We performed a comparison between Cisco IOS Security and Netgate pfSense based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two Firewalls solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."It is simple to manage, and there are a lot of functionalities in the same box."
"The most valuable feature of Fortinet FortiGate is URL filtering."
"Mainly the FortiGate reporting system is very good. It guides us through all the expectations of security. Fortinet provides us all that we need for security. Also, Fortinet FortiGate is a next-generation firewall. It is much more advanced than others."
"The solution is scalable."
"The most valuable features are the policies, filtering, and configuration."
"It's user-friendly and easy to operate."
"What's most important is the ease of use."
"The security features that they have are quite good. On top of that, their licensing model is quite nice where they don't charge you anything for the SD-WAN functionality for the firewall."
"The most valuable feature of Cisco IOS Security is posturing."
"Cisco has always been a premium product. There's a lot of other entry-level solutions. This is more robust."
"What I have used the most and received the most benefit from is the IPsec technology."
"The solution is easy to use."
"The security is very good."
"Cisco is head-and-shoulders above all of the competition when it comes to technical support."
"There is a positive impact on security, particularly the intrusion feature, which helps keep the solution concealed and secure."
"The technical is excellent."
"Easy to deploy and easy to use."
"It is effective. We have not had any problems."
"We generally use it because it's cheap. When we need something more robust we use Barracuda and Sony Wireless Routers. For certain clients, we use pfSense because it's compatible with the VoIP platform."
"I'm the expert when it comes to Linux systems, however, with the pfSense, due to the web interface, the rest of the staff can actually make changes to it as required without me worrying about whether they've opened up ports incorrectly or not. The ease of use for non-expert staff is very good."
"This solution has increased the level of security, given us more control, provided a deep insight into network traffic, and is a great VPN solution."
"The initial setup was simple and fast."
"The most valuable feature, for instance, is the ease of migrating configurations between different Netgate devices housed in the same box."
"It works. I put pfSense in, and it works. I can't think of any trouble I ever had with it. It runs on heat-sensitive appliances. They don't need a fan, so they don't overheat. It is affordable, fast, and very high-speed. It is built on BSD Unix, and it pretty much runs on any Intel processor."
"I would like to see a more intuitive dashboard."
"The support costs and licensing are sometimes so expensive."
"I think there could be more QoS features"
"We would like to have the ability to disable some of the security functionalities."
"The room for improvement is about the global delivery time period. Usually I need to wait for almost one month to deliver it overseas. So if you can shorten the deliver time it'd be great."
"There are some tiny bugs that sometimes affect the operations. In the past revision of it, there was a bug. Because of the bug, we had to downgrade the version. It happened only with the last revision."
"NGN, reporting and controls."
"There are some cloud-based features that could be much more flexible than they currently are."
"The pricing is the only con for this product."
"Cisco IOS Security should improve its functionalities."
"Cisco is a scalable product, but it is expensive compared to other vendors."
"It takes too much time to deploy a policy to FMC. It takes around eight minutes. You can't afford any downtime when you're changing policies."
"Signatures and other critical definitions need to be updated more frequently."
"The configuration should be easier in the solution."
"In the security portfolio from Cisco, the issue is marketing. Cisco is still seen primarily as an enterprise network player rather than being acknowledged as a security vendor."
"In the next release of this solution, we would like to see support for the 100BT and 7000 models."
"This solution is good for small businesses but it is not as stable as other competitors such as Fortinet."
"I've never tried it in large environments. All my clients are small businesses with a handful of employees, so I am not sure how it works in large environments. I keep up with recent versions, and there's nothing I'm waiting for, and nothing breaks when I get a new version."
"There's a bit of a learning curve during the initial implementation."
"Also, the GUI is helpful, but it's not user-friendly. It's complicated. It should be more intuitive for the average user and have an excellent graphical view. Of course, the user will typically know about network administration, but it still should be easy to understand."
"I have been using WireGuard VPN because it is a lot faster and more secure than an open VPN. However, in the latest version of pfSense, they have removed this feature, which is one of the main features that I need. They should include this feature."
"Improve analysis of logs and dashboards (control panel) with improved alert functionality."
"The product could offer more integrated plugins."
"The router monitoring needs improvement when compared with Sonicwall."
Cisco IOS Security is ranked 22nd in Firewalls with 47 reviews while Netgate pfSense is ranked 1st in Firewalls with 128 reviews. Cisco IOS Security is rated 8.0, while Netgate pfSense is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Cisco IOS Security writes "User-friendly and excels in documentation, making it easier to resolve issues". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Netgate pfSense writes "User-friendly, easy to manage the firewall, rule-wise and interface-wise". Cisco IOS Security is most compared with Cisco Secure Firewall, Meraki MX, Fortinet FortiOS, OPNsense and Palo Alto Networks URL Filtering with PAN-DB, whereas Netgate pfSense is most compared with OPNsense, Sophos XG, KerioControl, Sophos UTM and Cisco Secure Firewall. See our Cisco IOS Security vs. Netgate pfSense report.
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