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Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software vs. Cisco Firepower 1000 Series

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software

    Score9 out of 10
    N/ACisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) software is the core OS for the ASA suite. It provides firewall functionality, as well as integration with context-specific Cisco security modules. It is scaled for enterprise-level traffic and connections.N/A

    Cisco Firepower 1000 Series

    Score8 out of 10
    N/AThe Cisco Firepower® 1000 Series for small to medium-size businesses and branch offices is a family of four threat-focused Next-Generation Firewall (NGFW) security platforms designed to deliver business resiliency through superior threat defense. The vendor provides that they offers exceptional sustained performance when advanced threat functions are enabled. The 1000 Series’ throughput range addresses use cases from the small office, home office, remote branch office to the Internet edge. The…N/A
    Pricing
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareCisco Firepower 1000 Series
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    Firepower 1000
    1,000-5,000
    per appliance
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareCisco Firepower 1000 Series
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareCisco Firepower 1000 Series
    Considered Both Products
    Cisco
    Chose Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    We will be moving to firepower in the next update
    Incentivized
    Chose Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    Configuration and management of Cisco's ASA are straightforward. We chose Cisco ASA for many reasons, as well as Cisco's threat response reports. We previously had issues with Sophos UTM due to its poor performance. We no longer have to be concerned about performance issues …
    Incentivized
    Chose Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    We were using pfSense before in our environment but we were facing continuous issues in configuration management & policy-based management. After the implementation of Cisco ASA, it has resolved both the previous problems & also provided us a reliable solution with High …
    Incentivized
    Chose Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    We were using [pfSense] before in our environment but we regularly facing difficulties over it due to software bugs & downtime. After implementing Cisco ASA, it resolved our availability issue & provides us a reliable solution with the best security features & easy to …
    Incentivized
    Chose Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    The web interface is easy to use and configure. Also, it has a better IPS option [and] you can manage various firewalls in one console. GUI is much better than ASDM.
    Incentivized
    Cisco
    Chose Cisco Firepower 1000 Series
    These new Firepower's vs the older ASA are like night and day. The new interface, the additional features for security which were not available in the older ASAs to us. Everything about these new devices is making our job better (won't say easier because IT at this level always …
    Incentivized
    Chose Cisco Firepower 1000 Series
    The Cisco Firepower 1000 Series is the next step forward from specifically the Cisco ASA 5505/5506 products. We have found that it functions as we expect it to and we have another reliable product in our portfolio of Cisco hardware that we use in our environment. We have …
    Incentivized
    Chose Cisco Firepower 1000 Series
    No issues from a technical standpoint - Firepowers are secure, reliable and do what they say on the tin. Central management and configuration is easy and they fit in well with our existing Cisco infrastructure. These are not the cheapest available option for firewalls and we …
    Incentivized
    Chose Cisco Firepower 1000 Series
    The Firepower 1000 Series is definitely a better product both in terms of functionality and speed. Similar product, but much better.
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    87%
    Would buy again
    39 Answers
    89%
    Would buy again
    17 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    95%
    Delivers good value for the price
    41 Answers
    94%
    Delivers good value for the price
    17 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    91%
    Happy with the feature set
    41 Answers
    89%
    Happy with the feature set
    17 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    36 Answers
    87%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    13 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    98%
    Implementation went as expected
    40 Answers
    94%
    Implementation went as expected
    17 Answers
    Features
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareCisco Firepower 1000 Series
    Firewall
    Comparison of Firewall features of Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software and Cisco Firepower 1000 Series
    Feature
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    7.8
    49 Ratings
    10% below category average
    Cisco Firepower 1000 Series
    8.3
    33 Ratings
    4% below category average
    Identification Technologies6.532 Ratings8.031 Ratings
    Visualization Tools6.530 Ratings7.230 Ratings
    Content Inspection8.032 Ratings8.330 Ratings
    Policy-based Controls9.045 Ratings8.733 Ratings
    Active Directory and LDAP7.547 Ratings8.429 Ratings
    Firewall Management Console7.547 Ratings7.232 Ratings
    Reporting and Logging5.948 Ratings8.333 Ratings
    VPN9.048 Ratings9.128 Ratings
    High Availability9.047 Ratings9.232 Ratings
    Stateful Inspection9.046 Ratings8.828 Ratings
    Proxy Server8.031 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareCisco Firepower 1000 Series
    Small Businesses
    SonicWall NSA Series
    Score8.5 out of 10
    SonicWall NSA Series
    Score8.5 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Barracuda CloudGen Firewall
    Score9.4 out of 10
    Barracuda CloudGen Firewall
    Score9.4 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Cisco Meraki MX
    Score9.2 out of 10
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    Score9 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareCisco Firepower 1000 Series
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.0
    (87 ratings)
    8.3
    (34 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    7.1
    (4 ratings)
    7.0
    (2 ratings)
    Usability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (5 ratings)
    Availability
    7.5
    (2 ratings)
    8.1
    (2 ratings)
    Performance
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.3
    (29 ratings)
    Support Rating
    8.7
    (8 ratings)
    8.5
    (34 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.0
    (2 ratings)
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    6.5
    (2 ratings)
    8.1
    (2 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) SoftwareCisco Firepower 1000 Series
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Cisco
    Cisco ASA's are great for internal network connected access between a firewall and the central management server. And, for complex networks where high security requirements with overly strict compliance are necessary. For networks with limited connectivity to the core or for poor network connectivity these are not the best solution. There are other more stand-alone firewall's that do this better. These firewall's are a little more complex to set up to start with so significant knowledge of these devices is required to set them up and ensure they are best practice installed.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Cisco
    • ASA is our VPN concentrator. The client and server are very stable and very easy to use
    • ASA also offers Intrusion Prevention, to an extent. This is also very useful for an improved security posture for a small company
    • ASA allowed us to scale very quickly. We could onboard clients, partners, and consultants and give them a great onboarding experience as well
    • Administrative costs with ASA are low. It's very easy to administer.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    • 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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Cisco
    • The ASDM software is at times a nightmare to install because of different java versions[.]
    • [The firewall] could do with a power button, just to be able to do a hard reboot when needed[.]
    • It would be nice to manage the firewall via the web on port 443[.]
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    • 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
    Likelihood to Renew
    Cisco
    To be honest there has been now great products out in the market compared to Cisco ASA. I beleieve Cisco has to do a lot of improvement in this area. The other defeiniete factors is the cost when it comes to renewals which is always a premium on Cisco products
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    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
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Usability
    Cisco
    No answers on this topic
    Cisco
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Cisco
    I generally have not noticed the outages, however since it's a machine it can malfunction, we need to implement the firewall infrastructure in such a way that it is highly available with device failure, region failure etc. Else any solution will be having the issues if they are not build with resiliency.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    Has not let me down yet.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Performance
    Cisco
    No answers on this topic
    Cisco
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Cisco
    The support is usually very good and gets back to you very quickly. However I had some instances of when two engineers will give me wildly different answers to what I thought was a simple question. Overall however I do rate the support highly and they are generally always very good.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Cisco
    It was quite a good one, how ever requires an expertise to deploy hence the SMB segment would be finding it difficult to implement this product. The one good reason is that there are lot of ASA certified engineers in compared to the other certified engineers. Hence this resembles positively on the deployment as you have quite a lot of experienced engineer on your deployment
    Incentivized
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    Cisco
    Utilize the new FMC cloud which is available in Cisco Defense Orchestrator.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Cisco
    We were using [pfSense] before in our environment but we regularly facing difficulties over it due to software bugs & downtime. After implementing Cisco ASA, it resolved our availability issue & provides us a reliable solution with the best security features & easy to understand GUI.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    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,
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Cisco
    • Most network engineers have worked with ASA, so there is no need for re-training when adding or turning over staff
    • Current configs from older devices plug in easily, and are operational on larger devices if an upgrade is required
    • Many support options available
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cisco
    • 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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots