PACKETPERF

Primary Device

Cisco Secure Firewall 4245
Cisco Secure Firewall 4245
★ 3.3 Value Score

Technical Specifications

  • Firewall Throughput: 140 Gbps (FW+AVC, 1024B, per Cisco 4200 datasheet); 180 Gbps (ASA stateful inspection, 1500B UDP)
  • Threat Prevention Throughput: 140 Gbps (FW+AVC+IPS, 1024B, 50% TLS 1.2 traffic)
  • IPsec VPN Throughput: 140 Gbps (per Cisco 4200 series listing)
  • Max Sessions: 60 million concurrent (with AVC, per Cisco datasheet)
  • New Sessions/sec: 800,000 (unverified; one listing cites 1.7M)
  • Interfaces: 8 x 10GbE SFP+ on-chassis; 2 NetMod bays supporting up to 8 x 25GbE SFP28 (netmod-dependent)
  • Form Factor: 1U rackmount

Curation Review

  • ✔ Pros: Very high throughput for a 1U appliance (140 Gbps threat prevention and IPsec VPN, per Cisco datasheet); 60 million concurrent sessions with AVC for large data center and campus edge deployments; Modular NetMod bays allow 25GbE SFP28 connectivity; Supports Cisco Firepower Threat Defense (FTD) or ASA software images; Multi-instance support for consolidating workloads; Strong integration with Cisco Firepower Management Center and Cisco security ecosystem
  • ✘ Cons: Very high acquisition cost compared with mid-range NGFWs; Throughput and session figures vary across Cisco and reseller sources, so validation against the current datasheet is needed; Max VPN peer count and new connections per second are not confirmed by an authoritative Cisco source; Full 25GbE capacity requires purchasing separate NetMod modules; Licensing (threat, malware, URL) is a significant recurring cost on top of hardware
  • Est. Price: $222,425 - $326,223

Compare Against

Ubiquiti UniFi Cloud Gateway Max (UCG-Max)
Ubiquiti UniFi Cloud Gateway Max (UCG-Max)
★ 4.9 Value Score

Technical Specifications

  • Firewall Throughput: Not published by Ubiquiti in the sources reviewed
  • Threat Prevention Throughput: 2.3 Gbps IDS/IPS per Ubiquiti spec page (older listings show 1.5 Gbps)
  • IPsec VPN Throughput: Not published by Ubiquiti; third-party reviews report about 800-1,000 Mbps for WireGuard and 300-400 Mbps for OpenVPN
  • Max Sessions: Not published in the sources reviewed
  • New Sessions/sec: Not published in the sources reviewed
  • Interfaces: 1x 2.5GbE RJ45 WAN, 4x GbE RJ45 LAN (one LAN port can be reconfigured as a second WAN for multi-WAN)
  • Form Factor: Compact desktop; UCG-Max-NS variant includes 512GB NVMe storage

Curation Review

  • ✔ Pros: Low entry price at $199 MSRP; Compact desktop form factor; Five-port layout with multi-WAN support via a reconfigurable LAN port; Runs UniFi OS with integrated IDS/IPS, site-to-site and remote VPN options (IPsec, WireGuard, OpenVPN, L2TP); Manages 30+ UniFi devices and 300+ clients per Ubiquiti listing
  • ✘ Cons: Routing and IPS throughput (2.3 Gbps) is modest for multi-gigabit WANs with inspection enabled; Published throughput figures conflict across sources (1.5 vs 2.3 Gbps IPS, varying VPN numbers); Only one 2.5GbE port, with the remaining ports at 1GbE; Vendor does not publish IPsec tunnel, session, or new-connection limits; Some resellers list prices well above MSRP (one US listing at $394.79)
  • Est. Price: $199 - $279

Popular Comparisons

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