NetScaler VPX - Customer Licensed

My main use case for NetScaler these days is mostly load balancing, content switching, and the access gateway or NetScaler Gateway for accessing the VDI environment behind it.

A specific example of how I use load balancing or content switching in my daily work is that I completed a migration for a community where they had 800 applications in their production environment, and they also had the same in their development, test, and acceptance environments. I built a solution for those four NetScaler administrators to construct the entire NetScaler environment and manage it. During that migration, I had to take into account automation, the fact that there are many applications behind it, while application functional administrators do not even know how their application really works, things like certificates, which are always a hassle, and especially some applications that use non-standard ports that utilize WSS and not HTTPS along with other strange protocols.

NetScaler has positively impacted my organization because I work for a system integrator and deploy it for customers. Many customers are really happy with NetScaler, except for the pricing, as Citrix has changed a lot of their pricing in the last two or three years when they transitioned to Cloud Software Group. However, despite that, I know customers are really satisfied with the technical capabilities that NetScaler provides.

While I do not have specific outcomes or metrics from my customers, I think using Core Logic has made it much easier for the big municipality I mentioned to implement NetScaler as a total solution, thus speeding up their automation. There are likely many benefits, but I lack benchmarks or timing figures to quantify that.

I think the best features NetScaler offers are numerous options to tune or change the traffic on its way, as it is described as the pocket knife in networking tools. I have also worked with FortiADC, which is almost the same product, and after doing training on F5 BIG-IP F5 load balancing, I find that while the concepts are always the same, the way you configure it is completely different. In my experience, I think NetScaler is complex, but still the easiest to implement.

I think NetScaler can improve in pricing, and with the recent release of version 15.1, the successor to 14.1, there are claims of improved performance due to the kernel change. I believe that integrating Core Logic would provide even more benefits for Citrix.

For management, I think the Core Logic I developed would be a significant improvement for NetScaler, leading to easier management and standardized content switching for many admins.

I have been working in my current field for more than 20 years.

Customer support is quite adequate, though I know that new versions are not always heavily tested and are often tested in the field, leading to various problems for customers. Overall, their support is satisfactory.

Customer support is quite adequate, though I know that new versions are not always heavily tested and are often tested in the field, leading to various problems for customers. Overall, their support is satisfactory.

I did not use a different solution before NetScaler, but I did switch from NetScaler to FortiADC with another customer because of the pricing increase I mentioned, and I believe other customers may do the same if Citrix maintains that approach.

The implementation process with NetScaler is easier for me because the configuration resembles Cisco, where I also have a lot of experience, while Forti has a completely different philosophy in automation. I find BIG-IP F5's automation perplexing, but I know they have options too. NetScaler provides several ways to manage automation through SSH and their Nitro API; they also have a newer API for additional management options besides the GUI.

My company has a business relationship with this vendor as a partner and reseller, and we are not just a customer.

The return on investment with NetScaler is visible in that its HA feature allows load balancing over multiple servers, enabling maintenance or failovers and keeping businesses up and running. While it saves time and money due to its excellent features that ensure an always operational environment, I do not have specific figures since I focus on technical implementations and projects.

My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing has revealed that the licensing recently changed to a plus model, which is manageable if you know what you are doing. However, the transition from old licensing files to a cloud-based solution caused a lot of issues for customers. Pricing increased significantly, as one customer went from paying 100,000 euros a year for their NetScaler solution to 300,000 a year, which was a massive change they did not accept, leading them to transition to FortiADC. Other customers have also struggled with new pricing.

I evaluated options including AVI Networks, BIG-IP F5, and FortiADC before choosing NetScaler. Its stability is one of the reasons I went with it.

My advice to others looking into using NetScaler is simply to go use it. I give this product an overall rating of 8.

I have been working with all Citrix NetScaler VPX platforms: BLX, VPX, MPX, SDX, with all of them. I have completed more than 300 deployments with several different customers. I work with virtual and desktops, GSLB, Web Application Firewall, and all features that exist on Citrix NetScaler VPX.

I have been doing projects with customers integrating solutions because they have specific needs and require either new deployments or help solving issues on existing deployments. With Citrix NetScaler VPX, I have worked with environments with 10,000 users or more. I work with customers where the maximum number of users I have worked with is 30 to 35 with SDX. With Citrix NetScaler VPX, I have worked with environments with 5,000 users or fewer. They are using Reverse Proxy, Content Switching, Load Balancing, Cache Redirection, AAA, virtual servers, multiple configurations, and Multi-Factor authentication with Gateway and VPN capabilities.

The needs depend on your requirements. If you need to work with remote users, Citrix NetScaler VPX Gateway and virtual server features are very important. If you are providing websites, you need to use Content Switching, Traffic Management, and Load Balancing. When working with those configurations, you need to always implement SSO and two-factor authentication. You must authenticate users and always require a second factor. You must not work with just user and password authentication. You always need to configure Multi-Factor authentication with Citrix NetScaler VPX for access to the websites that you are load balancing. When connecting to Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops applications, this is very important. The most used features could be Traffic Management, Content Switching, Load Balancing, and Citrix NetScaler VPX Gateway.

I have been deploying in many customers because you are encrypting and decrypting on Citrix NetScaler VPX and you offload the backends. However, several customers always want to use SSL end-to-end with no SSL offload configuration. If you need safety, you need to configure all the servers, Citrix NetScaler VPX and also the backends for safety reasons. You are introducing additional load on the backends, but nowadays most customers want to use SSL in all the ways and in all the communication paths.

I have been deploying Web Application Firewall in many customers. Web Application Firewall has many configurations. Citrix NetScaler VPX Web Application Firewall works at Layer 7. You can configure signatures, which is the easy way to configure Web Application Firewall, but there are many security checks that you can configure and you need to talk with many developers to deploy it. It is very complicated. I have completed many deployments, and it is amazing, but sometimes it is confusing for most people because you need to do a lot of work when you configure security checks of Web Application Firewall feature.

I have been working with several different customers in all the fields. Normally, they are not small companies. The companies could be medium to high.

Content switching and load balancing are being used by customers. There are many different applications such as WebLogic, Oracle, websites, Tomcat, and more. There are plenty of web servers such as Microsoft IIS Web Server. It does not matter because you can load balance all kinds of web servers. You can load balance, keep the persistence, and do many things with all the applications and all web servers. Most of them are using HTTP regardless of the version, and also using WebSocket protocol.

Stability is an area for improvement. Sometimes stability issues occur. Stability can be improved by avoiding security issues. There are many problems with Citrix NetScaler VPX. There are many CVEs.

Stability issues sometimes occur when you deploy and when you update. It is very often that you have many issues because the deployment and updates introduce many issues. This is a huge problem if you have been working a long time with Citrix NetScaler VPX. It is not just Citrix NetScaler VPX. It also happens with MPX, SDX, CPX, or BLX. It is the same.

I have plenty of issues.

Some issues occur with SDX and the hardware crypto SSL cards. I have many problems with Citrix NetScaler VPX and stability with many customers. Some versions and new release versions had many issues. They were not working and not doing what Citrix NetScaler VPX was supposed to do and it was not working well.

It depends on the customer. I tend to deploy on-premise, on-premise, on-premise. I also have many users who are working with cloud and I tend to deploy their Citrix NetScaler VPX on cloud.

Customer service has been horrible. It has been horrible for some time. Since two years ago, it has been a nightmare. I have solved many issues and found many bugs myself. I solve the issues by doing workarounds because they are not able to solve or help me. Sometimes I tend to open the case, but I know that I am going to spend a lot of time wasting my time and trying to work in parallel solving the issues by applying workarounds.

I am totally comfortable with the initial setup.

I am an integrator. I integrate for several customers.

I have done maybe 500 or 1,000 deployments. I have automated many things and it is very easy to configure. You can use NITRO API scripts using PowerShell with several different languages and it is very easy to do it.

The setup cost is a little expensive for some customers. For some customers, this could be an issue.

Nowadays bugs that introduce new features are typical. Some versions are not working well in the initial version. My review rating for this product is 9.

One of our customers uses the solution for his payment portal.

The solution can be configured very granularly and has good control over security. I can customize it for different web portals. If one customer has five portals and I need different configurations for those five portals, I can use the configuration multiple times. I can do different configurations for each web portal. I can configure a different combination of configurations for various portals. On top of that, I can define security at its best. It is one of the most granular control firewalls.

The solution's pricing is very high compared to its competitors. This is the only challenge I faced when I tried to sell the solution for VPN, L7 firewall, or GSLB solution. I would like to enhance the solution's bot protection features.

Citrix Web App and API Protection is a very stable solution.

Citrix Web App and API Protection is a scalable solution. If I want to upgrade it, I just need to add licenses to it. Around 2,000 to 3,000 users are using the solution from my customer’s side. The solution was deployed in a single location.

It took around one week to conclude and deploy the policy for Citrix Web App and API Protection. Two to three people were involved in the solution's configuration.

The solution's pricing is very high compared to its competitors.

Our customer has an API for payment gateway integration, and the solution provides very good security for that. The customer is satisfied, and the configuration and appliance are stable. I can scale that bigger appliance, and it is a seamless solution for the customer and us.

I didn't face any challenges while integrating the solution into the existing system. When we sell the solution, we check the prerequisites, authentication, and integration requirements from the customer side. We check what kind of applications, authentication, and other things need to be integrated with the solution.

We give the solution based on all those considerations so that we do not face any hurdles in the future. So, I didn't find any integration issues with the solution till now.

The solution's deployment is very flexible. I'm able to create any kind of granular policy because of the solution's technology, configuration style, or language, which benefits customers.

Before choosing the solution, users should check what kind of integration they want to do with it. Most integrations are available with Citrix Netscaler, but I would recommend checking all the authentication systems, like multi-factor authentication, before placing the order. I would recommend the solution to other users.

Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

The solution is used for application security. We had many applications that external users accessed. We used it in the production environment. We have suspended it due to support issues. We used multi-layer security.

The product protected us from SQL injection. Citrix is good for application protection. It has advanced features to protect from attacks.

A company acquired Citrix and stopped providing support for the tool.

The product is scalable. We can scale it according to our requirements. The solution is suitable for medium to large enterprises.

The support was good before. Now, it has transitioned. So, we have decided to move to a different tool.

The setup was not simple. It was complex. We need knowledgeable in-house developers who know the features of the application. If there is any error, the functionality might be reduced. We need experts from both the vendor and our side for the deployment. The learning process is very important. The time taken for deployment depends on the applications. If an application is not complex, the deployment might take one day. If it has a lot of databases, the deployment might take longer.

We pay an annual subscription fee for the tool. The tool is cheap.

F5 and Fortinet are good products. There are only slight differences between them and Citrix.

Some solutions are available on the cloud, while some are available on-premise. I will recommend the tool if the support issue is sorted out. Overall, I rate the tool a nine out of ten.

Not many of our customers use the solution's web application firewall. We use the solution's IP Reputation and bot protection features. We use the solution mostly as Citrix and Gateway ICA proxy and load balancing. There are a lot of changes with the solution, but Citrix NetScaler has quite a comprehensive portfolio of training courses.

The licensing model and technical support of the solution could be improved. The exchange rate with the local currency contributes a lot to why some of our customers are looking at alternatives.

I have been working with Citrix NetScaler since it first came onto the market. I have been using the solution before the Gateway feature was a part of NetScaler, and it was a stand-alone product. I have been using the solution since Citrix acquired the product.

Citrix NetScaler is a scalable solution.

Citrix NetScaler has many features. The solution's basic features, like load balancing and Gateway, are pretty easy to use. It becomes complicated very, very quickly in large environments because it has many features. I would recommend the solution to other users.

There are much cheaper alternatives if you just need the solution for basic load balancing. There are no alternatives to Citrix NetScaler if you want to use it as a Gateway and access it from the public network. Integrating Citrix NetScaler with the existing infrastructure and applications is pretty straightforward once you get the hang of things.

Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.