Cisco Ethernet Switches Reviews

Versatility and streamlined IOS

Availability of expertise on the market (resources)

Streamlined IOS helped to develop templates for Ethernet Switches without worrying of compatibility of commands in regards to hardware platforms.

Modularity of Industrial switches (IE3000) provides flexibility in solutions yet based on one platform.

Vast array of Industrial models (IE2000, IE3000, IE4000, IE5000).

Acceptance of open source trends (there is slight move already - just keep going)

10 years overall for all switching/routing products. Industrial switches for last 5 years.

No

No

Well, need more pro-active option to add PoE modules to Industrial switches.

We deal with a Cisco partner - 4.5 out of 5.

We deal with a Cisco partner - 4.0 out of 5. Sometimes we find the solution before we get an answer from the Cisco partner.

Everything is driven by business requirements, which in turn different from one project to another. Major points are: availability of support/expertise beyond internal resources, territorial coverage, performance and support of multiple options from enterprise to industrial environment

Straightforward.

90 % in house. Vendor team has sufficient skills.

Cisco should look into more flexible licensing for hardware/IOS. It is hard to beat some vendors' lifetime warranty even they offer less in functionality compare to Cisco.

There are multiple vendors but they are very specialized and do not support versatile solutions. For example, we had to move from Schneider switches as they were just a marketing move by vendor and did not provided better performance or compatibility with SCADA products.

Start from your business requirements (what would you like to have) and budget (what can you afford).

I am using Cisco Ethernet Switches for internet usage.

The price of the solution could be reduced.

I have been using Cisco Ethernet Switches for approximately four years.

The solution is highly reliable.

I am the only one using this solution.

The support from Cisco Ethernet Switches is great.

I rate the support from Cisco Ethernet Switches a ten out of ten.

Positive

The initial setup of Cisco Ethernet Switches is straightforward. The deployment took approximately 30 minutes.

The deployment was done by myself.

The price of Cisco Ethernet Switches is expensive.

I would recommend this solution to others. This is the most reliable brand on the market.

I rate Cisco Ethernet Switches a ten out of ten.

There are no additional features in the switch from Cisco. They are conventional switches that only provide basic Layer Two switching capabilities and do not have the advanced security features that newer switches, such as Fortinet offer. They simply forward data and do not have any other capabilities.

The most valuable feature of Cisco Ethernet Switches is its hardware.

The current state of Cisco Ethernet Switches leaves room for improvement, particularly in regard to central management and security. While they possess the capability to function as owners of Layer Two, they fall short in regard to security awareness. While there are some supplementary products available that can provide additional security measures, such as the deployment of virtual machines, these solutions are external and not integrated within the switch itself. For this reason, Cisco Ethernet switches could benefit from incorporating the same centralized management and security features as other companies, such as Fortinet, offer in their FortiSwitches. By being aware of potential threats such as MAC spoofing and ARP poisoning, the switch can provide a more comprehensive level of security.

I have been using Cisco Ethernet Switches for a very long time.

I've communicated with the technical support team of Cisco previously in regard to their switches. I have always been pleased with the support I have received from them. No matter what challenges I have encountered with their products, I have always been satisfied with their assistance. The support team has consistently demonstrated their readiness to assist and I have never encountered any issues with their support services. Thus, I can confirm that I have indeed had previous interactions with the Cisco support team.

The initial setup of Cisco Ethernet Switches is never easy.

The solution is highly expensive compared to other solutions. The prices get tripled when they arrived in my country of Angola.

I would recommend others use Arista, Fortinet, or Juniper switches.

The adoption of Cisco Ethernet switches in Angola was a result of various factors, including the popularity and widespread usage of the brand. Additionally, the impact of the research and advisory firm, Gartner, has played a significant role in the purchasing decisions of decision-makers. Despite the speaker's advice to not solely rely on Gartner's recommendations, the company's influence is perceived as prominent as they often feature the most expensive solutions at the top of their rankings.

I rate Cisco Ethernet Switches a seven out of ten.

Our primary use case is for ethernet switches. We mainly use switches and routers as edge distribution switches. Some of the plants have been with the big pharmaceutical company Aragon. We have also been with a North American company, and others. Most of their switches were Cisco in pharmaceutical company where I worked for 10 years.

Some of the switches in the plants were used as a core. Many of them, especially in Bulgaria and in Europe, I installed myself. Others in America are responsible during the shift time for the configuration changes and so on. They are used in any level, as a Layer 3, Layer 2, whatever. All kinds of switches are used in the different places in our LAN. 

Cisco Ethernet Switches are great devices. I remember when we decided to replace all the HP switches from the American company when they acquired us. We replaced all the core switches with 3850, except in the bigger and biggest sites where we used the 4745 switches. That was great. They are very useful and very easy to configure. It was not much trouble at all and we got a more stable network.

We have been very satisfied with using Cisco 2960 series X with EIGRP Cisco proprietary protocol. This saved us much money and worked very stably.

We also installed 47 and 3850 Switches to the main servers on the 10-gig in some places and Nexus devices using 40-gig connectivity.

We are less in the Cloud because the Cloud technologies didn't work so well. That happened in all of the companies where I've been engaged.

I have been using Cisco Ethernet Switches for a few months in my current position but I would say 20 years or more in other companies.

The stability is great. Some Aruba devices are more stable, but with Cisco, we never had problems, with some little exceptions. It is very stable.

It is very scalable.

In this company we have a single usage. I first started with Cisco routers in 1997, now we install Cisco routers all the time.

The technical support for the core switches especially, but for the rest as well, is very good. It's excellent support. Especially for the core switches we had 24/7 support. On some sites in Bulgaria we one time had a problem at midnight and they delivered that switch in time. They brought the switch very fast. Very good, excellent, technical support solution.

Also, with previous accounts with the pharmaceutical company we had access to a dedicated engineer for the project. We had access to their WAP environment. So, all told, tech support is brilliant.

I have used Aruba which is very similar to Cisco. It is also easy to manage and to install. Installing it is straightforward but I don't have too much experience with the priority. We were responsible for their LAN but they have some special requirements which we didn't touch. We didn't use all functionalities in the Aruba. We just used them as Layer 2 switches or as access switches on the main site, and on the bigger sites they had still some old HP switches.

Also, if I remember correctly, Comware had all those old HP switches. We used Aruba just as Layer 2 access devices and didn't use much of the functionalities.

I prefer Cisco. Of course, Aruba is cheaper overall but not necessarily for those small Layer 2 device access switches. I don't know what the price is now, I didn't compare each comparable device. If I had to choose, I would definitely go with the Cisco.

In terms of the initial setup, for me, with much experience, it's straightforward. With most of the switches we had a good team and prepared more than the configuration on the access sheet and then automatically generated the configuration file, just moved it to the note part, visually checking for a minute. Then copy, paste, and done. Start installing. Mounting and connecting. Straightforward.

It takes about one day for the device, if you don't count the cabling and the rack mounting and moving those and so on, and including the break, between 30 and 60 minutes, not more, for each switch. If they are stackable with some stack devices, for all of them, let's say an hour to hour and a half. Not more because we had all the configurations prepared in advance.

I you have a big client or if you have a big project and register it, the discount is good. In the companies that I have worked for, mostly for switching, we had a 55% discount or more. So with that good discount, who cares? It's cheap enough.

Cisco Ethernet Switches are appropriate for small and medium businesses. They also are large enough for our data centers which we had in Tel Aviv, Israel and in California. We had such big devices there.

On a scale of one to ten, I would give Cisco Ethernet Switches a 10.

I would advise others who are looking into implementing Cisco to buy and implement it.

I have been using the newest line of Cisco switches, the 9300 series, for two or three years.

We have two different models for deployment. One is the SDN deployment model, which has to do with Software-Defined Networking and is the more recent.

The other is the traditional three-tier, via core access aggregation layer five switches with an Independent Architecture Designed environment or access layer switches where you just use them to connect users to a specific service. It depends on what the nature of the work would be and the scope of work. But generally, most traditional networks have three layers. You have switches in a core of the network, switches in the distribution or aggregation layer, or switches in the access layer. This is the Three-tier module. If it is a collapsed core then it would be just simply the core and the access.

A primary use case is you could use it to connect mostly end-users and host systems. Systems could be servers, systems could be printers, systems could be telephones, and systems could be video conferencing equipment. That's one end use of it.

Another is the use in the data center. Ethernet Switches can be used in a data center out to provide connectivity, wired connectivity for servers, database systems, platforms, other platforms systems, and storage systems. With Ethernet you could have different speeds, so you can have Ethernet running at 1Gig, you can have Ethernet at 10Gig, you can have Ethernet at 40Gig, and you have Ethernet at 100Gig. So, depending on the nature of connectivity, you have that in the data center, you can have that also in an office environment. Then you go up to have it in industrial space, monitoring of industrial machines and control systems. So again, Ethernet is widely used.

There are several situations where these switches are used. Most times if they want to move off the main site, or they want to move locations, or they want to have temporary spaces, they can use a switch. Temporary means they may want to expand connectivity from their network to a small branch office that is temporary. Temporary means they're going to run something there for six months and then after that the business won't be there.

With switches, you can expand your network with a connection aside but you can extend your network to a particular area. You can also develop a campus network, campus meaning you may have one building in there and then the company acquires another building, and then it's easy to connect the two buildings together with Fiber and a switch if you have that available. 

There is also multi-tenancy, if you're in a building when you have multiple floors, it's easy to extend the premises from one floor to another floor using a switch as well.

In terms of projects, technical projects, they are several, I mean even down to connectivity to third parties inside the data center. For example, you may find out that you need to connect to BT or you need to connect to your telco provider. Switches will facilitate your ability to connect to a third party to allow communications between two separate environments that are managed differently.

I've done projects where the switches are also used for translation. For example, one part is using Fibre, the other part is using Ethernet, and the switch can be used to communicate between the two technologies. The switch will transform the physical characteristics of the link from Fiber to Ethernet.

There are two things about this solution that I find valuable. One valuable feature is that you can string a number of switches together, and the fact that there are various methods to connect them, such as by stacking. A stack means that they operate as one switch spot. You have multiple physical switches in the stack. For example, you could have one particular physical switch and you can have many of them all connected together as if they're one switch.

Another valuable feature is that the switches can operate at different layers of the networking environment. You can have switches that operate at layer three, you can have layer four switches and also obviously layer two, data layer, is their normal operation.

These switches are versatile. They can operate as a router, but they can also operate as a switch as well. The fact that you can run routing protocols on them, and you can also run data link protocols, means that they are quite versatile enough.

At the moment the switches that you have can't scale because they've got their control plane and data plane in the same device. The problem with that is you're limited to the number of switches you can string along because of limitations with VLAN. VLAN does have limitations, but with Software-Defined Networking there is no limitation. This is bringing about changes in the networking field that are long-needed. Ultimately, I would like to see all of the switches support SDN.

Switches should be made stackable, even if they are not of the same model. Now stacking is another technology that a lot of switches can benefit from, but not all switches are capable of stacking. There are some switches that are capable of stacking, but not all switches. As a rule, in my view, I feel stacking should work between different switches and at the moment it doesn't. For example, if you want to build a stack, all the switches in the stack have to be literally the same. So that another area of technology which could be different. You could stack switches, even if they're not exactly the same, but they have a way of operating such that they can work together. It would be nice because it means people don't have to throw away things just because they can't meet what they want.

I think this solution is very stable.

These switches have been around for a long time. Before that, all the technologies used couplers, which were called BNC connectors, network taps, all those things that existed. Couplers that existed before the arrival of Ethernet, they didn't last even two, three years, whereas Ethernet has been around for more than fifteen years.

Ethernet will continue to be around, and it's a very stable technology in terms of the operation. As well, Ethernet is the way forward, and it will still be around for another ten or fifteen years.

Ethernet does not scale very well because you've got distance limitations. Ethernet can only run for about one hundred meters or less, so you have to use Couplers. This distance limitation is why we use Fibre. Fibre optics is actually a better technology than Ethernet, but it's more expensive. Everything about it, the equipment, the nature of the way the Fibre cables are prepared, is a lot more expensive compared to Ethernet.

Ideally, everybody would like to run Fiber switches because it's a better technology that carries more bandwidth. The high price is due in part to the components. All the components that make Fibre work are expensive to produce. It can be relatively cheap for what we use it for but overall, it's way more expensive than Ethernet. If it wasn't for that then Fibre would have been the best solution. Ethernet, as it is right now, the cost price point for Ethernet is very good, so it won't be going anywhere fast soon. In terms of scalability, don't have limits. If you want to scale, you need to use Fiber to scale.

In terms of users, the organization right now has more than a thousand, and the previous one had approximately five thousand.

With respect to user roles, some are call center personnel, some platform systems guys, some are software developers, some project managers, some are marketing managers, some are sales managers, and some are professional services. Department-wise you have your legal, HR, and your finance department.

To my knowledge, our business is focused on doing work for clients so I expect that our usage of Ethernet Switches will be expanding.

The technical support for this solution is very good. They're very responsive.

I have also used the Meraki MX switches, but they are more like routers and used to support the wireless systems for Meraki.

With respect to the initial setup, the complexity depends on the topology. Most times they're not complicated. What's complicated is if you need to use them as a layer three switch, then you could have some complex configurations to do. However, if it's layer two, which is data layer connectivity only, then it's easy. If it's layer three then it's a little more challenging because you combine layer two and layer three and it could involve routing protocols. It's a lot more complex. 

Generally speaking, it depends on the manner in which you want to use the switch. Some deployments took maybe two weeks, some three days, some a month, and some even up to three months.

When it comes to my implementation strategy, first of all, you have to get the physical hardware into the data center or location where it needs to be. Make sure the right structured cabling was in place to connect this equipment so that it can work in that environment. Both from a power perspective and from a cabling perspective. I got to cable this switch to other systems and make sure that the right type of cabling is in place. Also, I have to make sure of the configurations that I'm going to use and get them organized upfront. In other words, I have the configurations I am going to put on a device and the software version. 

Another important thing is the software version. Make sure that the version is the appropriate one to put on there. Ensure that it doesn't have bugs or things, the type of configuration I want to put on there doesn't have bugs or anything that could impact the operation of those configurations.

After that is complete, I make sure that all of the connectors or transceivers that I've brought are the right type of transceivers for the systems. I'm able to connect them onto the network. Now that's just the physical connectivity.

There are other things you would do in implementation to test that the switch is working fine once it's operational. There are other tests that you conduct like Ping test, IP test, or whatever to show basic connectivity exists to that switch from the management perspective. You may also have tools, such as monitoring tools that you would use. You would also configure the monitoring tools to be able to recognize that particular device on the network and maybe things like memory, CPU, all the things to do with power, all these environmental conditions around that device are being monitored as well.

Then obviously you've got documentation as part of it. If you're putting a new set of equipment in there, the site probably has existing documentation that needs to be updated to reflect the fact that the typologies changed or you're introducing new equipment into that topology. In some cases, you've done this all upfront before you start the implementation. While in some cases, some companies, for the rush of time they want you to implement first and then do the documentation later. So again, it's still part of that strategy. Implementation wise, that's the approach you would go with in my opinion. Obviously there are different implementation approaches, and the stuff we're talking about here is just hardware.

I am a specialist, and in most cases, I handle the implementation and deployment.

The time I would use another person is if the data center was far away when it's not conceivable that I would travel to that location. I'd probably use somebody from the data center or use a data center engineer who would set up the hardware. He would put the hardware in the rack, the network cage, or rack where the equipment is going to be located. He would help me physically screw the equipment, take it out of the box, and connect it into the cage, and then I'd give him instructions on where to put cable or where to plug the various cables that come with the equipment. So once he's done that, I'm able to remotely connect to the device.

Those are remote working situations where you're not physically able to go to the site and do the work there. Then yes, I would work with other people sometimes and give them some instructions on what I want to have done at that location.

What is happening in the industry is that they are separating two things that traditionally held back the growth of switches, which is the control plane aspect of the switch from the data point. What you're finding is that the newer generation of switches, you can control them with a different device separately from the switch itself. In terms of the improvements, the improvements that are going on right now, Software Defined Networking creates the basis for you to have switches that can scale, and can scale very well.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.

We primarily use the solution in our data center or campus connectivity. We're using bridges to connect end-user devices and terminals.

The solution comes from a solid company that always offers good quality products. It's a real market leader in this area and can provide end-to-end solutions.  

The initial setup is straightforward. It's not too hard.

The product offers very good customer support. It's likely the best in the industry.

There is very good distribution around the globe. 

The products are very reliable.

A single switch is very easy to manage.

Cisco doesn't do everything 100% perfect. There are competitors that have developed simpler and cheaper options, for example. The solution really should offer better pricing. It would help them stay competitive.

The product is a bit difficult to manage as there's a different management system now.

The network management system could be improved. 

I've worked with the solution for 25 years now. I've used it for decades. I have a wealth of experience with this product.

The solution is quite stable. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable. The performance is good.

The product scales quite well. It works for any size organization. A company can also expand it out if they need to.

We have around 2,500 customers and half of them use Cisco.

Technical support is excellent. It's the best in the industry.

As an implementor, I've worked with a variety of solutions, including Aruba, Mellanox, Juniper, Ruckus, and more. I've worked with most of the vendors in the industry.

The initial setup is not overly complex. It's pretty straightforward. 

The deployment depends. It can take from a couple of minutes to a couple of months. It depends on the project and it depends on the size of the network.

How many people you need for the deployment depends on the size of the job. Some companies have their own on-site engineers.

The solution does not come cheap. It's quite pricey.

You do need a license in order to use the solution.

I work with the latest version of the solution. I'm an implementor and my company is a Cisco Gold partner.

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

We use Cisco Ethernet Switches as part of our network infrastructure at two different sites.

Cisco switches has helped provide efficient and stable switching in the organization. Once configured and setup right they work fine without any worries and has helped free up resources to concentrate on other tasks. 

I love the fact that they can be configured to do exactly what you need them to do, which in my opinion is what anyone with Cisco experience would enjoy doing. They can be set up and configured nicely.

Ease of configuration for none cisco experts would be an improvement.

Pricing can also do with some improvement to make it more competitive with competitor products with similar functionality.

We have been using cisco switches for over ten years.

This is a stable product.

Cisco switches are scalable. I manage two large sites and at the first site, we have about 200 people. The second site has about 300 people. We do not have any plan to expand, per se. I do have plans to upgrade the switches and probably redesign the environment for better efficiency. 

Cisco has a good technical support and I love they way the come in to help when you are doing a research on their site. I have not had any serious need for cisco technical support and so I would not be in the best position to give a conclusive evaluation of this but I must say they do a good job with their certifications so people would need very little of such services.  For a few minor challenges I was also able to get answers from the cisco forums. There is a pretty good database online for any conceivable problems one would face with the cisco switches.

We did not use a different solution prior to this, although we are going to be buying a few Meraki switches that we will add to our environment. We are going to test them to see how well they work with Cisco.

The initial set was complex. When I came into the project, the features were just put in with no consideration, whatsoever. This meant that I had to start from scratch to design the network, draw up the configurations and setup vlans to easily manage the network.

It was implemented in-house.

The price of the product is on the higher side, I feel you pay for the  name of the product as well but it's still manageable for corporate customers. Licensing is simple and straight forward which is something going well for cisco switches.

My advice is that if you are going to be implementing Cisco then you should at least have someone in the organization who is knowledgeable and can manage the features. The alternative is to use Meraki because they are easier to manage.

We have some pretty old switches in our environment and some of them are only 100 megabits. I would like to upgrade them all to at least one-gigabit.

Some of our uplinks are on ethernet, but I want to upgrade them to fiber to improve the performance.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

All Ethernet switches come in various sizes and capabilities. For example, we can have a 12-port switch, a 24-port switch, or even a 48-port switch with multiple fiber up-links. Additionally, there are different feature sets depending on the brand and model, such as IP services, LAN-based, or IP-based. Stacking is only possible with similar feature sets, which means two 9300 switches may not be stackable, but up to eight of the same model may. Additionally, the iOS and feature set capabilities may differ between the same models. All of the switches are Ethernet, but the features they are equipped with vary, which means they will operate differently. For example, a LAN-based switch will only work at primarily layer 2, whereas IP services works more as a router with features such as NAT, multicast, dynamic routing, QOS, and other additional and advanced services.

Generally, we use the switches to provide LAN access to endpoints (workstations, cameras, wireless access points, IP phones, and so on).

In most projects awarded to my organization, we used Cisco Ethernet switches.

The most valuable feature of the solution is its stability and durability. There is no other alternative solution that is as stable as Cisco Ethernet Switches. We can expect Cisco Ethernet Switches to last for years without issue.

We often face issues with Cisco software, and while they do release patches to fix bugs, I believe they need to improve. Huawei, one of Cisco's competitors, is better in this regard. While I'm not a fan of Huawei due to my environment, clients insist on using it because it is cheaper. Despite this, I think Cisco could improve its software. Cisco should strive to improve the software for its switches. To make the switch more user-friendly, Cisco should create a system where a user can simply connect their cable and access the GUI interface without needing to configure the device first on the CLI.

I have been using the solution for nine years.

The solution is very stable.

The solution is highly scalable.

We have a good TAC support experience.

Neutral

The initial setup of a Cisco switch is straightforward for those who are technically inclined. This is because most Cisco switches are manned, meaning they require some configuration on the command line interface (CLI) before access to the graphical user interface (GUI) is granted. With a basic knowledge of the Cisco CLI, setup should take approximately 20-30 minutes.

The pricing is comparatively expensive.

I give the solution a nine out of ten.