We performed a comparison between Cisco Secure Firewall and Perimeter 81 based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Features: Cisco Secure Firewall offers strong threat defense capabilities, allows for application visibility, seamlessly integrates with other Cisco products, and provides high throughput. Perimeter 81 excels in offering a convenient single sign-on feature, easy configuration options, the ability to manage multiple networks, and efficient customer service.
Cisco Secure Firewall could enhance its network performance, policy administration, customization options, advanced features, management interface, deployment time, integration with other tools, and logging functionality. Perimeter 81 has room for improvement in defining different locations, login instances, user interface customization, tutorials, session timeouts, login/logout process, dashboards, QoS, traffic shaping, network traffic balancing, redundancy, security capabilities, and speed of upload and download.
Service and Support: Cisco Secure Firewall's customer service has received both positive and negative feedback. Some customers have commended the technical support provided, but others have encountered delays and challenges. Perimeter 81's customer service has garnered mostly favorable reviews, as customers have found their support to be prompt and beneficial.
Ease of Deployment: Users had varying experiences with the initial setup of Cisco Secure Firewall, with opinions being divided on its ease of use. Perimeter 81 was widely regarded as user-friendly and straightforward during the initial setup process, offering an intuitive interface and effortless connectivity.
Pricing: Reviewers have different opinions on the setup cost of Cisco Secure Firewall. Some consider it expensive because of additional expenses for licensing, support, and hardware. Users find Perimeter 81 to be reasonably priced and beneficial, offering various pricing options tailored to individual requirements.
ROI: The effectiveness of Cisco Secure Firewall in terms of return on investment depends on the specific use case and architecture of the organization. Some customers have reported positive outcomes while others have expressed dissatisfaction. Perimeter 81 has the capability to deliver a favorable ROI. Reviewers have mentioned the quick implementation process and the potential for cost savings.
Comparison Results: Perimeter 81 is the preferred option when compared to Cisco Secure Firewall. Users find the initial setup of Perimeter 81 to be easy and user-friendly, in contrast to mixed reviews regarding Cisco Secure Firewall's initial setup, with some users finding it difficult. Perimeter 81 stands out for its single sign-on feature, easy configuration, and user-friendly interface.
"Whenever we raise a complaint with FortiGate, their response and resolution times are minimal."
"We've found the solution to be pretty stable."
"Using this product makes the VPN seamless and almost invisible to me in the sense that I don't have to think about it."
"What I like the most is the configuration and that it's simple, and straightforward to maintain."
"It has improved our security capabilities."
"Fortinet FortiGate is scalable for our users. Right now, we have almost 70 users. We do not have any plan to increase our usage of FortiGate. For maintaining the firewall solution, one staff member is enough."
"This solution has solid UTM features combined with a nice GUI."
"Fortigate represents a really scalable way of delivering perimeter network security, some level of layer 7 security, WAF, and also a way to create a meshed ADVPN solution."
"The product is quite robust and durable."
"It is a highly stable product. We rarely receive any serious outdates, so it works quite well."
"The deep packet inspection is useful, but the most useful feature is application awareness. You can filter on the app rather than on a static TCP port."
"The interface is user-friendly."
"If we look at the Cisco ASA without Firepower, then one of the most valuable features is the URL filtering."
"Its security and filtering are most valuable. Every layer of data that comes into the organization goes through it. After setting up the criteria, it automatically filters the traffic. We don't have to check it often."
"With the pandemic, people began working from home. That was a pretty big move, having all our users working from a home. More capacity needed to be added to our remote VPN. ASA did this very well."
"It's easy to integrate ASA with other Cisco security products. When you understand the technology, it's not a big deal. It's very simple."
"The ease of use not only translates to quick adoption rates - it also ensures that our employees remain compliant with our cybersecurity protocols, enhancing the overall security posture of our organization."
"Perimeter 81 has increased my security and privacy while maintaining solid internet performance."
"Scaling Perimeter 81 was easy to do."
"Perimeter 81 provides a very secure and non-disruptive experience."
"Their split tunneling feature has been very valuable to our company since implementing the Perimeter 81 solution."
"Perimeter 81 is very pretty."
"It is a scalable solution."
"Our operators can work from home without any problems."
"My only complaint about FortiGate is a lack of QinQ VLAN tunneling. I haven't found this feature in any Fortinet product. You can do this on all Cisco routers, including the smaller models. However, QinQ isn't available on the biggest, most expensive Fortinet units. They still don't have that. I think now we're on software version 6.0, and they still haven't found a solution for QinQ. It isn't a dealbreaker, but that's my main complaint."
"It would be good if they had fewer updates."
"I don't like that anything more than very basic reporting is not included."
"The support from Fortinet FortiGate could improve. They are not easily accessible when we need them. They could improve their response time."
"Fortinet FortiGate could improve by adding enhancements to FortiMail, FortiSOAR, and FortiDeceptor."
"For the migration, everyone has a firewall in use and I am selling Fortinet. Typically, I am replacing another firewall. Previously, there was a tool available to convert configurations from one firewall, such as Palo Alto, to Fortinet, but this tool is no longer free. If it could be made free again, it would be very beneficial."
"Fortinet FortiGate could improve by having more storage in the hardware for log data."
"We'd like more management across other integrations."
"Cisco suffers from some integration issues with other products... There is a problem with the Cisco Catalyst Switches in terms of assembling bursts and having them interact properly with the Cisco Firepower."
"The stability and the product features have to really be worked on."
"We were also not too thrilled when Cisco announced that in the upcoming new-gen ASA, iOS was not going to be supported, or if you install them, they will not be able to be managed through the Sourcefire. However, it seems like Cisco is moving away from the ASA iOS to the Sourcefire FireSIGHT firmware for the ASA. We haven't had a chance to test it out."
"We're getting support but there's a big delay until we get a response from their technical team. They're in the USA and we're in Africa, so that's the difficulty. When they're in the office, they respond."
"In a future release, it would be ideal if they could offer an open interface to other security products so that we could easily connect to our own open industry standard."
"Cisco is not cheap, however, it is worth investing in these technologies."
"Licensing is complex, and I'd like it to be simplified. This is an area for improvement."
"It is not the newest, cutting-edge technology"
"A Google Chrome extension would be handy instead of logging into the app."
"The platform still lacks relevant dashboards and the ability to customize them based on our needs."
"I don't know if it is technically feasible, however, if the Desktop App could be used as a Web App or a Chrome Extension it would be very nice."
"I have found that the log-in/out process takes quite some time."
"The solution's speed of upload and download is an area where it lacks"
"Currently, I am not able to define a different country or location, which can result in negative experiences as the tool is being recognized by websites and this can make it difficult to access them or force me to disable the program temporarily."
"One of the more negative experiences using Perimeter 81 is the fact that I am logged off after a pre-determined amount of time which cuts off access to some of my company's resources."
"In order to have to bypass the login using the website, a good feature for Perimeter 81 to have is a login instance in the Perimeter 81 application. I'm using a Mac and we don't have that functionality."
Cisco Secure Firewall is ranked 4th in Firewalls with 404 reviews while Perimeter 81 is ranked 11th in Firewalls with 22 reviews. Cisco Secure Firewall is rated 8.2, while Perimeter 81 is rated 9.2. The top reviewer of Cisco Secure Firewall writes "Highlights and helps us catch Zero-day vulnerabilities traveling across our network". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Perimeter 81 writes "Great SAML and SCIM support with the ability to deploy site-2-site tunnels with specific IP restrictions". Cisco Secure Firewall is most compared with Palo Alto Networks WildFire, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX, Sophos XG and Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls, whereas Perimeter 81 is most compared with Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange, Cato SASE Cloud Platform, Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks, Cloudflare Access and Tailscale. See our Cisco Secure Firewall vs. Perimeter 81 report.
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