Our organization needs help understanding the potential benefits to going to 5510 vs. 5505.
 

The 5510 has more features than the 5505,  If you think you might need these in the next 5 years I would get the larger box.

From the TS description page (hopefully translated for you)

VPN remote connections  It looks like the 5505 will support 2 remote connections (like a user connecting from their laptop from home or the cyber cafe)  The 5510 will support many more users but you have to buy licenses for more than 2 users.

The 5505 provides one fire wall, like to protect your inside network from the Internet.  The 5510 will provide up to 5 virtual fire walls so you can segment individual networks inside your building from each other all with the one box.   This could be used to provide a network for WiFi connection for the public that is isolated from your internal file servers and printers, you could add an additional network for a computer lab with different network restrictions, you could then also isolate your payroll server and payroll department PCs from the rest of the network, In addition to the fire wall protecting your networks from the Internet.  Another advantage of the department segregation of this device (if it was properly set up and configured, as in any of these examples) if you were to get infected with a worm trying to propagate to all your computers, the 5510 could isolate the infection to a single department.

If you are going to have several remote offices connecting to your office via the Internet, the 5510 offers better support for the office to office communication.  If it is only one or two remote offices the 5505 would be fine.

Hopefully this clears up a little for your decision process,  you may want to consider finding a local Cisco reseller and contract with them for the design and installation of the product.  They should be interested in the services even if they don't sell you the hardware, and if not find another reseller.

Dave

Thanks Dave!  Could you explain more about what you said below? 

>>VPN remote connections  It looks like the 5505 will support 2 remote connections (like a user connecting from their laptop from home or the cyber >>cafe)  The 5510 will support many more users but you have to buy licenses for more than 2 users.

I was leaning towards the 5510.  What concerns me would be the support for more than 2 remote connections.  Do you happen to know what kind of pricing we are looking at for more than the 2?  Our organization would need at least 10. 

We are currently using a open source solution called "m0n0owall" and wanted to go to a more robust and reliable solution.  From what I've read and seen on Cisco I'm really impressed with the 5500 series. 

Being a non-profit I was looking to find out which would be a better value in the long run and I'm thinking 5510. 
 

Does anyone have a 5510 in production?   Would we be able to segment our 2 groups LAN and Wireless networks to go through one gateway?  For some reason our current firewall doesn't have that ability.  We have a LAN (10.0.0.0)  and Wireless (10.0.1.0) and both seems to go out however for our Websense filtering we need to have our Wireless network actually run thru the 10.0.0.0) network.  Running a tracerot.  I've noticed it goes thru 10.0.1.0 gateway and then out to our ISP.  I've had support tickets with both Websense and Cisco and they are leaning towards saying that my current firewall is not able to route it that way.  ..   I guess what I want to know is .. I'm assuming this Cisco device should be able to do this???

I appreciate your thoughts on the matter.

I am also using the m0n0wall solution and have found it to be very robust and reliable.  I wouldn't think the 5505 would offer anything better than what you currently are using.  So I agree the 5510 would be an improvement over the m0n0wall.

I don't have time to check on the Cisco web site but you should be able to find at least list pricing there, also CDW PCMall or a local Cisco reseller should be able to get you the pricing for the additional clients.  Remember the Tech Soup offering includes 5 years of SmartNet, so don't let the reseller sell that to you again.

Dave

Ditto on what dwelp wrote.

As far as robust, pfSense is quite solid.  I bang the heck out of mine with lots and lots of traffic, and it has never needed a reboot.

But if you want an appliance for some different stability reason (simple appliances keep ppl from messing with them too much), then just go with the 5510, I'm guessing.

HTH

Oh, I hope you can tell me how to make pfSense robust because ours is a disaster right now! I am desperately looking for affordable tech support on our Soekris box w/ pfSense and Samba, since the tech that made them for us has left the area. Anyone have any ideas?

Hey ! hi i just wanted to know where cisco asa 5505 0r5510  are used and for what purpose.

Hey is there someone who can help me out on my query which i have posted recently ?

Well, your query is already defined in the thread of the post.  Can you be more specific on what information you are looking for?

Still not totally clear, is it a device used to install remote system between two or more systems?

The Cisco ASA5505 and ASA5510 are both Unified Threat Management systems.  They can perform a lot of functions in one box.  I believe you would need the ASA5510 if you planned on having a robust, easy to manage VPN solution.

Thank Shipley i will go through the link you recommended i hope this would clarify my doubt.

I hope so, too.  If you have more questions to ask, please let us know.  Sometimes it is best to discuss a scenario where you think you could use the device and we can let you know if that's where it would be appropriate.