Likelihood to Recommend I think it is well suited for smaller companies or (as in our case) extension to a central system with higher performance. My personal guess is, that it can be quite annoying with those delays in bigger environments, when 20 or more devices needed to be managed. From the point of security, support and updates it works quite good and seem to have no downsides.
Read full review This is a higher-end firewall, built for a medium to large business. It handles traffic and scanning and protection well but it would be a bit of a budget-buster and probably overkill for a small to (barely) medium sized business. SonicWall makes SoHo devices for those use cases and they would be more appropriate.
Read full review Pros My organization is all Cisco and wants to stay in the Cisco life cycle, Firepower 1000 series is great for small to medium-size office. Very robust enterprise-grade security solution with updated threat features to handle any current and upcoming threats. The solution is backed by Cisco to ensure constant security updates. Integrated AnyConnect remote client VPN is a big plus to allow for secure remote workers access. Easier to set up a site to site VPN due to the large user base and case studies published on integrating to other manufacturer solutions. Read full review VPN Content filtering IPS Anti-malware Read full review Cons ACLS in gui are PIA cant see object details Objects in ACLs dont show IP addresses Have to renames every object to name+ip to make acl GUI useable Speed to data can use improvement. Health warnings should allow you to resolve you have to dig n search in some cases. Read full review The logging interface is voluminous and difficult to get quick and good information from. SonicWall NSA is trying to mimic Palo Alto Network's investigative features but falls far behind. Read full review Likelihood to Renew It is quite good, robust and reliable but not always so easy to manage and configure. The tools could be improved and the price is not low for an entry level firewall
Read full review Usability Firepowers are secure, reliable, central management and configuration is easy and they fit in well with our existing Cisco infrastructure. Good feature set and support. Good management and control with chassis manager and central control with additional Firepower Management Centre.
Read full review The usability takes a bit of training, like any firewall, but I've found that showing even Tier 1 helpdesk how to do basic things has been easy. We have entry-level IT technicians performing white-listing, IP entries, VPN access and LDAP functions, to name a few tasks. The menus in the GUI are pretty straight forward.
Read full review Reliability and Availability Has not let me down yet.
Read full review Performance Great performance even on the lower end model of the series. You can push a lot of traffic through these devices without much performance impact. If you decide you want to inspect encrypted traffic however, you may take a big hit on the cpu and memory of the box, but they still manage to keep up even with all the bells and whistles turned on.
Read full review Support Rating I have had troubles with Firepower Management Center and the FTD's in the past. Sticking to a Gold Star image and upgrading when the "bugs" are fixed is great. That still doesn't mean you are left vulnerable though. The extra features are just not enabled yet. Great product and calling support is readily available for any issue.
Read full review Cost, ease of use and reliability after implementation. It's a great and easy product to use to meet the needs of smaller organizations that want a more "legitimate" setup without going overboard or spending Cisco money. Great product. Can be rack mounted or stand alone. VPN easy to setup and update. A great product to start with and grow with in a developing organization.
Read full review Implementation Rating Utilize the new FMC cloud which is available in Cisco Defense Orchestrator.
Read full review Alternatives Considered Cisco Meraki MX is much more simple to configure it if you compare to Cisco Firepower 1000, but it is more limited to pur some complex configurations. The Cisco Firepower 1000 Series is typically deployed as a physical appliance, while the Meraki MX can be deployed as a physical or virtual appliance.The Firepower 1000 Series has a more complex user interface, with a steeper learning curve, but offers more customization and configuration options. The Meraki MX has a simpler, more intuitive interface,
Read full review We compared the
FortiGate to Sonicwall and continued with Sonicwall as we were a mid-size school where the Sonicwall was performing adequately, and the learning curve was steep to switch platforms. The Sonicwall offered everything the
FortiGate did, and was not as costly, both in the appliance and in licensing.
Read full review Return on Investment We have seen improved throughput on our internet. It took several attempts with Cisco engineers to configure the device; it requires a deep set of knowledge to set up in a more complicated environment. This will allow us to move forward with a more stable and configurable environment with security available we didn't have before. Read full review Was affordable, allowing for advanced routing and security. Enabled us to build VPNs without purchasing additional services Was simple enough to manage in house without external support. Read full review ScreenShots