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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Cisco Secure Firewall

    Score8.4 out of 10
    N/ACisco Secure Firewall delivers comprehensive threat protection for modern, distributed networks. Built to support hybrid workforces and multicloud environments, it enables Zero Trust access, application visibility, and secure remote connectivity. With integration across the Cisco Secure portfolio, including SecureX and Talos threat intelligence, the firewall powers organizations to detect and stop more sophisticated threats. Centralized management simplifies policy enforcement, orchestration,…N/A

    SonicWall NSA Series

    Score8.4 out of 10
    N/AThe SonicWall NSA Series is the company's mid-range next generation firewall (NGFW).N/A
    Pricing
    Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall NSA Series
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall NSA Series
    Free Trial
    YesNo
    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 Secure FirewallSonicWall NSA Series
    Considered Both Products
    Cisco
    Chose Cisco Secure Firewall
    The other products do well with simplifying some of the tasks such as rule creation where it would create rules based on a zone.
    Incentivized
    SonicWall
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Would buy again
    6 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    6 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    6 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    6 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    6 Answers
    Features
    Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall NSA Series
    Firewall
    Comparison of Firewall features of Cisco Secure Firewall and SonicWall NSA Series
    Feature
    Cisco Secure Firewall
    7.9
    79 Ratings
    9% below category average
    SonicWall NSA Series
    8.3
    5 Ratings
    4% below category average
    Identification Technologies8.168 Ratings8.85 Ratings
    Visualization Tools7.072 Ratings9.05 Ratings
    Content Inspection8.371 Ratings5.04 Ratings
    Policy-based Controls8.976 Ratings9.95 Ratings
    Active Directory and LDAP8.865 Ratings6.94 Ratings
    Firewall Management Console8.374 Ratings9.05 Ratings
    Reporting and Logging7.175 Ratings8.95 Ratings
    VPN7.665 Ratings10.05 Ratings
    High Availability8.571 Ratings9.95 Ratings
    Stateful Inspection7.870 Ratings7.04 Ratings
    Proxy Server6.741 Ratings7.01 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall NSA Series
    Small Businesses
    SonicWall NSA Series
    Score8.4 out of 10
    pfSense
    Score9.9 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Barracuda CloudGen Firewall
    Score9.4 out of 10
    Barracuda CloudGen Firewall
    Score9.4 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    Score9 out of 10
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    Score9 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall NSA Series
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.0
    (84 ratings)
    9.0
    (5 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    7.2
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Availability
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Performance
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    7.6
    (35 ratings)
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall NSA Series
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Cisco
    The software offers advanced firewall solutions from Web threats management to behavioural analytics and comprehensive application security. Cisco Secure firewall software is incredibly easy to deploy and implement. Customer support services providers are concise and very responsive. Integration and customization of the software are exceptional. The product boasts impressive capabilities, enabling it to stop threats and manage all security flaws in real time.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Cisco
    • It's good at segregating networks and ensuring that you only give the access that you need to give. Especially with medical devices, you want to only give the access that they need and keep them in their own separate areas so that they can't just communicate with the rest of the network. It's also good at the border for keeping attackers out of the network.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    • Relatively inexpensive compared to some of the higher-end products, like Palo Alto Networks.
    • Easy to set up, as the SonicWall NSA interface is consistent across all models.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Cisco
    • I wish that the deployment of the updates to the sensors from the FMC was faster.
    • Cisco ASA firewall did a great job of authentication and authorization on the local firewall. FTD does not authorize users well in terms that an AAA must be setup to provide the granular tools that the ASA did.
    • Cisco's method of licensing the firewall can be improved. The FMC and the FTD are licensed through the Cisco software manager and there are instances where the devices are licensed but the firewall still displays and error due to licensing.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    • Ideal with smaller businesses. Would have to examine for more complex needs of larger businesses.
    • Scalability might be an issue for super large organizations.
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Cisco
    It works really well. We can do most anything we want or need to with it, and you don’t have to have a doctorate or multiple certs to necessarily figure it out. The thing that would probably have to happen to make us switch would be if we just got priced out - Cisco’s more powerful and higher bandwidth models cost a pretty penny.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Cisco
    The platform is powerful and feature-rich, especially when paired with tools like Firepower Management Center (FMC) and SecureX. The policy structure is logical, and the visibility into traffic flows, threat activity, and rule hits is quite strong once you're familiar with the interface
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    There is room for improvement when it comes to learning the UI, but the UI is overall pretty good. It doesn't take long to learn if you are famaliar with firewalls.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Cisco
    As for the availability, in general we did not experience any issues with it, neither in situations where there's only one physical device implemented nor when there's and High Availability pair. Failover works like a charm, no complaints here, it works as it should and so far it has been highly reliable.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Performance
    Cisco
    no slowing down, vpn is working fast
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Cisco
    Firewall support is professional just like any other technology Cisco sells. From answering simple questions to bringing out outages affecting a large population of our workforce, Cisco support is always courteous, professional, and communicates with our team to keep our request on their radar. Some of the brightest people I've met are from Cisco support both in IQ and EQ which shows the talent Cisco is able to onboard to their team.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    Most of the time, calling SonicWall NSA Support, you get an expert who can help resolve your issues. RMAs are pretty easy once they determine there is an issue with the hardware. Support is available 24x7, which makes emergency calls easy. The only downside is the support engineers may have thick accents; however, their expertise more than makes up for any language barriers.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    In-Person Training
    Cisco
    very good
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Online Training
    Cisco
    was a good training but questions was answered not so good. Training was "Fundamentals of Cisco Firewall Threat Defense and Intrusion Prevention (SFWIPF)".
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    Cisco
    Our initial implementation was aided by Cisco's professional services and was excellent. The engineer was very knowledgeable and helped us work through issues while building out our new internet security edge Part of this involved tools to migrate the firewall configuration from old to new.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Cisco
    Cisco Secure Firewall works better with the Cisco ecosystem when we can utilize it and feels beefy enough when we utilize it in the data center. The Fortinet we have found are great, small cost boxes for remote offices with a better UI then Cisco Secure Firewalls. The feature set included with the firewalls feels similar from a security point of view.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    Cisco
    was not involved
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Scalability
    Cisco
    you can choose up to 50 devices i think thats enough for our organization
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Professional Services
    Cisco
    was not involved
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    No answers on this topic
    Return on Investment
    Cisco
    • Positive impact. Cisco is a big player in IT environment. It is future stuff, everything, what you learn today, maybe something can be tomorrow. And yes, it's quite important to learn the new stuff every day. And yes, that's it. Yes, I'm happy with Cisco.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SonicWall
    • 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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Cisco Secure Firewall Screenshots

    Screenshot of Cisco Secure 1200 Series Firewall FamilyScreenshot of Cisco Secure 4200 SeriesScreenshot of Cisco Secure 4200 SeriesScreenshot of Cisco Secure Firewall 1200 Stack FamilyScreenshot of Cisco Secure Firewall 200 SeriesScreenshot of Cisco Secure Firewall 200 Series