an SLA that
guarantees 99.99% reliability. Is there something in this range 
available in Tokyo? At my old place, they used OCN, but at a price
that would simply ruin us. Maybe I could do with a T3 connection, but
I should be in the same price range like our US connection. What are
other people using here?

Sven