We performed a comparison between Palo Alto Networks PA-Series and SonicWall NSa 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's great for capturing the traffic and troubleshooting it."
"The features that we have found most valuable are the SSL VPN and the User Portal."
"The most useful functionality of Fortinet FortiGate is the user interface, multiple engines, and their cloud with the latest integrations. Additionally, the Security Fabric tool is very good."
"Whenever I need something, Fortinet improves and updates the software for me."
"The web tutor and automatic rules by schedule are good features."
"The ease of setting the solution up is a valuable aspect for us."
"We purchased Fortinet because of the pricing, its functionality, because it met our requirements, and the total cost of ownership over five years was quite reasonable. In the market, Fortinet is rated quite well."
"You can purchase switches and you don't need to do anything with them. You just put in the firewall and the switches get all the policies and rules that you already have in the firewall. With Fortinet, you just connect the FortiSwitch to the Fortinet and that's it."
"It has its own logging system. You can go to monitoring and check the logs to see if a connection is getting blocked. You can use multiple types of logs to check if a file or a port is getting blocked or if there are any TCP resets from the source or destination. It's easy to troubleshoot with the monitoring and logging it provides."
"It is a stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"The solution has a three-layer architecture, and it helps customers to deploy the solution quickly."
"It offers a seamless transition from one option to another, making it exceptionally versatile and user-friendly in an enterprise setting."
"The documentation is great."
"Comprehensive logging is essential for monitoring and analysis purposes. For remote users, the firewall can be configured as a VPN concentrator, with VPN policies defined within the firewall settings."
"The solution is easy to manage."
"The direct profiles is a valuable feature."
"The antivirus and items of that nature were quite helpful to have."
"The solution has many useful features, such as content management, user management, user filtering, and domain controller connectivity mapping."
"The solution can scale."
"The product is simple to manage."
"Anti-Spam reduces unwanted mail on corporate exchange services."
"The most valuable features of this solution are intrusion detection, intrusion prevention, and the advanced capture client, which provides live traffic analysis."
"The most valuable aspect of the solution is its ability to work like any other firewall."
"This product has kept us safe and we haven't had any breaches."
"I could not configure sFlow from the FortiGate graphical user interface. I realized that the sFlow configuration is available only from the CLI, and discovered that sFlow is not supported on virtual interfaces, such as VDOM links, IPsec, or GRE."
"The product does need better support in the cloud environment. It's not exactly cloud-native right now."
"The solution could be more user friendly."
"I don't like that anything more than very basic reporting is not included."
"Price, of course, can always be more competitive or better."
"Scalability for Fortinet FortiGate needs to be improved. SD-WAN security for this solution also needs some improvement."
"Lacks training for new features."
"Usually, we sell the bundle with the UTM or threat management piece with IPS, IDS. Other providers, such as Palo Alto, are ahead in terms of safe functionality. So, for me, delivering truly safe service is probably something that still needs to be improved."
"There is room for improvement in streamlining this process for smoother transitions."
"The support provided by the solution is not that good."
"The web interface is slow."
"The pricing of the solution needs improvement."
"I have found that the tool works well for me, but there are areas where security testing and protection could be improved, especially in virtual or cloud environments. However, in this project, once we deployed it, we haven't encountered any issues. The cost is currently manageable, but as we migrate fully into the cloud, additional features like capacity upgrading and improvements to hardware resources will be necessary, especially since our equipment consists of older generation switches and routers. So, I'm looking for additional capabilities in these areas."
"The SD-WAN feature of Palo Alto Networks is not good compared to FortiGate."
"The solution's licensing price could be improved."
"The UI definitely needs work. In my opinion, the UI could be simpler and more user-friendly for the average user."
"This product is unable to secure access to endpoints for our external employees."
"The implementation for VLANs is a little bit cumbersome. It would be good to make that a little bit easier."
"They should consider upgrading the capabilities within the GUI."
"I'd like to see integration with Microsoft 365 for authentication."
"A room for improvement in SonicWall NSa is the log server because it could be more user-friendly compared to Fortinet and Palo Alto Networks. My company has many rule sets up for review, so sometimes, my team needs to use Excel for filtering, but the UI cannot support the Excel function."
"We have security as a service, and they make recommendations about adding to the denylist and other things. That part could be more accessible and more user-friendly. I'd like to see SonicWall add a user-friendly interface where our internal team can drag and drop everything."
"The cost could be lower. There could also be more flexibility for smaller companies."
"Potential improvement around the associated VPN cost"
Palo Alto Networks PA-Series is ranked 16th in Firewalls with 28 reviews while SonicWall NSa is ranked 19th in Firewalls with 80 reviews. Palo Alto Networks PA-Series is rated 8.6, while SonicWall NSa is rated 7.8. The top reviewer of Palo Alto Networks PA-Series writes "Offers trained customer support, stability and ease of use ". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SonicWall NSa writes "Great performance and security with reasonable pricing". Palo Alto Networks PA-Series is most compared with OPNsense, Juniper SRX Series Firewall, Sophos XG, Netgate pfSense and WatchGuard Firebox, whereas SonicWall NSa is most compared with SonicWall TZ, Meraki MX, Sophos XG, Cisco Secure Firewall and Netgate pfSense. See our Palo Alto Networks PA-Series vs. SonicWall NSa report.
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