Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN Reviews

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.

I am using Cisco SD-WAN for access to the internet.

Cisco SD-WAN could improve the integration with the cloud.

I have used Cisco SD-WAN within the last 12 months.

Cisco SD-WAN is a stable solution.

The scalability of Cisco SD-WAN is good. 

We have approximately 2,000 people using the solution and approximately 25 of them are engineers.

The support from Cisco SD-WAN is good.

The setup of Cisco SD-WAN was easy.

There is a monthly subscription to use this solution.

I rate Cisco SD-WAN a ten out of ten.

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.

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 are a solution provider and SD-WAN, Cisco's software-defined wide area network, is one of the products that we work with.

At this point, only one of our clients has implemented this solution. They are a bank that has redundant links in their branches.

The most valuable features are manageability, scalability, and simplicity.

We have had some problems with the licensing model, and it is something that should be improved. Specifically, Cisco has some bugs regarding licensing that they need to resolve.

Cisco's SD-WAN is a stable product.

This is a scalable solution. Our financial client has approximately 200 branches.

This was our first implementation of this solution and we didn't need to contact technical support.

I have used Citrix SD-WAN as well, although I have very little experience with it.

The process is well documented and the installation is easy. In our team, we have four people on the team to implement SD-WAN.

The length of time required for deployment depends on the environment. For controllers, it takes between two and three days to deploy. For individual branches, it depends on the situation.

We have an in-house team of four people for deployment and maintenance.

Overall, this is a good solution and I recommend it. The only complaint I have is that I would like them to resolve the problems with the licensing model.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.

The solution is primarily just for software-defined WAN or WAN edge solutions. We use it to connect to data centers.

All the features that they have in there have been great. The solution offers good quality of service, visibility, connectivity, and security. It's all of that stuff that makes it good. That is what's required.

Cisco is finding its footing in that area, and they're getting better.

For our team, the installation is pretty straightforward.

The solution can scale. We haven't had any issues doing so.

The quality could always continuously improve. For example, we've had stability concerns in the past.

Native connectivity into the major cloud providers would be ideal.

Often, the solution does require a specialized team to come in and assist with the initial setup.

Technical support could be more helpful and responsive. 

I've been dealing with the solution for three or four years at this point. 

The solution could be more stable. There are issues that they've had to deal with.

The solution seems to be scalable so far. For all the opportunities we've been involved with, it's been good and we haven't hit a wall.

We do deal with technical support from time to time. Their tech support could be better. We are not 100% satisfied with the level of service they offer.

For us, the implementation is easy, as we are trained to handle it. The product usually requires somebody like us to come in there and help customers through this.

Deployment times vary depending on the client and the environment. It depends on how big, the opportunity, how many sites, how many branches, et cetera. All of that stuff comes into play.

We assist our clients with the implementation process.

I can't speak to the costs associated with the product. We get involved with just the installations, that's all.

We're a service partner. As implementors, we install all versions. Usually, however, when we get involved, it's always the latest version that we are installing.

I'd advise users to understand what they're getting. It's a good idea to probably do a POC to see it and make sure it meets all the requirements that the company is looking for before buying in completely.

I'd rate the solution at a six out of ten.

If I have to give a neutral view of all the SD-WAN platforms that I have known so far, Cisco is good in routing.

The solution does not offer WAN optimization.

We have found that their SD-WAN has a lot of scope for improvement.

For example, they can probably look at their security stack. They can look at including some features like WAN optimizing, which is currently not there as a part of their in-built SD-WAN features. That could make their device a full-fledged SD-WAN with a single stack or a single device, solving many problems. It would mean once a customer goes for a Cisco SD-WAN, he doesn't have to look at a second device in his ecosystem.

Cisco has got integration challenges.

The solution lacks advanced security features.

Besides a WAN optimizer, I would like to see if they can do something about the security, and maybe they could have in-built security features such as a firewall.

The cost could be better. Cisco is not great for the SMB market. These are price-sensitive customers and they typically will not go ahead with Cisco, unless and until they are a global organization and they have their entire ecosystem deployed on Cisco. Otherwise, Cisco is struggling to connect with these players as their pricing is high. They need to have better technology at a more competitive price.

The organization that I work for, basically, we have deployed it in our lab. We do testing of multiple OEMs. It's been more than two years, that we have been using Cisco SD-WAN.

I have experience with a variety of different solutions. I also have worked with
Versa, Fortinet and FatPipe.

The initial setup could be more straightforward. A solution such as FatPipe, for example, has a very easy setup. In that case, when it comes to the GUI, in four, five clicks, the entire network gets established.

The solution needs to be priced more competitively. SMBs won't even look at Cisco as they already know it will be too expensive. 

I've worked with other solutions and therefore have evaluated them a bit.

For example, FatPipe has an easier initial setup. The GUI is very simple, and the platform is highly, highly advanced, even as compared to your Cisco, Versa, or Fortinet options. 

What I see in Fortinet is more for firewall extensions, with some software-defined controls. While the functionalities of WAN Optimization, functionalities of a seamless failover are not there. There are some potential technologies that FatPipe has, that are not there in any of these OEMs. On top of that, it's a very simple to use technology for many customers. A lot of our customers have also given this feedback that technically Cisco, Fortinet, et cetera, might be big names, however, FatPipe technically is superior technology today, when it comes to SD-WAN. In terms of FatPipe, they have a single device that has routing, switching, load balancing, WAN optimizer, and FatPipe does full WAN optimization. 

Cisco also claims to do WAN Ops. Fortinet also claims to do WAN optimization. What I have found is that Versa doesn't have that feature at all. Versa needs to come up with WAN optimization feature in order to catch up.

Cisco does a basic sliding window and PCP, UDP, which is a basic level of WAN optimization, whereas FatPipe does sliding window TCP, UDP, caching, comparison, data application - all seven or eight techniques are possible.

We're both customers and resellers. 

I'm not sure which version of the solution we're using at this time. I don't know the version number off-hand. 

Cisco is no doubt a great company in the routing area. Nobody can beat them or nobody can even come close to them. That said, to be very honest, in the SD Wan space, they are struggling. There are a lot of cases where Cisco is technically disqualified when it comes to pure SD-WAN. SD-WAN is the game of FatPipe. FatPipe is the one who invented this technology, and they have delivered SD-WAN since 2002. This company has more than 20 years of experience, from what I understand. Whenever you use these two technologies, you actually get to know that FatPipe in comparison to Cisco is so seamless, extremely seamless. 

Cisco doesn't have advanced security features. Cisco doesn't really do WAN Ops. It does packet duplicates. Technically, both do packet duplicates. If they have failover traffic from a primary to secondary link, they will duplicate the packet. Otherwise, there cannot be a seamless failover. FatPipe has patented technology that doesn't do packet duplication. That's the reason they save 50% of Enterprise bandwidth while doing a failover. On top of that, FatPipe is the only SD-WAN. If at all there is a video on the voice system that is going on in any of this other technology, it is bound to fail. If there is a glitch in the primary link, or the primary link is failing, FatPipe is the only technology that is able to hold everything down. The user will not even know that the primary link has gone down. That is why it's extremely unique and extremely compelling technology. It is something that no other OEM in the world has. Even Cisco can't touch it.

In general, I'd rate Cisco at a seven out of ten.

Normally, you use it for the internet connection.

The orchestration on the VPN connection between remote locations is a fantastic feature. I used it some time ago. 

The bandwidth limitations would be good to remove, but it is a policy and license situation for Cisco because the cost is very high. 

It would be good to have OTP implemented with VRF. It can have support for EIGRP Over the Top (OTP) VRF. I saw some limitations in regards to the VRF protocol and the advertisement between VRF configuration. EIGRP Over the Top basically was quite limited with the VRF configuration. If you wanted to do rollback in VRF by using the EIGRP OTP protocol, the formation was not populated across. Cisco got back and confirmed that it is a configuration that I need to wait for until the next release, which is going to happen in one year. 

Cisco documentation is not the way it used to be before. It just gives an easy way to configure, but it doesn't go into the details of the configuration. The information that you need is there, but sometimes you want to go further and get more information, but the information is quite limited. It would be good to cover a few business cases or configuration cases. They used to be there in the past.

I have been using this solution for around seven years.

It is good. There are some nice elements about it, but there are a few difficulties, and it is always an improvement process.

It is good. You can scale as much as you want, but you have a limitation of the license. 
You cannot go further than a certain number of licenses. I can only have 15 locations or so because it would scale the price.

Technical support is good and always handy to give the answers to the questions that you have about how to use it. They always find the issues and the resolutions of the problems that you have.

I am currently using Fortinet SD-WAN because it is less expensive. It is not as expensive as Cisco SD-WAN. That is the reason we switched from Cisco SD-WAN to Fortinet SD-WAN.

It is not that complex. If you concur with the previous configurations that you need to perform a VPN tunnel and everything related to it, then it is not that complex.

The deployment duration depends on how you implement it and the complexity of the connections. If you are having a full mesh configuration, it will take you quite a long time. It depends on the infrastructure that you need to connect to. For a basic operation, it might take you five hours.

I don't use any integrator or retailer at all. The way they have implemented SD-WAN is that they just provide the device. The devices are handed to me to be implemented and configured.

For maintaining the product, you just need to monitor the connection to the platform through the web portal. Overall, you need to dedicate two hours per day to assess the functionality of the devices and implementing them. It could be as easy as one day or five hours. It could also get very complicated depending on the configuration that you are doing. So, if you want to go fancy in the configuration, it can take you easily one weekend deploying the configuration. It depends on how complicated you want to go. I would say as long as you keep it simple, it will take you pretty much three hours or two hours for implementing it.

It is expensive. The license limitation is there in terms of bandwidth. Basically, Cisco is always good in terms of performance and related things. However, if you want to have a license, for example, for 100 Mbps, they charge you because of their 100 Mbps. If you want to go without the license of 300 Mbps, it is a bandwidth license as well. This is not happening with other vendors. That is the reason why we moved away from Cisco. The bill gets a little bit high.

I do remember that one time we were trying to increase the bandwidth for at least five devices, and the license got as high as 20-grand for five devices, only for the license. It was expensive for us at the time. Our company is not a big company, but it is a solid company. The price was very high, and we moved away from Cisco because of the price.

I would recommend it only if you have the budget to buy and implement a good solution with Cisco. Otherwise, unfortunate for Cisco, there are other vendors. They do the job pretty well. They are able to deliver what you require in the same way that Cisco does, but the price is going to be a little bit affordable for the company.

In my company, we don't have any plans of buying anything related to SD-WAN, but, in terms of personal growth, I'm planning to get more information and more knowledge about SD-WAN. There are a couple of courses that I could learn from.

I would rate Cisco SD-WAN a six out of ten. It is a good solution with SD-WAN, but it is not the best.