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MD.SIHAB TALUKDAR - PeerSpot reviewer
System Engineer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Top 10
Jan 17, 2021
Stable and reasonably-priced, and the support is okay
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable feature is stability."
  • "The performance should be improved."

What is our primary use case?

This is a product that is used at the infrastructure level to protect the network from outside traffic.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is stability.

What needs improvement?

When using this product, our network is slower. The performance should be improved.

The installation could be made easier.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been working with Cisco Firepower NGFW Firewall for more than two years.

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What do I think about the stability of the solution?

This is a stable product and we plan to continue using it.

How are customer service and support?

Support from Cisco is good enough.

How was the initial setup?

The installation can be easy, although it is slightly more difficult to install than Fortinet FortiGate. One day is enough for deployment but it takes a long time to configure.

What about the implementation team?

I deployed Firepower with support from the team in India.

We have a team of three people for deployment and maintenance.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The price of Firepower is not bad compared to other products.

What other advice do I have?

This is a good product and I recommend it.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Mohd.Rivai - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Security Engineer at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Real User
Top 10
Jan 15, 2021
Good UI but too expensive and not very stable
Pros and Cons
  • "The user interface, the UI, is excellent on the solution."
  • "The stability is not the best."

What is our primary use case?

I primarily use the solution for the IPsec only. 

What is most valuable?

The user interface, the UI, is excellent on the solution. Let's say you want to check the real-time locker - you can create it by the UI using ADSM.

What needs improvement?

The VPN portion of the solution isn't the greatest.

The stability is not the best.

The solution is far too expensive.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been working with the solution for about six months, or maybe a little bit less than that.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I haven't found the stability to be very good. The IPsec stability leaves a lot to be desired. They really need to work on the solution's stability capabilities.

In ASA, I built the IPsec between ASA and Fortigate due to the fact that most of the time I have to restart the timer to flow the data.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We only have two to three users who directly deal with the solution within our company. Overall, we have between 100-200 employees. We haven't really scaled it.

I personally would prefer not to use ASA going forward. However, I don't know if the company itself has any plans to increase usage or not.

How are customer service and technical support?

While I've dealt with Cisco technical support in the past on other solutions, I have not contacted them in regards to this specific product.

That said, my past experience with Cisco technical support has been very positive and I found them to be very helpful in general. I just can't speak to this specific product.

How was the initial setup?

I was pretty junior when the solution was initially implemented in the organization. For that reason, I did not take an active role in implementing the solution. I wouldn't be able to really discuss the setup specifics or the level of difficulty.

I'm not exactly sure who handles maintenance, if any, within our organization.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The licensing is quite expensive. I don't have the exact amount, however, it's my understanding that it's a very pricey solution. There's a lot of competition out there, including from Fortigate, which offers just as good, if not better products.

What other advice do I have?

I'm not overly familiar with ASA. I only work with it on an administration level.

I work with the latest version and I use the ASDM version server.

I wouldn't recommend that an organization choose ASA as a solution. They should look into other options.

Overall, I would rate the solution at a six out of ten. We haven't had the greatest experience.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Cisco Secure Firewall
February 2026
Learn what your peers think about Cisco Secure Firewall. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: February 2026.
881,757 professionals have used our research since 2012.
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Program director at a tech consulting company with 201-500 employees
Real User
Jan 14, 2021
A stable firewall solution with antivirus and bot protection
Pros and Cons
  • "I think Cisco ASA Firewall is the most stable firewall solution."
  • "The price can be better."

What is our primary use case?

We use Cisco ASA Firewall to protect different sites at a protocol level. We also use it for antivirus and bot protection.

What is most valuable?

I think Cisco ASA Firewall is the most stable firewall solution.

What needs improvement?

The price can be better.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using Cisco ASA Firewall for the last ten years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I think they're all are stable. I've never seen a firewall that's unstable.

How are customer service and technical support?

I'm satisfied with their technical support.

How was the initial setup?

It's easy for me to configure one because I have firewall configuration certifications. I don't know what someone with nothing in terms of experience would be able to do. 

It normally takes me a week to implement and deploy. I normally need a week and three people to do maintenance.

What about the implementation team?

I used to implement it several years ago, but now I ask our engineer to do it.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Cisco ASA Firewall should be cheaper.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend Cisco ASA Firewall to potential users. 

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Cisco ASA Firewall an eight.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
General Manager at a paper AND forest products with 1-10 employees
Real User
Jan 14, 2021
Secure, stable, user-friendly, and the partner support is good
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable feature is that it's secure."
  • "In the future, I would like to be able to use an IP phone over a VPN connection."

What is our primary use case?

We are using the ASA in our network to create a VPN between six places. We also use it for servers and data synchronization.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is that it's secure.

It is really stable and I've never had an occasion that due to this firewall, I have had issues with the network, a breakdown, or otherwise.

This is a user-friendly product. Once you have a specialist who can configure it properly, you'll be pretty protected everything you want is in it.

What needs improvement?

In the future, I would like to be able to use an IP phone over a VPN connection.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working with Cisco ASA Firewall for at least seven years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability is good.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We have not tried to scale our network. It was established a long time ago and nothing has changed since then.

How are customer service and technical support?

I have been auditing their partners in Bulgaria and I am in contact with them on a regular basis. I have not had any real issues with my equipment but overall, I think that the support is perfect.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were using the ASA 5505 and our network is faster now, so we are now in the process of upgrading our network to the 5506 model. The 5505 is a 100 megabit product, which is very low.

What about the implementation team?

We had a company that set everything up for us. They have Cisco engineers and I'm paying them annually for next-business-day support. They do all of the maintenance for us.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

They have a lot of different models but most of them are really expensive. This is the main thing because, for us, the price is important.

What other advice do I have?

Overall, I am pretty satisfied with this product and I recommend it.

I would rate this solution a ten out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner
PeerSpot user
Presales Engineer at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
Real User
Jan 10, 2021
Good remote access and clusters but the firewall is a bit dated
Pros and Cons
  • "The clusters in data centers are great."
  • "Some individuals find the setup and configuration challenging."

What is our primary use case?

In general, we support more public fiscal entities. Most of them are quite sizeable at 5,000-6,000 employees. We use it mostly for remote access.

What is most valuable?

The clusters in data centers are great.

We enjoy the use of the remote access VPN. We have a mechanical firewall with IPS and we have no more than these. In general, ASA is for remote access and the mechanical firewall right now is more used for data centers. 

We work to combine customers and we have a lot of customers that use networking from Cisco. They buy Cisco firewalls due to the fact that all of their networks are working with Cisco features.

What needs improvement?

It would be ideal if the solution offered a web application firewall.

We've had some issues with stability.

The solution has some scalability limitations.

The firewall itself has become a bit dated.

The pricing on the solution is a bit high.

Some individuals find the setup and configuration challenging.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using the solution for ten years or more. It's been at least a decade at this point.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Normally, we don't have any problems with stability. That said, when we have problems, it may be difficult to resolve quickly. The tech from Cisco is really good. However, we have some problems that take more time. Issues haven't come up very often. We've only had two or three problems over ten years that took a while to resolve. Largely, it's quite stable. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We typically work with large public organizations. Our customers are quite big. Some are even up to 8,000 employees.

My view is that the ASA is for data centers. When you need more performance or something like that, this may be a problem. This is due to the fact that we don't have the ability to add more performance - more CPU or more equipment - in our cluster when we deploy the solution in a perimeter. It's complicated to expand the performance with ASA on the perimeter.

How are customer service and technical support?

We have a good relationship with technical support. They're very helpful. Sometimes we get a solution and sometimes we don't, however, they are always available to help us deal with issues.

How was the initial setup?

I have been working with this equipment for years, so for me, the initial setup is pretty easy. For customers who use the Cisco solutions for the first time, maybe it's complicated. They probably feel it would be easier to configure if there was a simpler graphical view or something like that. Often a complaint is that it's difficult to configure. However, I don't have that issue.

To deploy one solution, how long it takes depends on the customer or the size of the enterprise. For a large enterprise or large public entity, we need more time or more resources to deploy the solution. That said, it's not too difficult for us as we work a lot of time with ASA. We can go fairly quickly.

What other advice do I have?

We support ASA 5508, 5585, and 5525 - all the versions of the firewall. Again, we built a HTAB machine too.

We've worked with Cisco for many years and I love working with them.

Right now, ASA is getting older. A better recommendation may be to use Firepower, a Next-Generation Firewall, no ASA. In cases for some remote VPN access, we recommend ASA, however, for all of the deployments, the recommendation now is to use a Next-Generation Firewall from Cisco Firepower. 

Overall, I would rate the solution at a seven out of ten. That said, for remote access alone, I'd rate the product at a nine.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner
PeerSpot user
reviewer1293345 - PeerSpot reviewer
System Administrator at a non-profit with 1-10 employees
Real User
Jan 8, 2021
User-friendly UI, blocking by category, has plenty of features
Pros and Cons
  • "You do not have to do everything through a command line which makes it a lot easier to apply rules."
  • "The solution could offer better control that would allow the ability to restrictions certain features from a website."

What is our primary use case?

We use the solution to monitor the connections as part of our parameter protection for our network. We restrict what kind of traffic comes in and out, we use it basically for traffic management.

What is most valuable?

Cisco used to be all command-line operations and now Firepower is in a way modelled from FortiGate. Firepower has integrated a UI into it now.

You do not have to do everything through a command line which makes it a lot easier to apply rules.

You are able to see the traffic of what sites users are visiting.

There are warnings if you are about to go to sites that could be malicious.

It also allows you to block within categories, such as, by URL.

The solution always had these capabilities, but it did not have a user interface that was user-friendly.

What needs improvement?

The solution could offer better control that would allow the ability to restrictions certain features from a website. For example, If we want to allow YouTube but not allow uploads or we want to allow Facebook but not allow the chat or to playing of videos. This ability to customize restrictions would be great.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been using the solution for three months now. We have always used Cisco but before we were using the ASA and now we use the new version with the threat defence.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability is good so far.  My opinion could change in another couple of months once we get more deeply involved with the solution.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We currently are protection approximately 220 users.

How are customer service and technical support?

We just deployed it a couple of months ago, we have not used the tech support with the Firepower yet. We have not had an issue that we have had to raise with them. 

Generally, the tech support for Cisco takes too long to go through the different tiers of support agents to get to someone that can resolve the issue. You end up speaking to someone that is not qualified to solve the issue, then you have to be escalated upwards over and over. This system could be better.

I rate the tech support service generally from Cisco a seven out of ten.

How was the initial setup?

The installation is not hard and not easy either, it falls in between.

What about the implementation team?

The time of implementation took us two to three days. This was in part because we were migrating from another Cisco firewall. The config files were already there, we just had to bring them over. While having the config files we just had to set up the hardware to have us up and running. The install could have taken longer if this was not the case.

What other advice do I have?

Currently, I would give this solution high marks because I have not had a problem. However, keeping in mind, my evaluation period has been short. I would not give the solution a ten, nothing is perfect.

I rate Cisco Firepower NGFW Firewall a nine out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
it_user1307058 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Consulting Engineer at a comms service provider with 201-500 employees
Real User
Jan 6, 2021
Easy to configure, good VPN capabilities, and the antimalware features provide extra security
Pros and Cons
  • "The most important feature is the VPN connection."
  • "I would like to see the inclusion of a protocol that can be used to protect databases."

What is our primary use case?

We are a solution provider and the Cisco ASA Firewall is one of the security products that we implement for our customers. My clients use it for security, and also to establish VPN connections.

How has it helped my organization?

My client is in the financial sector and all of the connections are doing using the VPN. This type of access makes the connections more secure.

What is most valuable?

The most important feature is the VPN connection.

My clients also use the antimalware features and the scan is very good. It also supports packet inspection and IPS.

Cisco ASA is easy to configure.

The integration with the security features is something that I like.

What needs improvement?

The SecureX ASA administration platform should be improved.

The orchestration of modules should be improved.

I would like to see the inclusion of a protocol that can be used to protect databases. This would be a good feature to have added.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been working with the Cisco ASA Firewall for approximately three years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I have not had problems with stability, although I have had some small issues with bugs. In general, I can operate without a problem. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is very easy to scale this product. With SMC, you can control all levels of ASA in a central console. You can simply add a new ASA firewall to protect your network, and you will be able to control it.

We have approximately 300 users.

My clients for this solution are medium-sized organizations.

How are customer service and technical support?

I have not been in contact with technical support but I use the implementation guide. I have also used the community support and I think that it's okay. The information that I received about the configuration was good.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Prior to Cisco ASA, my client was using Fortinet FortiGate. They switched because there were complaints about the connection being slow.

How was the initial setup?

The complexity of the setup depends on the needs and requirements of the client.

When a client does not know exactly what is needed, the complexity increases because the configuration is not clear. You really have to have a good understanding of what the client needs before configuring it.

If the model does not have SMC then it is complex to configure.

The length of time for deployment also depends on the requirements, but it will usually take between three days and one week.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

This is an expensive product, although when you buy this solution, you can do many things so it provides good value for the investment.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

My clients did evaluate other options but ultimately chose this product. Other than the VPN connection, I don't know the reasons for this decision.

What other advice do I have?

I can recommend this product because it is one of the most stable firewalls on the market. The suitability, however, depends on the environment and what is needed.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner
PeerSpot user
reviewer1471347 - PeerSpot reviewer
Administrator at a university with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Jan 5, 2021
Flexible solution and can be easily integrated with your network hardware
Pros and Cons
  • "I have found the stability of this solution really good. This is why I use it."
  • "Comparing Cisco solution to others, it is expensive, it would be better for it to be cheaper."

What is our primary use case?

I am doing research on the product and testing it for security.

What is most valuable?

It is a flexible solution and can be easily integrated with your network hardware. It is a very useful product. This product is very popular in the industry and the network security environment is good.

What needs improvement?

It would be a benefit to improve the integration with other similar products from other vendors on the market, for example, Huawei or Fortinet products. Comparing Cisco solution to others, it is expensive, it would be better for it to be cheaper.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the solution for three to four years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I have found the stability of this solution really good, this is why I use it.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The product is scalable.

How are customer service and technical support?

The customer service is really helpful, they do their part in keeping our organization's network from outside intrusion.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have used other solutions in the past, such as Cisco Firepower. I find Cisco products to be superior.

How was the initial setup?

The solution is normally easy to install but if the user has more requirements, as in a more complicated setup, it could take more time.

What about the implementation team?

I did the deployment myself.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The product is very expensive. 

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend this product. I suggest this solution to my colleagues because it is a great product and is really stable. When looking at other products in use in other companies this product is superior. 

I rate Cisco ASA Firewall ten out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Cisco Secure Firewall Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: February 2026
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Cisco Secure Firewall Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.