Amazon CloudFront vs BIG-IP

Likelihood to Recommend

Amazon CloudFront is best suited when there is a need of speed in serving static and dynanic web contents of a web application. If the content is already in that edge location, CloudFront delivers it immediately. If the content is not currently in that edge location, CloudFront retrieves it from an Amazon S3 bucket or an HTTP server. Amazon CloudFront is not appropriate in case users can tolerate some delays or servers are present near to the location of user. It also Integrates through the W3 Total Cache plugin. Amazon CloudFront Pricing based on bandwidth usage that's the best part of it.

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Ashish Agarwal

Software Engineer

GenpactInformation Technology and Services, 1001-5000 employees

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The BIG-IP is definitely well suited to scale up for demanding and/or complex enterprise traffic management. Although currently, we're only scratching the surface of its capabilities it has not been too complex or difficult to implement and manage. Having said that, I don't know that it would be the best fit for smaller-scale deployments, as it would probably be overkill unless you needed several of the modules they offer. Although we are only using one module, we are making extensive use of it. Similar to products like the Check Point firewall, there are so many options and features available that the limiting factor is more likely to be administrator time or knowledge than the BIP-IP itself. The good thing is there are always more features and options to grow into if needed without having to find additional solutions.

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Paul Luchini

Network Engineer

Kentucky Administrative Office of the CourtsGovernment Administration, 1001-5000 employees

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Pros

CloudFront, like other CDNs, is a very reliable content delivery network for delivering content like images, videos, HTML, and javascripts that are run on browsers across the world.
It provides secure hosting of content at no extra cost. AWS Certification Manager also provides the ability to create and manage custom SSL certificates at no extra cost for our websites.
It is secure, which means that it uses AWS Shield for Layer 3/4 DDoS mitigation and AWS WAF for Layer 7 protection. Hence seamlessly integrating with other AWS services. So you do not have to shop outside of AWS ecosystem

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Verified User

Team Lead in Engineering

Financial Services Company, 10,001+ employees

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Easy connection: you can connect to your corporate network with two clicks.
IP restriction: F5 has a list of possible insecure IP numbers, if someone tries to connect using one of these numbers, F5 BIG-IP won't connect.
Always on feature: Very handy feature, if you install always on, you won't need to click connect.

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Verified User

Analyst in Information Technology

Information Technology and Services Company, 501-1000 employees

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Cons

If price is the main concern, CloudFront is not the cheapest-in-class by a wide margin
Some of the settings are not obvious to new users, and the management dashboards could use work
Lacks fine-grained access controls and statistical reports for usage

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Joshua Dickson

Director of Engineering

NorthOutComputer Software, 51-200 employees

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Occasionally, it fails to connect and gives me very little feedback to help me correct the problem.
The interface is simple, but a bit dated.

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Verified User

Professional in Human Resources

Internet Company, 10,001+ employees

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Usability

Amazon CloudFront 9.0

Based on 1 answer

Easy way to integrate a CDN within the AWS infrastructure. It allows further customization based on company needs.

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Carlos Becerra

Senior Software Engineer & Project Manager

WiFiesta IncInformation Technology and Services, 11-50 employees

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BIG-IP 9.0

Based on 1 answer

Great customization and easy to use help reference menus

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Alan Matson, CCNA:S, MCP

Senior Network Security Engineer

InsightInformation Technology and Services, 5001-10,000 employees

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Support Rating

Amazon CloudFront 7.2

Based on 4 answers

CloudFront is a good CDN solution. It can be a bit complicated to implement depending on your needs, but AWS tech support is great. You get to avoid a ton of upfront costs by going with CloudFront. It works best in conjunction with other AWS services in your infrastructure. Once you set it up, you won't need to do much to maintain it. It just works.

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Verified User

Manager in Information Technology

E-Learning Company, 51-200 employees

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BIG-IP 8.2

Based on 7 answers

I was pleasantly surprised by F5 support, with my experience being the best of all the network vendors. I was not speaking to someone across the world, the engineer fully took ownership and followed through to solution without me having to keep calling. The support engineer also was able to resolve an unusual situation, in which most other vendors' engineers would simply give up.

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Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology

Publishing Company, 1001-5000 employees

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Alternatives Considered

Amazon has always been creative and leading, and I have been using its services for years. They are very reassuring and have fast and responsive support--you can call them from any time zone to respond quickly. High security on servers, open hands on changes, and increasing and decreasing server resources and features.

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Ali Kazempour

Information Technology Manager

AzerexInformation Technology & Services, 1-10 employees

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Netscaler and F5 Big-IP are very similar. I liked the Netscaler GUI a little better, but they both basically serve the same purpose quite well. Both are more advanced than the cheap/free software-based alternatives out there. Both can be clustered to avoid having a single point of failure at the load balancer level. Both can be programmed with custom rules to handle traffic routing.

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Verified User

Technician in Information Technology

Entertainment Company, 51-200 employees

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Return on Investment

Our website loads much more quickly in other countries as a result of CloudFront. For example: loading cached assets from CloudFront in Australia is 4x as fast as it would be to load the same assets without CloudFront.
Very inexpensive service considering the value it brings.

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Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology

Entertainment Company, 1-10 employees

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Less issues with our load balancers means better availability for our clients and less penalties from our SLAs.
Easy for newer network engineers to learn means less time spent training them.

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Verified User

Professional in Information Technology

Information Technology and Services Company, 10,001+ employees

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Pricing Details

General

Free Trial

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Free/Freemium Version

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Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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Entry-level set up fee?

No

Amazon CloudFront Editions & Modules

Edition

First 10TB	$0.09
Next 40TB	$0.08
Next 100TB	$0.06
Next 350TB	$0.04
Next 524TB	$0.03
Next 4PB	$0.03
Over 5PB	$0.02

Additional Pricing Details

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General

Free Trial

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Free/Freemium Version

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Premium Consulting/Integration Services

—

Entry-level set up fee?

No

BIG-IP Editions & Modules

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Additional Pricing Details

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