Aruba Wireless Reviews

Clients use Aruba Wireless for their wireless network needs.

We have many customers using the solution, both on-premises and cloud.

The support for both on-premises and cloud deployments has proven to be very effective.

We are not facing any difficulty in convincing customers to have Aruba Wireless, and there are no specific features that customers are particularly looking for in wireless.

I have been using the solution for over ten years.

The solution is very stable. Many customers do not face any complaints about the product or the network going down.

I rate it ten out of ten on scalability.

Technical support is good.

Positive

The initial setup is straightforward.

I do not know how to calculate our ROI.

Pricing is competitive compared to other companies like Cisco.

I would definitely recommend Aruba Wireless.

I'd rate the solution ten out of ten.

The most valuable features of Aruba Wireless are the seamless feature and the concurrent user.

Aruba Wireless can improve the assigning of access points. We have times that the nearest access point is not assigned but one far away. The integration between access points could improve.

I have been using Aruba Wireless for approximately one year.

Aruba Wireless is very stable among all the other access points I have used.

The scalability of Aruba Wireless is good.

We have approximately 1,000 to 1,300 users using the solution. We plan to increase the usage of the solution. There are plans to install 150 access points in January.

We have a partner in Indonesia that we use for support that is called Agiva and they sometimes escalate issues to Aruba Wireless. I do not have direct experience with the support of Aruba Wireless.

I do not have any experience with other vendors other than Aruba Wireless.

The initial setup of Aruba Wireless is simple, including a wireless plan used. If we have instant access points and change them to computer access points, it is simple to do.

We have a license for the source mobility controller.

The price of Aruba Wireless is expensive.

I rate the price of Aruba Wireless a two out of five.

We have four people for the maintenance of the solution.

I rate Aruba Wireless a nine out of ten.

I've been a consultant for six years.

Aruba is easier than Juniper.

The stability and management could be improved.

I have been working with Aruba Wireless for five years.

We are currently working with Aruba Wireless but will be changing to Juniper later this year.

When it comes to stability, Cisco is number one. Aruba and Juniper are similar.

Aruba Wireless is a scalable solution.

Technical support is good.

I have been working with Juniper WLC Series for one year. We plan to implement Juniper next month.

The initial setup is very easy.

The pricing is fine.

Cisco is more expensive than Aruba or Juniper.

Aruba has pricing for a Virtual license with a VLAN package.

We decided to change to Juniper because it looked right, and because of the easy management.

I would rate Aruba Wireless a nine out of ten.

We primarily use the solution for the wireless services for the entire campus.

The wireless service is pretty much standard. 

We like the centralized configuration and monitoring. 

We like the performance of the access points as they're not easily interfered with by other wireless devices. 

The initial setup was straightforward. It's really easy.

The documentation is great.

The pricing and licensing structure are great.

It's very easy to work with.

I would like to see a faster web interface in the controller and more troubleshooting tools, including real-time troubleshooting tools.

The stability is quite good. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze.

A lot of people use the solution. We have about 120 access points and more than 1,500 clients who use it daily.

In terms of scalability, it is very easy to expand the network. We build new schools and buildings all the time so the usage is always increasing.

We haven't used technical support yet; I really am not qualified to answer to how helpful or responsive they are.

That said, the forums are quite helpful if you need assistance or to gain insights into usage.

We previously used HP Access Point and LANCOM Access Points. The HP series was discontinued and the LANCOM is very outdated. Therefore, we switched over to Aruba.

The initial setup is straightforward and not overly complex. A company shouldn't have any trouble handling the process. 

We had it up and running in a day or two. The deployment is fast.

We have installed and configured it by ourselves. We did not need the assistance of consultants or integrators. That said, we had the access points, however, we needed some education, some training. The company who sold us the access point really spent two or three days training us and then we configured it ourselves.

We had a very good experience with them. We were satisfied with their level of expertise.

The license is not that expensive. The access point comes with a perpetual license. That's a very big deal in this kind of market. For example, Cisco charges annual licenses in comparison. Aruba Access Points come with perpetual licenses. It could be one license and you have it forever. There is no need to renew or buy something extra.

The pricing is very attractive. I'd rate it at a five out of five. 

You buy the controller. You buy the access points and the licenses and that's it. If you want to have technical support on the controller, you have to buy subscriptions. However, the licenses and the warranty of the access points are free and forever. There's an unlimited lifetime guarantee.

We are a university, so we have the whole community using this product.

We are using Access Point 305 with the Aruba controller 7210.

It's a very good solution. We have our problems, however, all wireless products have their problems. We haven't used state-of-the-art wireless solutions like Cisco or Huawei, so we're not able to compare everything together. That said, we are very happy with what we have.

I would rate the solution at an eight out of ten.

I have worked with versions 2.207 and 3.303 and 305. Because I am the service provider for my customers, I've worked with Ruckus, Aruba, Cisco, and UniFi. Most of my customers ask for new wireless solutions. Last week I installed 37 access points. My customers are very satisfied.

Configuring the main controller is very easy; with Aruba, it's just plug-and-play. The roaming features are great too.

Most of the access points don't include the chargers. If you want to increase your coverage, then you need to have a charger. When our customers ask about access points, we always recommend Aruba; however, when we tell them that they need to buy the chargers separately, they become upset, saying: "We already bought Aruba access points, the chargers should come with it".

This is my main concern. In the last five years, I've installed nearly 300 Aruba access points and most of my customers have complained about the chargers. If this problem was addressed, I wouldn't have any other complaints.

I have been using this solution for five years.

I have not experienced any bugs, software, or hardware issues with Aruba.

This solution is both very stable and scalable. I want to mention something about Aruba's compatibility between various model types. If you already have version 207 installed and you want to switch to version 3.3, it's not compatible; you can't add it to your network. You need to create a standalone network for this access point only.

I only spoke with Aruba's technical support one time. With Aruba, you don't need a lot of support. It is very easy to use. 

The initial setup is very easy. You just need to configure the main device. If you have a standalone or virtual appliance, you can just configure it and install the rest without connecting to the main device.

Deployment time varies, but usually, it's very fast. Most of our customers need 10 access points on-site. For me, this only takes roughly 15 minutes to install.

I used to use Ruckus. Ruckus takes a long time to configure. Cisco takes longer too. Aruba is the easiest to install. Just configure the main device, and install the rest. Nothing else is required.

I'd like to mention something else. Last week, I installed roughly 37 access points — Aruba 303 I believe. Our clients complained about the coverage. Their access points should be able to cover 50 meters, but Aruba was only covering 25 to 30 meters, max. I know Aruba, and like anything, there are advantages and disadvantages. I like Aruba for its easy installation, management and because they provide the best and most optimized connection.

The most important thing is the heat map; you need to have a good heat map and make sure it's configured correctly with Aruba. If you don't have a heat map, you may have issues.

Here in Jordan, some providers will go to a company that requires 10 access points and tell them they only need five. In reality, they just want the job and the client. Then, after everything is said and done, the client complains about the five access points not covering the whole area. 

Some preparation is required before you can get started with Aruba. The total amount of power needed for the access points needs to be calculated. I would recommend doing this yourself as some companies just want to sell their products.

Companies in Jordan were quite loyal to Cisco, but in the last five months, I have installed roughly 500 Aruba Switches. Version 1920 is very popular; it's very fast and great for network stability.

Cisco and Aruba offer the same features. My customers don't need advanced features. What's the point in spending an extra $300-400 dollars for features you won't even use?

On a scale from one to ten, I would give this solution a rating of eight. If they increased their coverage, I would give them a rating of 15, not simply ten.

Aruba was our primary wireless solution until very recently.  

In the end, when you bring on a wireless solution, you only need a wireless solution. That is the intrinsic value. We had both Aruba ClearPass and Aruba AirWaves. We had all the management features also available from Aruba. These worked well together as a class of products.   

When I compare Aruba with Juniper Mist, Juniper is the more an AI-driven management solution. It is more of a modern solution, I think. Aruba needs to be more competitive with Juniper.  

We have been using Aruba Wireless for four or five years now.  

I think Aruba is stable because it was working okay. There was no problem with downtime. The issue for us with functionality was because we have much more reflection in our building due to the height of our ceilings.  

We bought the product through a reseller. For support, we needed to go through that reseller instead of Aruba self. It is hard to judge the capabilities of Aruba support directly.  

We had Aruba and we just replaced it with Juniper Mist a few weeks ago (September 2020). The AI-driven management solutions from Juniper Mist suits our business more than the Aruba solution we used before. I think Aruba did the work we needed before, but better management is the reason why we moved over to Juniper Mist.  

Before Aruba, we worked with HP Colubris. We stopped using the HP Colubris solution because HP no longer provided it. That is what happened.  

Aruba is comparable to competing solutions when it comes to price. I am going to say that the support pricing for Juniper Mist is higher than Aruba. I think that is because Juniper is more of a cloud model than Aruba.  

You do also have a cloud solution from Aruba called Aruba Central, but I have not compared prices for that.  

The advice that I would give to someone considering Aruba as a wireless solution would be to look into the Aruba Central cloud solution that they are offering right now. I think we are at a time of brand control that needs to be managed and needs to be supported. I think that working with a cloud-based solution is a better option than on-premises solutions.  

I think what is more important than a particular tool is that you also have the depth of wireless knowledge to really be able to competently manage such environments.  

On a scale from one to ten (where one is the worst and ten is the best), I would rate this product as a seven-out-of-ten. To improve on that score they would have to make Aruba more available to cloud management. They just recently started with Aruba Central and they are not as far along as Juniper Mist is with having a mature cloud solution.  

The problem for Aruba is that Juniper Mist is a new product without a longer legacy. They can start from ground zero. Aruba needs to support the older controller-based models and that may slow them down when it comes to development.  

Aruba is moving to the cloud platform model. We are presenting solutions using Aruba Central to clients for the management of their infrastructure. The majority of the implementations we have are still currently are on-premises. Customers now are slowly implementing cloud solutions for Aruba. We have 80% on-premises and 20% migrating to the cloud version of the solution.  

With Aruba Central, we can manage controllers, EAPs (Employee Assistance Programs), switches, et cetera. Everything in one place. So we can manage anything we need to using Aruba. Aruba on-premises wireless is something we use for education. It is mostly implemented in schools and in universities. We use it to establish APs (Access Points)  around the campus to make sure there is coverage campus-wide. Then they have mobility controllers on-premises that control all the infrastructure.  

Another use case is for companies that have branches from the data centers. At the prime location, they have APs powered within the company and Mobility Masters in the data center. The Mobility Masters cluster-connect to the mobility controllers and then control all the APs and all the wireless infrastructure. Then we have links connecting the branches. On the branches, we have small mobility controllers that feed all the information to and from Mobility Masters. That is, the Mobility Masters connect to mobility controllers and then the mobility controllers connect to the APs.  

Portugal is a small country and our smallest companies always have EAPs. EAPs are a version of a solution from Aruba that the NAC (Network Access Control) AP has inside a virtual controller. These NAC APs control all the other APs.  

It gives us a reliable, mature solution that we can roll out to our clients.  

Wireless technologies, relatively speaking, are a new solution. The technical guys from Aruba are very good. The support is very good. It is very easy to implement the product. Another solution that Aruba has is the NAC and the ClearPass. ClearPass is a good solution for additional security of access points and it is integrated so it is very easy to deploy. It is very interactive and not so analytic as other solutions so, in my opinion. Aruba is a very good company — very good technology-wise — and they make very useful products.  

Perhaps one of the things that I think Aruba can improve on is developing their current information channels. Aruba has a lot of information available about their products and to find the information you need is not always so easy. It is more complicated than it should be. I think that they are great and do have a lot of information available — probably all the information that any user really needs to do things themselves. They are doing things well and trying to do things in the right way. They should just improve more on the organization and searchability of the information to make it easier to find what you are looking for.  

I am with the sales service for Arrow, Portugal which is a solutions company. My role is to help the partners in designing solutions. I am working with Aruba products as a partner and reseller for three years now.  

Aruba Wireless is stable. Very stable. Because Aruba has already been around for more than 10 years or so, it is a mature product and a very stable product. If there is a problem, the support team is very good with working through the problems. When a client wants a new version, we have confidence in Aruba that everything has already tested and we have access to stable versions of the release. We have access to all the information for the versions whether they are the old ones or the new ones.  

My impressions about the scalability and the product is that it is highly scalable. You can start with a low quantity of access points — as low as one installation — and then scale it to thousands if you have to. You can do the upgrades in the mobility controllers to allow the growth of the infrastructure. Because of the way it is created, it is highly scalable and highly reliable.  

Of course, we have plans to scale our own usage of the product. Because we work as a value-added distributor of Aruba in Portugal, we have to meet the needs of our client base which is growing all the time. We have plans to increase the implementation of the product in our market to meet those demands. It is partly because we are working with a superior product like Aruba that we are growing in our market.  

The Aruba technical support team is very good. They are very skilled people and can help you with the support you need when it comes to their products. They are very good at turning around a response within 24 hours. It is fast and helpful.  

In my experience the initial setup of the Aruba EAP solution is straightforward. We can call on all the APs and then you have everything connected. Now they also have a Soho gateway solution that it is integrated. It is very easy to turn on this solution. I can install the Soho add-on instantly for the Aruba solution. I think that they are doing very well to keep the customer in mind when building and testing their products for ease of setup and use.  

Our deployment did not take a very long time. Even initially. For clients, the deployment takes more or less time than ours. It depends on the size of the implementation. If you have to do only 10 APs in a small deployment, it can take only two or three days to complete the whole thing. If you have a bigger implementation, it depends on the size of the project. It could take weeks for the deployment if it is a very large one.  

We did not have to use an integrator, reseller, or consultant for our deployment. We could do that ourselves. But we do work with all the integrators in Portugal because we help them to sell the solution so that they can implement it for the clients. We help them sell the product and then they do the deployments.  

The advice I would give to a customer that wants to implement this product is that they must have good support from a product partner. Try to find a certified partner to do the job of planning and implementation. This should be a certified HP partner to do the job as Aruba is an HP company. Choose the right partner, the right technical guy, and the right company to implement the solution for you. It will make sure you have the solution deployed in the way you need it to be done to fit your needs and expectations. That is the most important thing that I can think of.  

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate this product as a nine-and-a-half.  

We are using different versions depending on the customer. We have about 400 or 500 customers. Some of them are Aruba, some of them have other technologies. Different versions are deployed all over. We use it as a wireless device manager where appropriate.  

There are only so many features in Wireless controllers. The fact that Aruba has a virtual controller onboard the internet access points makes it cheaper than to buy Aruba Central licenses or Meraki Cloud licenses. That probably makes it most valuable.  

Aruba Wireless is among the leaders in the market. We are not talking about basic access points. As a leader, they keep ahead of the field.  

We have been using it for a year-and-a-half.  

The stability is very good.  

It is very scalable.  

The technical support is good. My impression is that pre-sale support is very good with Aruba. Their global presence is important. I do not have to deal with any other technical support because they have a follow-the-sun type of system that uses different support teams. When I ask for support, we get it and we get it during regular business hours. I never phoned anywhere else but the North American team. They are good and responsive.  

Installation is pretty straight forward.  

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate Aruba wireless eight-out-of-ten. Nobody would get a ten.