Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN Reviews

Cisco SD-WAN is used to connect users to network applications securely.

The segmentation, high security, and flexibility of the Cisco SD-WAN are the most valuable features.

The cost of Cisco SD-WAN is high and has room for improvement compared to competitors such as Fortinet which has similar functionality.

The technical support has room for improvement.

The UI has room for improvement.

I have been using Cisco SD-WAN for a couple of years.

Our engineers dislike dealing with Cisco technical support as they frequently face redirection and have to wait for months to get their issues resolved.

Neutral

The initial setup is straightforward and easy to deploy.

The price is based on the types of routers being used as well as the product licenses.

Fortinet FortiGate has a more comfortable UI and better logic than Cisco.

I give Cisco SD-WAN an eight out of ten.

Cisco SD-WAN is mainly intended for medium to large enterprises as it provides significant benefits for organizations with distributed offices across different regions or countries.

I recommend that new users become familiar with all the features that Cisco SD-WAN offers, to enable them to complete their tasks effectively.

The software for Cisco SD-WAN is overkill because the box is more powerful than required. Cisco needs to replace it with a normal router because the current one is very advanced. They expect a stable internet connection but then try to get sophisticated devices to connect to any infrastructure. However, the infrastructure requires only SIM cards, so it's not that difficult. Implementing a router and a dual-SIM router would be sufficient, but Cisco makes it complicated.

I cannot speak to additional features, but we've heard that Cisco may add analytics to the SD-WAN.

We have been using this solution for about nine months, and it is deployed on-premises.

I have not heard any complaints about the stability. The problem with this solution is with the interface, not the equipment.

I can not speak to the scalability, but we used Cisco SD-WAN for a big gas station digitalization project. The gas station had to be connected to a government-owned company and then deployed to 5,500 locations, so it was a big project. I believe a government-owned company currently completes the maintenance of the 5,500 locations.

Our company was just in charge of implementation and installation. I am unsure how many technicians they have, but the maintenance response is so slow, which may mean that the technicians are not well educated or trained about the SD-WAN. Regarding deployment, it took one person about two to three days to connect, configure and do the ATP.

The technical support is very responsive, but they lack resident experts. So they have to divert the support to Singapore or Australia. They should have experts locally to provide support.

The deployment is complex, and Cisco makes everything complicated. It took about two to three days to deploy, and the engineers completed it.

The solution is costly compared to Aruba. You also have to pay if you want to implement extra features like a VPN.

I rate this solution an eight out of ten. The Cisco brand is strong, and its connections to the government are also strong. Cisco has very good distribution and connections with universities, unlike other equipment manufacturers. In addition, they provide free seminars to government officials and receive allowances in return. Cisco does a great job managing its customers.

I believe Cisco and Palo Alto here in Jakarta and Indonesia are very strong compared to Aruba and Citrix. I last heard about Citrix when I worked with Nokia and Motorola ten years ago. Citrix only does password and computer synchronization, which is done from Singapore. Citrix also did not have local support about ten to 12 years ago.

Cisco has been around for quite a long time and gives a very good discount to system integrators if they try to sell their product. Although they have high published prices, the price for a distributor or reseller is very attractive with discounts sometimes as high as about 20% or 30%.

We are an IT integration company that implements this solution for customers and clients. We deploy the solution on-premises.

The solution is stable.

The solution is expensive and could be cheaper.

The solution is stable.

It is a very scalable solution. 

We have experience with customer service and support.

The initial setup is straightforward in a laboratory environment, but when we started implementing it in the field, we had some problems. We are deploying a pilot of the solution for a few branches.

We have seen a return on investment.

We have a subscription and a three-year license.

I rate the solution a nine out of ten and I would recommend it to others. 

Our retail clients use this solution to connect their branches.

With this SD-WAN solution, all we have to do is configure the VM network. The older reconfiguration could take months or even years because we needed to check, verify, test — this was very hectic. I would say that this solution allows businesses to avoid any unnecessary lengthy network changes. At the same time, necessary network changes can be done quickly and easily.

This solution comes with comprehensive technical support. 

Cisco should focus more on making products that are convenient for users. Sadly, I think they are more interested in making money rather than making reliable products. 

The Cisco way of thinking is to create umbrella-like solutions. I would prefer it if this solution was separate from the entire monstrous Cisco portfolio, without additional marketing and other unnecessary features. Still, so far it has been working well. Plus, the support is great. The only drawback is that it's an expensive solution. 

I have been selling Cisco SD-WAN for two years.

For standard use, it's pretty stable. If you want to use this solution to manage traffic, then it depends on the release. Cisco has several patches for a variety of problems. Still, they can't guarantee that there won't' be any bugs. 

This solution is pretty scalable. 

Cisco's technical support is great. 

The initial setup is complex. Setting up the controllers and the certification center is difficult. 

In the Russian market where we operate, this solution is expensive. 

Overall, on a scale from one to ten, I would give this solution a rating of nine. 

If you're interested in using this solution, first ask yourself how often do you need to change your network configuration? If you rarely have to switch, then you don't need SD-WAN.

We use it for network services. We use them as edge network devices, edge network routers, and firewall routers.

We looked at an SD-WAN service and Cisco was a vendor that provided termination of those services. We bought it and it met the specification. Cisco Viptela solution met the specification for our network.

I would recommend better-integrated management. Some of the other vendors have moved to integrated management platforms. Better analytics and operational consoles with a deployment configuration that can work easily across the network. 

I have been using Cisco SD-WAN for over five years.

It is pretty good. We have been reasonably happy with it.

The scalability is fine. The issue has not been an issue of technology, it's been one of price. 

It was straightforward.

We had a vendor and it was not hard. We took a while to get the templates, but not that long. 

Cisco SD-WAN is a good product, but as I said earlier, it's not priced competitively. There is nothing wrong with the product, but it is not as good as what you can buy from other vendors for a lower price. It depends because it's bandwidth-based licensing. It depends on how much bandwidth you put through it. Other products on the market do not have any licensing for bandwidth and that is one of its cost issues. 

We will be migrating to a different vendor. I would rate Cisco SD-WAN a six on a scale of one to ten.

We use this solution to interconnect our branches with the headquarters and interconnect other countries with the hub.

Before we deployed SD-WAN, we used to have at least two links per branch but could only use one at a time. Now we are able to use all the links together.

The best feature about SD-WAN is the ability to consolidate the links to the branch and load-balance the traffic.

There should be more flexibility in the licensing. In the next release, I would like Cisco to add all the troubleshooting tools from Viptela to SD-WAN.

I've been using this solution for two years.

SD-WAN is very stable - once it's deployed, you can just forget about it, it runs by itself.

This solution is very scalable - the only requirement is to add the licenses for the devices being brought on board.

The initial setup was not very straightforward, but it gets easier the more deployments you complete.

We used an integrator and Cisco themselves.

When purchasing, there are so many features available that it's quite confusing deciding which to choose. And some of the devices force you to buy licenses you don't want. 

As far as deployment is concerned, either get Cisco Professional Services or an integrator to assist, as the person taking lead on deployment needs to have experience with the product. I'd give this product a score of seven out of ten.

Cisco SD-WAN's most valuable feature is the ease of transition.

Cisco SD-WAN's smart account stuff could be improved. People still think they're using traditional licenses, so customers need a lot of education on using SD-WAN devices, especially on the smart/virtual account side.

I've been using Cisco SD-WAN for about two years.

Cisco SD-WAN's stability is good - I haven't found any issues at the operational level.

Cisco SD-WAN's scalability is good.

The initial setup was complex and required us to plan ahead. If you don't have an in-house design team or outsource to a third party with expertise, the setup will be difficult.

It takes some time, but Cisco SD-WAN gives a good ROI - for example, we have had some savings in terms of transport.

I'd advise anybody thinking of implementing Cisco SD-WAN to learn the smart and virtual account setup and the staging and installation process very clearly. This isn't just a case of buying a license or device and installing it, you need to create a lot of stuff, so you need to understand the technology before buying it, at least in a test lab or non-production environment. I would give Cisco SD-WAN a rating of seven out of ten.

We use Cisco SD-WAN for a VPN, and we create the DNS in Fortinet. We have used this solution for data centers and failover tests for disaster recovery.

It is really easy to deploy and use. It is also easy to use for failovers and designing solutions.  

The rollout is really quick. It is easy to adjust and roll out.

I have been using Cisco SD-WAN for five or six years.

It is as stable as your lines are. We mostly have fiber connections, and it is really stable and performing well. I once had a problem with a power unit, but I have never experienced any downtime.

We have contacted them. All engineers were experienced enough to support us. We had a special team from Cisco.

The initial setup was straightforward. The design takes longer than the implementation. You have to know your layer 3, but it can also define layer 2 or layer 1. It is really a great tool. 

I used a consultant for the implementation. I am an architect, and I only design the solution. I discuss the solution with the network engineer and then roll it out with the help of the network engineer and the project manager.

It is much cheaper than other solutions. Most of our clients are the top 500 companies, and they all have a corporate contract.

I would recommend this solution. It is a great solution, and it is already defined. It is more suitable for medium and large enterprises operating in lots of regions and countries. For smaller organizations, you can use a normal business DSL solution. 

I would advise doing a VR test to make sure that all settings are correct. We have had issues where the configuration or IP spoofing on the network was not so good. You also need to know the number of tenants that you need. You can set it up on paper, but if you don't test it, you would never know that it is working. 

I would rate Cisco SD-WAN a nine out of ten. It is the best solution that I ever had, but there might be something better than this in the future.