Edge Gateway: Fast Secure Remote Access
Scaling and maintaining high performance for an ever-increasing number of remote and mobile users is a growing challenge for IT organizations. Traditional remote access services don’t easily support the data center consolidation and virtualization essential to providing quality of service and controlling costs.
BIG-IP Edge Gateway is an advanced remote access solution that drives identity into the network to provide context-aware, policy controlled, secure remote access to applications at LAN speed. The standalone device integrates SSL VPN remote access security with application acceleration and optimization services at the edge of the network. As an available option, an endpoint security service can validate devices via policy to protect users from virus or malware infections, accidental data loss and rogue device access.
With asymmetric and symmetric acceleration, remote users can access applications up to 10x faster than without acceleration. The gateway unifies SSL VPN access, dynamic access control and app acceleration all while being completely device agnostic.
With up to 8 Gbps of throughput, BIG-IP Edge Gateway supports as many as 40,000 concurrent users. The ability to handle this volume offers considerable cost savings over the necessary alternative of purchasing multiple traditional SSL VPN devices to meet this volume. With the consolidation of platforms and services, CapEx and OpEx costs can be reduced as much as seventy-five percent.
Most F5 competitors' access clients interrupt worker productivity by requiring constant reconnection as users move locations or restart applications. BIG-IP Edge Gateway’s integrated client (standalone or web-delivered) permits location awareness and zone determination. IG-IP's advanced roaming, domain detection and automatic connection called SmartConnect provide users on the move seamless access when transitioning between locations. Translation: F5 is trying to make VPN headaches a thing of the past.
The Gateway also gives IT staff a way to offer access based on context. User’s policy + user location = correct redirection to local resources. There’s single sign-on for almost all directory services across all application types, devices and operating systems. Reduced complexity and increased efficiency.
The Gateway also has application prioritization. Best example? VoIP traffic gets the prime spot and the most bandwidth, so calls are clear.
FirePass: Secure Authentication via Web
Available in both physical and virtual appliances, FirePass SSL VPN provides secure access to corporate applications and data using a standard web browser.
FirePass grants users different sets of privileges based on who they are, what client they’re on and where they are coming from. When combined with an authentication server like Active Directory or LDAP, the group memberships for the user can determine which resources they can access with fine-grained control.
FirePass also provides access through firewalls. While IPsec connections may be blocked by firewalls or proxy servers, port 443/TCP is almost always allowed. Clients can be checked for an active virus scanner, registry entries, personal firewall and other security requirements before being allowed access to the network.
In addition to providing full network access like IPsec, the FirePass can provide access to only one server and port, and portal access to web sites and file shares, thus eliminating the need for any network access.
Multiple FirePass 4100, 4300 and Virtual Edition units can be clustered to support large-scale deployments. In fact, for large-scale clustering, FirePass can be used with the F5 BIG-IP family of products to offload SSL termination. This enables FirePass to scale to tens of thousands of concurrent sessions in a cluster and maximize the SSL VPN cluster performance.
FirePass controllers can also be configured for failover between pairs of servers--with an active server and a standby server. This keeps users from having to re-logon to another FirePass in case the primary unit fails.
WebAccelerator: Intelligent Content and Browser Caching
BIG-IP WebAccelerator provides intelligent technologies that overcome WAN latency performance issues for remote and mobile users. By decreasing page download times, WebAccelerator offloads servers, decreases bandwidth usage and ensures a quality user experience.
By locating content closer to users, BIG-IP WebAccelerator speeds up clients’ first and repeat visits to portal, CRM, eLearning and e-commerce sites. WebAccelerator is ideal for extremely scalable Dynamic Content Caching, lowering costs through server and data center consolidation.
WebAccelerator Intelligent Browser Referencing (IBR) features can often deliver a tenfold increase in interactive user performance when using portal, CRM or collaboration applications (SharePoint, Oracle Portal, OWA, Siebel, Hyperion, PeopleSoft, Plumtree, SAP and custom and homegrown Web applications).
Deployed in a symmetric configuration, BIG-IP WebAccelerator can increase Web application performance forty times over non-accelerated applications. WebAccelerator is the only product on the market that can be deployed in both asymmetric and symmetric configurations simultaneously, giving organizations the freedom to choose the most appropriate configuration for their environments.
WebAccelerator was the first to provide robust acceleration for Web content via SSL. It comes with hardware offload, FIPS and client certificate support and other advanced SSL features on a security-hardened and certified system. This advanced capability and scalability accelerates secure Web applications 2x to 10x (first time and repeat visits) without worries about potential internal DOS attacks on the WAN optimization solution.
Enterprise Content Delivery Networks (eCDN)
BIG-IP WebAccelerator can be deployed symmetrically in conjunction with other F5 solutions to create an eCDN that gives enterprise Web sites high availability, DOS protection, and the fastest user experience. This solution also helps ensure regulatory compliance for confidential company information.
Many enterprises use commercial CDNs with erratic results and unpredictable costs. BIG-IP WebAccelerator allows organizations to control these costs by reducing redundant and repeat downloads of content -- even dynamic content. WebAccelerator allows enterprises to augment their own content delivery architecture, while still being able to fall back on a CDN overlay network when needed.
BIG-IP WebAccelerator is available both as a standalone version and as a product module for BIG-IP.
ARX Series: Smarter Backup through Virtualization
ARX is a series of file virtualization appliances that work as proxies for CIFS and NFS. They enable administrators to control where files physically reside based on policies for age, file type, etc. while presenting users with a single target.
F5 ARX file virtualization devices enable you to dramatically simplify data management and reduce storage costs. ARX introduces intelligent file virtualization into the file storage infrastructure and automates many storage management tasks. The result is a dramatic improvement in cost, agility and business efficiency.
Many companies back up all of their files repeatedly, even though only a small fraction of them are modified on a regular basis. ARX automated tiering policies decrease the amount of unchanging or non-critical data backups.
Through virtualization, ARX solutions eliminate "islands of storage" to improve capacity utilization on existing systems. ARX consolidates resources into a unified storage pool, reclaiming stranded or unused capacity.
ARX offers administrators the flexibility to manage storage infrastructure in ways that best meet business needs. It permits moving data easily whenever and wherever wanted, including between heterogeneous storage devices, without impacting users. Powerful policies perform a range of data management tasks--whether moving entire file systems or even individual files--automatically and non-disruptively.
ARX solutions eliminate the complexity of file storage environments by consolidating hundreds or thousands of client-to-server mappings to a more manageable number. Replacing physical mappings with virtual ones, they enable storage management tasks like tiering, capacity balancing and replication and migration without client reconfiguration or impact on client access.
F5’s Data Manager application offers file system discovery, data profiling and powerful reporting to provide a detailed look inside the file data environment. Administrators can apply better management policies to create a more efficient, cost-effective storage environment.
Enterprise Manager: Total F5 Infrastructure Management
Enterprise Manager is a centralized management appliance for F5 BIG-IP® devices. It gives you a consolidated, real-time view of your entire F5 application delivery infrastructure and provides the tools IT organizations need to quickly optimize performance and scale infrastructure to meet business needs.
Enterprise Manager decreases deployment and management times and cuts operational errors for a significant reduction in operating expenses and total cost of ownership. Operators select, stage, and automate common operational tasks, including:
- Configuration and certificate management
- Software updates
- Policy control
- Continuous performance optimization
Along with advanced monitoring capabilities, Enterprise Manager gives administrators the ability to set threshold and alerts to react quickly to changing network conditions and protect the user experience.
More than 160 customizable metrics capture current and historical data from F5 BIG-IP devices. With total visibility into application delivery infrastructure over time, technicians can analyze the data to:
- Troubleshoot and minimize the business impact of performance issues
- Budget and forecast more effectively
- Improve capacity planning
Ask Questions or Request an F5 Demo
Links to More Information
> BIG-IP Application Performance Management
> About BIG-IP
BIG-IP Modules
External Links
F5 and Gartner Magic Quadrant (Gartner Website)
