Cisco PIX vs Cisco ASA 1

[pkirill]

Can anyone offer any comparative info between the PIX series and the ASA series? What are the major differences between the product lines? We are a smallish company of 40 with one small branch office and are looking to upgrade our firewall solution. Preferably something with "clientless" VPN for our branch office and 10 mobile users. I'm not a security guru so I am deferring to those who are.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

 

[g0atbailey]

We just upgraded from a PIX506 to the ASA5510 with the AIP-SSM module. I like the new product. If you do decide to purchase one, get the AIP-SSM with it. It will do inline IPS which will block many types of attacks, viruses, and worms. The great this about the ASA is that it is a PIX, VPN concentrator, and IPS solution all in one appliance. It ships with the 7.x OS, so if you are used to the PIX OS 6.3 it will take some getting used to. Also, setting up the IPS is a little tricky at first. I had to open several TAC tickets with Cisco to get it running smoothly.

 

[pkirill]

Great info - much thanks. We will be moving from a Symantec 360R which is one step up from something we could buy at CompUSA - only more expensive. This will be my first Cisco product, so I'll be learning from scratch. The AIP-SSM suggestion is also helpful. We are running Symantec Enterprise on the servers and clients, but like they say the best way to take a punch is to avoid getting hit all together.

Thanks again!