We performed a comparison between Cisco IOS Security and Sophos XGS 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."The application control features, such as Facebook blocking and Spotify blocking, are the most valuable."
"One of the nice things about FortiGate is that it can be deployed on the cloud or on-premises. You can actually do both. That's the biggest reason why I stick with this solution as opposed to something like Cisco Meraki. Another nice thing is that I can log directly into a FortiGate or get to it through their FortiCloud access products. They're pretty reliable and consistent. One of the reasons why I started using the product was their single pane of management. I can deploy their line of firewalls in conjunction with their switching and access points, and I can manage the entire network from one interface. I don't have to log into one interface for the firewall, another one for the access points, and another one for the switches. These firewalls have access point controller functionality built right into the system, so I don't even have to purchase additional devices to manage them."
"Fortinet FortiGate protects against internet-based threats, both internal and external. It is scalable, stable, easy to use, and easy to install."
"The most valuable feature of Fortinet FortiGate is load balancing. It can provide central management and VPNA. Additionally, it has enhanced our security environment."
"There is an easy process for configuring it, and it is straightforward to implement the device from scratch."
"Fortinet FortiGate's ease of management is the most valuable feature."
"The solution is very, very easy to use."
"The most important feature, normally for small business customers, is link load balancing."
"Previously, anyone in the organization would see any data point in the wall. They could just go and connect their machine with that data point and could access the network. But now, even if someone came and tried that, they will not be given access."
"The VPN was valuable for us because more people are working from home. It has a lot of reporting and easy-to-use management tools."
"One of the valuable features of the solution is its flexibility and it performs great."
"You can scale it when you need to."
"What I have used the most and received the most benefit from is the IPsec technology."
"The product has valuable features for business intelligence."
"The solution is stable."
"One of the main features is that the hardware is extremely reliable."
"The solution is stable and reliable."
"The most valuable feature of Sophos XGS is the application control."
"It is scalable."
"The most valuable features in Sophos XGS are bandwidth management, content filtering, and WAN link management failover. If one internet activity or one link would fail, automatically it will switch over to another one."
"XGS' most valuable feature is ransomware protection."
"The solution offers more antimalware and antivirus feeds than others."
"One of the main advantages of Sophos XGS is the processor. You don't have to wait a long time for when you are managing the firewall and the traffic is faster now."
"The solution is very user-friendly, and the GUI is so good that I don't have to use the CLI. This eliminates the need for typing; clicking allows me to get to what I'm looking for."
"The scalability could be better."
"The sniffing packets or packet captures, can be simplified and improved because it's a little confusing."
"The renewal price and the availability could be improved."
"It should be more stable. There should be full integration within Fortinet products themselves as well as with other third-party products. Especially when you're not dealing with SIEM and the correlation of the security box, we want Fortinet to be able to share that information with as many other products as it can."
"The setup is pretty complex and not easy to implement."
"Scalability for Fortinet FortiGate needs to be improved. SD-WAN security for this solution also needs some improvement."
"I would like some automated custom reporting."
"In the balance between links feature normally you can just choose one option to balance. It would be better for the solution to have more than one option, preferably three."
"I think setup could be one area for improvement, because sometimes we don't have people inside so we have to move to the place."
"We have a very bad experience on the support. They take too much time requesting logs, and they are not coming directly online to resolve the issues."
"Most of their features are meant for Cisco. You cannot integrate them with any other vendor."
"With respect to user-friendliness, it is a command-line interface and those with such experience will get along just fine, whereas others may struggle."
"The product's technical support services need improvement."
"Sometimes I find it difficult to manage. Some configurations are difficult for new engineers, for example."
"The graphical user interface or the GUI could be better. Beginners can use some devices with the GUI, but some security devices are configured using CLI. It would also be better if it had its own Intrusion Protection Service and Intrusion Detection Service on the server."
"Cisco IOS Security could improve by having more compatibility with other Cisco solutions."
"There are a lot of false-positive cases."
"When it comes to different interfaces there is some speed issue that can be improved in Sophos XGS."
"We'd always like the solution to be a bit less in terms of cost."
"The speed of report generation could be improved."
"It has recently started to suddenly block and crash."
"I recommend Sophos increase the user capacity of the firewall by 1.5 times. For example, say the firewall can accommodate 1,000 users now, then it should handle a load of 1,500 users."
"There are issues with some designs being able to work on high availability."
"The configurations can be a bit complex."
Cisco IOS Security is ranked 22nd in Firewalls with 47 reviews while Sophos XGS is ranked 17th in Firewalls with 58 reviews. Cisco IOS Security is rated 8.0, while Sophos XGS is rated 8.0. 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 Sophos XGS writes "Easy to use, simple to learn, and offers great reporting". Cisco IOS Security is most compared with Cisco Secure Firewall, Meraki MX, Fortinet FortiOS, Netgate pfSense and OPNsense, whereas Sophos XGS is most compared with Sophos XG, OPNsense, Netgate pfSense, WatchGuard Firebox and Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls. See our Cisco IOS Security vs. Sophos XGS report.
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