ASA 5505 Base License - Proper Upgrade Path?

[nicholas.gallman]

I've searched and searched and have found similar issues, but confusing answers.

I have two ASA 5505 appliances running base licenses. I learned this the hard way when I put them into production and discovered random communications issues. This is when I discovered that my units have an "Inside Hosts" value of "10". Additionally, my units do not support dual ISP links; which I need.

My question.....

Exactly "which" Cisco license do I need to upgrade from my base license to support unlimited inside hosts and to enable dual ISP links?

I've found results that state the proper license as being "ASA5505-SEC-BUN-K9", but I thought this was the part number of the actual "hardware" with the unrestricted license installed.  I need just the license to upgrade my existing hardware from base licenses to licenses supporting unlimited hosts and dual ISP's.

My reseller says I need two licenses to get there.... an unrestricted license AND the security plus license; totaling $1,000.00 to upgrade one unit. I mentioned to him that I thought I could upgrade with the Security Plus license only, but he showed me the following:

Cisco ASA 5505 Security Plus license (provides stateless Active/Standby high availability, dual ISP support, DMZ support, VLAN trunking support, and increased session and IPSec VPN peer capacities)

ASA5505-SEC-PL

http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/security/asa-5500-series-next-generation-firewalls/prod_brochure0900aecd80402e36.html

....stating that the Security Plus license only doesn't specify unlimited hosts.

Help.  I just need clarity.

[Karsten Iwen · Accepted solution]

You reseller is right. I also had to learn that "the hard way" some years ago. When you add a SecPlus license to a Base ASA5505, the actual user-limitation stays the same. But there is also a 50 user license that is a little bit cheaper.

If you buy directly an ASA5505-SEC-BUN, then you get an ASA with SecPlus *and* unlimited users. 

[nicholas.gallman]

Thank you, Karsten. I'm OK with the spend, just so that I know I'm not spending for something unnecessarily. I'll have to spring for the unlimited, for there are way more than 50 devices (and growing) that need connectivity.