Item: F5 BIG-IP
Rating: 8
Author: Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with F5 BIG-IP

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use F5 BIG-IP's (we are redundant) as a load balancer, and a IP handler for DMZ space for web servers. the load balancer function worked really well for us, we were able to handle multiple web servers loads t a database server setup. While we were able to use the F5s for the DMZ function, it really just translated IP address ranges, this was a complicated task that the F5s really weren't designed for, but it worked.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Load Balancing, this is what they were designed for
interface NAT, they can handle multiple interfaces from firewall to switches
traffic management, we could segment traffic and watch/analyze traffic for issues

Cons

The appliance had power supply problems, replaced 2 over the 5 years, $3000 each
The appliance as a hardware device had no support 2 years after we bought them, moved to virtual
Requires F5 knowledge, their terminology and way of doing things needs training

Most Important Features

Load Balancing
Traffic management
traffic analytics

Return on Investment

Solved the issue with load balancing
Helped us better understand our network traffic
support ended too soon, we needed to replace

Alternatives Considered

We did not evaluate other solutions, we purchased a whole new rack of equipment which upgraded our servers from physical to virtual and the F5 BIG-IPs were part of that upgrade

Key Insights

Do you think F5 BIG-IP delivers good value for the price?

Not sure

Are you happy with F5 BIG-IP's feature set?

Yes

Did F5 BIG-IP live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of F5 BIG-IP go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy F5 BIG-IP again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Cisco Firepower 1000 Series, vSphere, Iperius Backup

Likelihood to Recommend

As a load balancer for larger networks, in use with their security appliances this is a robust system. it is a load balancer as it's primary function, we were able to analyze traffic through the interface and stop some traffic which was undesirable. It gave a dashboard which helped with the traffic, the other connected devices throughput, so it can be some help with monitoring of your network trafic to help make decisions.

Comments

Please log in to join the conversation

F5 BIG-IP load balancer