Cisco Firewall and IDS Advice

tpatt100

I could go on a rant about how management did not listen and did a proposal that the government says is totally wrong and NOW they want me to write a new proposal.... but anyways.

I am doing a DIACAP SIPR implementation and was told I cannot have the router/firewall/IDS on the same device (kind of figured this earlier but anyways).

So I am going to be doing this for a small network for different labs in the same building connected via protected fiber. Only a handful of clients in each lab but I am going to expect expansion later but even then I doubt it will grow very much due to government restrictions on who touches the network.

Does anybody have any adivce for a Cisco firewall, perimeter router, and IDS? Mainly IDS advice since I have never touched,looked at a Cisco IDS before. My last experience with a Cisco firewall was a PIX and that was 6-7 years ago. I am checking out Cisco's site at the moment but wanted to see if anybody here has done any recent projects/contracts and could give me some real world advice.

thanks a ton.

tpatt100

Change #1232132

Going with Snort IDS/IPS now and a Juniper Firewall.