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James_Rey_18035
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Mar 17, 2016

Establish IPSec VPN with F5 Big-IP and Fortigate 30C

Our primary requirement is to establish IPSec VPN with our F5 Big-IP 5050 on our DataCenter to Fortigate 30C on our branches across the globe.

 

Question 1. We haven't successfully done the configuration with both using Static IP. What is the right configuration? 2. Is F5 capable on establishing IPSec VPN to Fortigate 30C's via Dynamic IP? 3. Is F5 capable on establishing IPSec VPN to Fortigate 30C's via Dynamic DNS? 4. What are other method we can establish VPN from F5 to Fortigate 30C?

 

Help.

 

  • We are using 11.6 and have found that the ipSec module in F5 is very erratic and not at all reliable. We moved our ipSec connections to another system altogether. SSL VPN connections from our clients work well.
  • You're correct that IPSec VPN (IP ESP) of BigIP is still unstable in most cross-vendor implementations. As of now, only consider using BigIP as a peer in IPSec VPN implementation when it's paired with ASA, or another BigIP. In various other setups, I have always concluded the stability is just not good. In regards to SSL VPN which is an entirely different thing, I find BigIP to be very stable.