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Cisco Wireless pros and cons

Vendor: Cisco

4.1 out of 5

151 reviews
88% willing to recommend

4,466 followers

Pros & Cons summary

Cisco Wireless offers robust security features and integration with Identity Services Engine, but enhancements are needed in security and third-party integration. While praised for stability and ease of configuration, complexity in licensing and high costs are significant drawbacks. CleanAir and RRM enhance performance, yet issues with interference and coverage exist. Despite the cost, reliable performance in high mobility environments and responsive support make it attractive for those prioritizing network reliability and template deployment.

Buyer's Guide

Get pricing advice, tips, use cases and valuable features from real users of this product.

Prominent pros & cons

PROS

Cisco Wireless is highly stable and reliable, offering seamless connectivity and mobility.

The security features and Identity PSK save SSIDs and enhance user experience.

CleanAir and RRM optimize signal quality and interference detection.

The integration with Cisco ISE provides comprehensive network security and management.

Cisco Wireless offers great scalability and support for IoT applications.

CONS

Pricing is considered high compared to other competitors, making it difficult for small companies to afford.

Licensing is complex and challenging, creating frustration for users who require a simpler and more straightforward process.

Cisco Wireless struggles with interference and coverage issues, impacting the reliability and performance of the network.

There are notable stability concerns, particularly with new firmware releases, affecting environments with diverse AP types.

Security system's alertness and response capabilities need improvement to effectively detect and respond to intrusions.

Cisco Wireless Pros review quotes

LM

Network Engineer at County of victoria

Sep 9, 2021

It always runs, and it's very reliable in terms of performance.

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Division Head Enterprise Infrastructure (SVP) at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees

Feb 22, 2022

Wireless connectivity is the main feature. It is also securely integrated with ISE, which is valuable because, in the banking industry, we also cover the security aspect. This Wi-Fi controller integrates with the ISE system that we have. Every user that comes on the wireless needs to log in with the domain. If they don't, it will not allow the user to join the network. This is the key feature of this solution.

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Team Lead - Network and System Engineer at a non-tech company with 501-1,000 employees

Mar 22, 2018

This product has a Clean Air Solution, which means it can detect non-WiFi signals. It not only signals but it can also detect that what type of device it is coming from. And if it needs to change the channel in order to avoid that unwanted signal, it can do so and that way the client machine will have better performance.

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reviewer1486461

Technology Specialist at a consultancy with 1-10 employees

Feb 19, 2021

The CleanAir features and the fast transition.

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JM

Engineer at Comunidad Cristiana Misioneros San Wenceslao

Dec 20, 2021

The integration is great.

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HH

Coordinator of the IT Department at College Notre-Dame

Feb 9, 2021

Overall, Cisco was stable and worked well for all our needs until we started having more and more students and teachers using YouTube and Zoom — what with classes being isolated and everything — which put a lot of strain on our Wi-Fi network.

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DD

Domagoj Dujmić

Network engineer at Teva Pharmaceuticals

Oct 25, 2022

The solution is scalable.

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HS

Himanshu Singhal

Sr. System Analyst at NSUT

Jun 28, 2020

The feature that I have found most valuable is its durability because we can rely on this solution. It is also easy to configure. Lastly, if something happens, we get good support from Cisco.

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Ravi Ramachandran

Senior Manager at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees

Sep 2, 2019

Our organization has improved using this product because it helps enhance user experience. We use video communication a lot, like Skype. We used to get a lot of interference before and had a lot of issues during wireless voice or video calls. We get greater speed and performance with wireless now. It is nearly the same as a wired network.

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CEO at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Aug 22, 2018

Authentication is the important feature for us. My IT staff no longer has to look after catering to clients who come from overseas.

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Cisco Wireless Cons review quotes

LM

Network Engineer at County of victoria

Sep 9, 2021

Their software's really clunky.

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Division Head Enterprise Infrastructure (SVP) at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees

Feb 22, 2022

The main concern is the length and overlapping. We have to put on four to six access points on the same floor, and we face the issue of overlapping areas. If Cisco can extend the range of their indoor APs, we would need to install just one or two access points, and it would eliminate the problem of the overlapping area.

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Team Lead - Network and System Engineer at a non-tech company with 501-1,000 employees

Mar 22, 2018

If needs to provide more visibility. It can detect and do it, but as technicians we don't have a lot of visibility into seeing exactly what's happening. It doesn't give us a lot of log information for us to troubleshoot. They probably have additional software you need to purchase to get that kind of information. But I think not all companies can afford additional software to see those kinds of details. So if the wireless controller already had, built-in, those types of things for the technician or wireless engineer, it would be more attractive for the end-user.

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Free Report: Cisco Wireless Reviews and More

Learn what your peers think about Cisco Wireless. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2025.

831,158 professionals have used our research since 2012.

reviewer1486461

Technology Specialist at a consultancy with 1-10 employees

Feb 19, 2021

I wouldn't mind if Cisco allowed their premiere devices to be able to have that cloud-based support as well, or cloud-based management.

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JM

Engineer at Comunidad Cristiana Misioneros San Wenceslao

Dec 20, 2021

There's a delay in equipment that comes to Columbia, to our country, and that lasts almost six months.

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HH

Coordinator of the IT Department at College Notre-Dame

Feb 9, 2021

The biggest reason why we could no longer continue with Cisco Wireless was because of the high cost to upgrade everything. It was disappointing that Cisco treated us as just another big company, and did not offer any leeway on their pricing given that we are an educational institute. And although the system we had in place from Cisco Wireless was good enough over the last ten years, it started to show its age when pushed to its limit during the pandemic.

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DD

Domagoj Dujmić

Network engineer at Teva Pharmaceuticals

Oct 25, 2022

The current issue with Cisco is I don't have centralized management.

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HS

Himanshu Singhal

Sr. System Analyst at NSUT

Jun 28, 2020

One thing which we really don't like about Cisco is that it is very expensive.

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Ravi Ramachandran

Senior Manager at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees

Sep 2, 2019

The product could be improved with interference reduction. Because wireless frequency interferes with microwave or Bluetooth technologies, this causes issues. A lot of users still use legacy wireless adapters and black box and they do not experience the speed that they could get using the latest technologies. The number of devices on the market makes wireless communications complex. If the problem of interference could be resolved it would further improve utility and ease of system design.

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Mgr - Applications Enterprise Applications at a healthcare company with 10,001+ employees

Oct 29, 2021

It's very scalable, but when you shift gears sometimes, you have to do more work than people anticipate.

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Show 10 more reviews (out of 124)

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