Purple VS Gold SE - new buyers guide

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Sean Reynolds

• October 16, 2025 14:29
• Edited

First of all! Well DONE! This product hits a sweet spot. I've been evangelizing it to everyone who will listen. 

 

My issue is that I've purchased the Purple SE. I though since my internet was only around 650 mbps up and down anyway, that it might be seamless... It is not. I routinely get latency hiccups and it's only really around 350-400 mbps.

That being said, I'M IN! I purchased the Gold se and the rack mount to both increase my throughput and clean up my modem and some other devices at the top of my rack. 

 

I'm having second thoughts however. The issue I'm having with my purple se is that the CPU can't handle 85 devices on my network... I know that sounds like a lot, but I have a lot of iot devices, it's not all laptops watching youtube. 

 

My worry about the Gold SE is that I might end up with similar CPU bottlenecks even though the network connections are capable of 2gbps up and down. I'm curious if the purple (non se) would actually be better for me? I'd really like more real world network analysis to help me make decisions. Why doesn't the Gold SE just have the same processor as the Purple? Is the 6 core actually a much faster CPU than the two Golds 4 core CPUs? 

Please give more Real World throughput with N devices on network charts so that I can actually make an informed decision for my home network. 

Thoughts? 

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  Firewalla CM

  • October 16, 2025 19:28

  Hi Sean, the Purple SE supports only up to 500 Mbps packet processing speed. Your WAN speed will typically be less than this. I think the reported speeds you were seeing before might be due to this limitation.

  Both the Gold SE and Purple should be able to handle the devices you have on your network with no issues. The Purple also has short-range Wi-Fi, which is why it has a couple more CPU cores than Gold. If you need the extra ports, memory, and 2Gbps packet processing speed, the Gold SE is a great option for medium networks. 

  You can compare more feature differences in our comparison guide: https://help.firewalla.com/hc/en-us/articles/360010465893-Guide-How-to-Choose-between-Different-Firewalla-Products

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  Sean Reynolds

  • October 16, 2025 19:36

  Yeah, I've seen the marketing sheets.

  My concern with the Gold SE is that while the network ports can handle 2Gbps, the CPU may fail to perform at high speeds due to fewer cores. 
  
  For example these can also run docker images... Would the Purple be able to do more overhead processing on packets via a docker add-on than the Gold SE because it has a more powerful processor in it? 
  
  How much faster is the Purples processor than the GoldSE? That is what I would really like to know. 

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  Firewalla

  • October 16, 2025 21:24

  Remember, in order to examine traffic, CPU is needed. If you are using more CPU than allocated, then it will impact speed. If you are for sure looking at running docker images that's CPU intensive, please use the Gold Plus or Pro (Pro has 8GB of ram)

  If you are asking about the Purple (not SE), its CPU is faster than Gold SE if you don't use WiFi on the Purple. If you do, then the performance is likely the same as Gold SE)

  As of your purple SE speed, have you tried to use this to optimize its speed https://help.firewalla.com/hc/en-us/articles/360056875493-Speed-Tests-and-Speed-Optimization-with-Firewalla

   

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  Jen Fox

  • November 14, 2025 15:23
  • Edited

  Heya Sean Reynolds using the Gold SE , supported the original Purple [ still using it, inconjunction with slate 7 during travels
  
  for purple, the original, FULL ids/ips, but down to 600mbps, but the countries i return or visit usually is under 500mbps so no biggie. 
  
  
  
  thus far, 
  
  unifi controller + the ful lIDS/IPS on gold SE is running well. 

  
  Edit : 
  - typical home is 12 devices, some IoT 
  
  - 5 are very network hungry, 
  
  - Unifi U7 pro 
  
  not much issues, though the latency increases, as more devices are trying to stream, and the optimizations are applied from the youtube recommendations [ increasing minimum data rate and unicasting etc ] 
  
  

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