F5 BIG-IP DNS Reviews

One of our primary use cases for F5 BIG-IP DNS is local traffic management. We also use the LTM module, application services, load balancer, and advanced firewall. F5 BIG-IP DNS is a secure web gateway. 

It would be great to see a F5 BIG-IP DNS cloud version. What we within the Australian government are looking at doing is utilizing a secured DNS service much the same as the English GCHQ version of their protected DNS service. That's a fully-managed external platform and it's used by multiple government agencies, so we get a better holistic view of all malicious DNS traffic that is occurring. 

We have been using F5 BIG-IP DNS for about six years, although we are looking at migrating off to a central government-provided DNS upstream service. We are doing this because we have adopted a cloud-only policy. 

F5 BIG-IP DNS has been rock solid in terms of stability for years. 

We have not had to scale it much as our internal infrastructure was small. We have 1,000 individuals using F5 BIG-IP DNS. 

The tech support is always great. 

Positive

It took us about six months to get it all bolted down and working as we expected it to. It was relatively simple for us to launch. 

We received a bit of external support from F5 – from one of the channel partners here in Western Australia, but it was relatively simple to turn on in-house. 

Moreover, once we set it up, the ongoing maintenance turned out to be relatively small.

One a scale of one to five, with one being expensive and five being adequately priced, I would give this solution a four. However, the solution we are migrating to is free. 

We did not evaluate other options because when we picked up the BIG-IP package, we wanted to implement a number of things, and DNS is a bonus blade that we picked up. Therefore, we didn't do a full evaluation because what we were buying for was more like ASM module and the load balancing features out of that BIG-IP box. We just picked up DNS as a subsequent bonus.

On a scale of one to ten, with one being the worst and ten being the best, I would give F5 BIG-IP DNS an eight as a solution overall. 

My use case includes load balance swaps and mostly exposing web applications to the Internet.

We have different use cases for different clients. For example, for one of our clients, F5 improved global server load balancing with an active-active site configuration for Disaster Recovery.

Most benefits are for disaster recovery and having a spare data center for business continuity. 

From the perspective of global server load balancing, this feature has helped business continuity.

DNSSEC feature contributes to enhancing network security posture. 

The global load balancer is mainly for availability, allowing for more data center options, but for strict security reasons, not so much beyond DNS security.

We faced challenges while integrating DNS into the existing network infrastructure. Integrating with actual customers' DNS solutions and migrating them from local servers to F5.

The IP intelligent services are good for mitigating threats, but there are also false positives.  So, it's not a standalone solution that can cover everything.

F5 can consider enhancing the security profiles.

Another area of improvement is documentation. 

I have been using it for four years now. 

The hardware version and the cloud edition have been stable.

It is a scalable solution , especially in the cloud. The licensing is manageable and satisfactory.

The quality of customer service and support varies. Cloud-related issues have been challenging, but they handle common issues for virtual and physical editions competently.

Positive

The initial setup is complex, and the documentation could be improved. It is not very well documented. 

It is not very easy to learn. 

Just one person can handle it. The deployment process involves analyzing the current architecture and determining how F5 can benefit the existing setup. Documentation and analysis are key steps.

The hardware version takes longer due to the need for on-site work. The virtual edition is easier to install but lacks the throughput of the physical version. Typically, it takes about five days.

It is not difficult to maintain, especially if you have an active-passive cluster.

You cannot do much around DDoS protection without an additional license from F5 for full DDoS protection. 

Since it is WAF, you can implement some solutions, but for a comprehensive DDoS solution, other licenses are more effective with their cloud-based or web-based services.

I would definitely recommend using this solution. 

Overall, I would rate the solution a nine out of ten. 

The solution is used for balancing the load. For example, if someone calls the X-ray department, we use the solution to transfer the calls to different servers. This way, we are not putting a load on one specific server all the time. F5 BIG-IP DNS balances the load. For example, there are a hundred calls and I have ten servers, so every server will receive 10 calls instead of one server receiving all the calls.

The solution has improved our organization by providing a means to transfer data from one source to another securely.

The most valuable feature of the solution is security. I have not encountered any hacking attempts since we have been using the solution.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is quite old and may go extinct in a few days, months, or years, depending on whether it offers additional features. I first heard about the solution over ten years ago. People are moving away from it slowly to cloud-based load-balancing solutions. I don't have any strong evidence to back up my opinion, but that's what I believe based on what I've seen. Cloud-based tools are already available in the market, so no one will consider an on-prem tool unless it's affordable for small organizations. The solution can improve by adding cloud integration through plugins or additional configurations so we can use F5 BIG-IP DNS to communicate with the cloud.

I have been using the solution for seven months.

The solution has been in the market for over 12 years, used by many organizations because it is very stable.

I give the stability an eight out of ten.

I am currently facing around three or four hundred servers, all of which are using F5 BIG-IP DNS load balancers. The solution easily handles the load. I believe the solution is quite scalable.

I give the solution a seven out of ten.

The solution is currently on-prem. The engineering team is always upgrading something. Perhaps in six months, this solution will be pushed to the cloud. The cloud has its own load balancer tools. We may decommission the solution down the line.

We have between 70 and 80 middleware users on our team that use the solution. We are the link between the development and the production teams. We are the service providers, sitting at the center of the funnel of time. Time flows through us, and we act as a bridge between the developers making requests and the rest of the world. Without this center frame, the requests would not be visible.

Our organization started using the solution a long time ago, around 2014 or 2015. At that point, the cloud was not as popular as it is now, and F5 BIG-IP DNS was at its peak. The organization may soon migrate to a cloud environment.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is a very user-friendly solution, and because it's an old tool, it's easier to understand in the first call compared to an API gateway. The solution is quite easy to configure any new items which are available. New users should keep the configuration neat and shouldn't mix different types. The details are fine enough, the solution won't give us bad feedback and will result in a positive output.

We use the solution for the JPMC Logistics site. In our data center, we have deployed a couple of GTM devices to manage multiple sites across the globe. 

I sometimes encounter issues with the porting of F5 BIG-IP DNS. The porting functionality is not up to the mark when troubleshooting or attempting to access logs or connections. Additional attention is needed to ensure smooth operation. 

I have been using F5 BIG-IP DNS for 2 years.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is stable.

The solution offers good scalability.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is excellent. Whenever we encounter any issues and reach out to their support, they are always ready to assist. They promptly address any severity level of the problem and often call us to troubleshoot and resolve issues effectively. I would rate their support a solid 9.5 out of 10. It's truly awesome.

Positive

We opted for Citrix NetScaler, too. F5 BIG-IP DNS has better load-balancing features than Citrix NetScaler. It stands as the top leader in the market, renowned for its unmatched performance, scalability, and advanced features. Its dominance is evidenced by its widespread adoption and proven track record in delivering seamless and reliable application solutions. 

The initial setup is quite simple. First, we need to understand the customer requirements. If it is simple, and we have an expert network team. We need to deploy the F5 BIG-IP DNS in one data center. If the architect understands the traffic flow, the traffic will hit the DNS directly. After DNS resolution, the traffic will be routed accordingly. If they know the complete flow, then it's a straightforward process.

I rate the solution's pricing a five out of ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive.

The configuration process is straightforward, making it easy to set up wide IPs and distribute traffic across local US sites and data centers via VPN. Overall, my experience with F5 BIG-IP DNS has been positive.

Overall, I rate the F5 BIG-IP DNS a nine out of ten.

We use F5 BIG-IP DNS to handle traffic from multiple servers. 

The solution is easy to configure and deploy. It is scalable and works without any downtime. F5 BIG-IP DNS is a flexible solution. 

The tool needs to improve its UI. 

I have been working with the solution for two years.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is scalable, and we have around 5000 users. We plan to increase the number of users. 

F5 BIG-IP DNS' installation is straightforward and can be completed in 10 minutes. You need to deploy the virtual servers with the right interfaces. 

I rate the tool's stability a nine out of ten. 

We are using the latest version of FS BIG-IP. We use the solution for classic reverse proxy authentication. We have approximately 800 internal staff and 2,000 external customers using the solution.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is useful, depending on how you use it. Once you write to it, you can do anything you want from it, making it a very powerful solution.

The solution is complicated to use. It is difficult to write to. F5 BIG-IP DNS is powerful but challenging to use.

I would like to see the login facilities improved, as well as more troubleshooting.

I have been working with F5 BIG-IP DNS for two and a half years.

The solution is stable.

I have not scaled F5 BIG-IP, it is only a single-box solution.

Prior to using F5 BIG-IP, we used PMG. We switched because PMG was at end of life.

The initial set up of F5 BIG-IP DNS is complex. It took approximately six months to deploy.

We implemented the solution through consultants. We are still using the consultants, so we will need to add someone to our team to handle future deployment and maintenance.

Anyone deciding to implement F5 BIG-IP DNS should be aware that it is a complex and powerful product.

I would rate this solution an 8 out of 10.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is used for global load balancing.

F5 provides us with a mechanism to accomplish complex product balancing.

Hand management and working with rules are two areas that need to be improved.

It would be beneficial to have information and categorize it for licensing, features, and what is included in which license. I would like to see more marketing documentation, rather than technical documentation.

I have been working with F5 BIG-IP DNS for five years.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is more stable than Loadbalancer and Citrix.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is easy to scale. I don't have any issues with the scalability of F5 BIG-IP DNS.

If I am not mistaken, I don't have any support cases.

I have experience with Citrix, Kemp, Barracuda, Cisco, Loadbalancer.org, and NGINX.

I  use LTM, and my colleagues have set up an access manager, DNS, and other security features. LTM is used for local load balancing.

In most cases, I work with ADC and my colleagues work with the security, we divide the work.

The initial setup varies depending on the scenario. Generally, it requires some knowledge.

In some cases, it is expensive. F5 BIG-IP DNS doesn't provide the best prices for new or small customers.

We recommend it for customers who have complex product balancing requirements. For example, if a customer needs to parse network packets and needs to change them. 

We are partners with both F5 BIG-IP and Loadbalancer.org.

I would rate F5 BIG-IP DNS an eight out of ten.

If the client wants to clarify that they are using the trusted packet and trusted browsing, they can use the DNS load balancing. F5 can provide some DNS service solutions. The client forwards the traffic, and the DNS is verified whether it can be trusted. If it's suspicious or malicious, it will be declined. If the traffic is observed to be trusted, valid, or legitimate, then it can pass.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is a stable solution.

The solution's initial setup is complex compared to Fortinet.

I have been using F5 BIG-IP DNS for ten years.

F5 BIG-IP DNS is a scalable solution.

The solution's technical support is complex.

I did a POC for Cisco Umbrella on the client side.

You need to connect to the console port, put the management IP, and connect the management IP for the dashboard in the management port. Then, you must go to the laptop and browse the management IP, username, password, and GUI. There is a CLI option also, but most of the configuration is done on the graphical unit. The CLI dependency is very low. For the first configuration, I need to go to the CLI, put the management IP, and connect to the graphical unit.

Overall, I rate F5 BIG-IP DNS an eight out of ten.