FortiNet FortiGate is a firewall option with high integrability. It offers a variety of deployment options and next-gen firewall capabilities, including integration with IaaS cloud platforms and public cloud environments.
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Pricing
Cisco AnyConnect
Fortinet FortiGate
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Cisco AnyConnect
FortiGate
Free Trial
No
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
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FortiGate pricing starts at $250 for home office use, up to $300,000 for large enterprise appliances.
Must contact sales team for pricing.
Even though we have a FortiGate firewall on our network, we prefer Cisco AnyConnect as it is one tool for multiple solutions. We are using ISE which by default needs Cisco AnyConnect to be installed on the user's side, so we can use it also to connect through our VPN.
It's well suited for the mobile task force we have at Engel for all the information workers, the salespersons, and the salespeople that are abroad and are not often on the Engel premises but are on customer premises. So for them, it's the only really good tool to connect to central IT resources. But when I look to the future way of utilizing cloud resources and having a hybrid approach and having SaaS services like Salesforce, which are running natively in the cloud, then AnyConnect might not be suitable for them because anyway, I have a direct connection via an HTTPS tunnel to run all my SAS applications. I would not see any benefit of using AnyConnect in this case. So the more a company runs in the cloud, the less it needs AnyConnect.
For FortiGate Firewall, the basic functionality and requirement is met easily as Fortigate is among market leaders in NGFW. There are some extra points that inclined us to use Fortigate as our main Firewall. [Fortinet]Fortigate has a very well refined and functional SD-WAN solution when it comes to load balancing for normal Internet Traffic. SD-WAN - Load balancing of Internet traffic is a USP of Fortigate and makes it stand tall in the competition. Be it 3 or more Internet Links, multiple Subnets/segments of users to distribute and bandwidth load balancing for links and users. SLA based monitoring of Internet Links / MPLS links, makes it even better to choose the links on the basis of performance (Latency, packet loss, Jitter etc). SSL VPN configuration - The deep CLI-level debugging is also very helpful in troubleshooting. Type of tunnel can be easily configured - Full Tunnel or Split Tunnel for SSL. Though, I think Fortigate is one of the best options for small and mid-sized organizations, there are some areas for improvement. First, the CLI interface is very hard to adapt as the commands and directory hierarchy is very different for common syntax and standards.
Cisco AnyConnect connects the machine with the VPN very smoothly in a few clicks also provides security with Multi-Factor Authentication.
It Provides the facility of creating Network groups such as Local and Project Network so that user can limit the connectivity options.
The System scan feature is so robust, it Scans the System every time we connect to a new network and remembers the older Network and does not Scans while we connect to usual Netwroks.
Manual Administrative Config: The Enrollment requires the user to enroll from their end and can't just be "Setup" for the user unless you act as the user. For things like SMS text, it would be nice just to put it in place and have it work without a "Setup/Enrollment" process. This does, however ensure the user understands the process.
Active Directory Sync and Azure Sync Did not automatically match up accounts and duplicate, so I had to do it manually, to be fair the account usernames do not match the Email Address which is used for Azure so it would be difficult.
Duo Support and Cisco Support seem to have not been integrated with each other well, most support tickets end up with a Duo expert and a Cisco Firewall Expert on at the same time, though this has improved dramatically.
They did not force my Admin to use an NTP Server off the bat, which would have fixed a few issues we had that persisted for a while until he started using one. (A bit old fashioned)
When we switched to Fortinet Fortigate, it took some time getting used to and become familiar with the new interface. Being used to strictly command-line interfaces, a full GUI-based firewall was something brand new. Careful planning had to be done when creating rules to ensure we didn't miss anything. However, once we got used to the new GUI interface, going from one Fortinet product to another was simple, as Fortinet used the same interface for all of its devices.
This is software is easy to use, easy to maintain, easy to support, cost effective, and extremely secure. We will continue to use it for all employees well into the future. We have already renewed our licenses for another 5 years - that's how confident we are that this software will remain a primary security solution for our firm.
Fortinet's products have kept improving with new software releases and they continue to deliver great value. Their support is also very good. I believe that as a small enterprise, their products have given us competitive advantage delivering features and functionality that enable us to innovate and do things better. They also continue to be a leader in the markets they serve.
Compared to other products that I have used, Cisco gives me more information and it is easy for me to understand what's happening from the application, which is Cisco AnyConnect, which other vendors don't. It's very hard for me if I have to work with other applications, I have to get support from the application owner vendor. But in Cisco, I myself can read through and get this thing. Now with that being very comfortable, I mean very, very useful. I would like to get to more detail in a more simplified way. There are plenty of things. It is also where there is something it gives me in a simplified way. This is what has happened that would help me in some cases. But always there is a scope for improvement in any product. I never rate any product to 10, even if it's better because there is always room for improvement. So I personally feel we can still make this better. It is a good product, but we can still make it better
The user interface shared among many simultaneous users is very easy to get around. With shared favorites among users, most tasks are easily bookmarked and can quickly be found and edited. Their strategy for web filter integration is easy to understand and manage as well. With some general direction, setup and maintenance were easy to do and easy to teach others in the organization to do as well.
Thus far, I have not encountered any outages to Cisco AnyConnect. Any firmware updates are completed infrequently and efficiently such that the users don’t experience noticeable downtime. I have not encountered any errors running the platform at any time of day or night , or from any geographical location. Provided a hard-wired or WiFi internet connection is available, expect Cisco AnyConnect to run without unexpected interruption.
Their support team is extraordinary and quick responding. All support team members have great product knowledge and takes very minimum time for query resolution. Support is available on phone, emails, etc. As per my experience with their support team, I will rate them with 10 stars here because it was truly exceptional.
We live in Turkey. Fortinet's Turkey office [dealt] constantly with us in our every problem or our experience. In addition, global support teams also supported every ticket we opened in every problem we encountered. They support innovative approaches and evaluate and offer solutions. In this context, they were very supportive of the problems we encountered in previous versions.
We are quite satisfied with the deployment. We might extend our deployment. My suggestion to everyone will be utilizing Cisco cloud infra as well. As it will give you some nice features like cloud based firewall, DNS Security and threat intelligence. Threat intelligence was a key decision maker for us and people should not ignore it.
I have tried the above too. I have noticed that the consistency and reliability that connect provides are way better than theirs. Integration with 2-factor authentication apps is something extremely important, and I am not sure if this two software provide such functionality. Network stability and speed are also not as good as Cisco Anyconnect.
[Fortinet] FortiGate is not only cost effective but it gives the comprehensive security against the APT attacks and gives the complete traffic visibility and granular control. You can easily create the VDOMs (Virtual firewall) within a Fortigate firewall and customize the dashboard as per your requirement if you have multiple VDOMs within a single firewall.
We are able to seamlessly work on multiple clients daily, and it allows us to quickly handle more projects at the same time.
Cisco AnyConnect has allowed our own company's coworkers to remotely connect back to the corporate network, easily assisting work schedules and processes, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Being forced to work remotely, meant our processes still happened quickly and efficiently, by being able to leverage and use Cisco AnyConnect VPN.
Even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, I have worked 100% remotely for a few years now. This was always due to the reliable connectivity and ease of use with Cisco AnyConnect VPN. I live 2+ hours from our nearest corporate office, and even further from some of my client locations, and I have always been able to connect to any of my multiple Cisco AnyConnect VPN connections, within seconds.
Fortigates have an interesting bundle model for support and subscription services that make it an attractive option to deploy Firewall, IDS, Ant-virus, anti-SPAM in a single device. The cost of the bundle is pretty much what you pay for the device, not requiring huge expenditures on it's time to renew the hardware.
