Citrix SD-WAN [EOL] Reviews

We are helping our customers create secure and redundant networks. That's the primary use case.

It’s helped my clients. For example, we did multiple roll-outs. The other banks, bank branches, require good connectivity, which is very important for a branch to have. They managed to have an SLA of almost 100%. In the case of network failures, they had very few issues, and most of the links, since they were on a traditional network, used active-passive. However, with this product, they could aggregate the bandwidth and come up with new use cases. The customers are really happy.

They have a zero downtime failover mechanism, where, when there's a link failure or a link weakness, or bad link conditions, they provide the ability to fail back seamlessly. That's the most important feature I have worked with.

The initial setup is pretty seamless.

The solution is stable.

It’s scalable.

Right now, certain SD-WAN vendors work with very strong enterprise-scale firewall features. For example, Fortinet is what most of my customers prefer to have. However, in terms of Citrix, they had minimal features. Now, they have improved things. That's an area where Citrix has to improve since Citrix is not a security company. They rely on other vendors like Zscaler. Overall, network security and next-generation firewall features are areas that they can improve on.

We have worked with them for around five years.

We haven’t had any real issues with stability. We put it in for countrywide operations, however, and we expected there would be a lot of returns. There are actually very few, and even these returns were out of Citrix's control. For example, we had a few appliances return back due to lightning and the resulting power surges. Besides that, we rarely have failures, so the client is happy.

In my case, my geography is relatively small. I operate in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and the Maldives - these kinds of countries. Here, we don't have many installations over 1,000. That said, Citrix can very easily go beyond 1,000 branches and endpoints. They have large scalable models also. For my use cases, they are scalable enough.

The customers who are using the solution 100% rely on it, at least for the branch connectivity. They are not quite keen to use inter-data-center use cases, such as WAN optimization. However, in terms of my customers, they use it 100% in most cases. We have helped some customers to improve their application performance with this solution. Most customers ask from our side from a traditional SD-WAN whether they can move to a zero-trust network. It was the evolution of Citrix. We are helping and educating our customers, et cetera.

Customer service is really good. We have had a few tech support cases. We had to do some version upgrades where we had some challenges. However, the tech support is really good. I have worked across many products, for example, for Extender Top, XenServer, et cetera. The Citrix team has been extra helpful.

Positive

My customers used the traditional BGP routing base on a normal Cisco-based solution. So this is the evolution of new tech for them. They are moving from traditional interest to SD-WAN.

We recommend products like Meraki and Fortinet. Fortinet is good, especially for some hospitality customers. We find it quite interesting. In terms of Fortinet, the customers are really keen since their CPs are very cost-efficient, so they have a big advantage in TC when compared with Citrix. Especially Fortinet, people like it due to the security advantage, and Fortinet is influencing this market in terms of network security.

Once we do the base configuration or the head setup and then the configuration, then we can send an L2 team to do the deployment with very few instructions. We ask them just to plug in the cables and download their profiles. It's quite seamless. My customers evolved from a traditional BGP environment. For them, this is quite seamless. They are happy, and the operational overhead is also lower for them.

For a single customer, the effort involved in the deployment varies. Maybe a five-man team could very easily manage the network since the failures are lower, and they also have this failover feature where even when the branch is down, they can still help the customer. Five or six people would be sufficient to manage and maintain everything. With Citrix cloud coming in and analytics help, you won’t need a big team. It's quite proactive, and not quite reactive. The number of people required is relatively low to maintain everything.

We do the deployment ourselves.

There are multiple pricing options. They have an MSP model also. However, we deployed the channel or the normal appliance model. Of course, it has been three to four years on the same price point. I'm not quite sure of the price ranges. Roughly, the hidden devices can scale up to $20K for one appliance. However, the branch CPs are USD $1,000 to $2,500.

We get everything under the list price. However, especially if you are thinking of having a branch internet breakout, then sometimes you might have to get another solution like Zscaler or Symantec for the proxy of internet security.

I’m just an end-user.

I used to work for a Citrix partner, so we were the Citrix regular partner. Right now, in my present job, I'm not affiliated with them.

What we used is the on-prem deployment. They have certain companies on the cloud. However, it's pretty much on-prem for this solution.

Potential users should ask Citrix to give firm commitments regarding product life cycles and changes. Usually, Citrix is undergoing a lot of changes internally. Their product directions change, product names change, and many things change. So Users need to check, especially if they are modernizing the network.

I’d rate the solution seven out of ten.

As the top manager and core engineer in my company working to secure job sites, I used a demonstration version of Citrix SD-WAN to enhance the communication between our branches and data centers. Specifically, it has been used to connect single branches with multiple data centers, where communication can flow quickly across them all. So, with Citrix SD-WAN, the primary use case is the provision of wide internet access from the data centers into our branches, as well as letting us manage the IT services through the cloud. 

Previously, we had simply been using direct internet access in each branch, but we realized that our internet usage would be more normalized with Citrix SD-WAN. Our hardware devices are on-premises, of course, but the SD-WAN management is now done on the cloud.

The reason why we went with Citrix SD-WAN came about when we were looking to integrate one of our branches with the rest of the company in a simpler, more centralized manner. We wanted an easy integration solution that would let us deploy connectivity to a branch with only a few clicks, and so we tried Citrix SD-WAN. When deploying Citrix SD-WAN, we found that we could deploy very easily with a simple installation template, and it helped us clear up the configuration to get everything up and running.

The main advantage of Citrix SD-WAN is that it enables fast communication between our branches and data centers. And, with its cloud management features, it also makes the process of adding new branches into our company network much easier.

Another reason why I like this solution is because it ensures the smooth and effective operation of the company's POS software. 

Given that Citrix SD-WAN solved all our problems by providing us with everything we needed to unify communications with our branches and data centers, I cannot suggest anything further in terms of improvements.

I have used Citrix SD-WAN for three months.

It is stable.

It's a scalable solution. Once you've deployed it in the cloud, it's very flexible and can be adapted to your needs.

I think their support system works very well, and we were also working with a local reseller which was a good experience.

We were trying some other vendors at the same time that seemed to fit the job, but we had to help those vendors too much in trying to come up with a solution for us.

The setup was incredibly easy. The hardest part of the job was having to deploy during the day. However, with the configuration template we used, the deployment was a breeze.

Our communication with the vendor support was highly interactive and, in total, it took us only a day or two to deploy.

As a team of five members, we deployed Citrix SD-WAN in-house without the help of a third-party reseller team.

As for maintenance, we promoted one staff member to handle physical intervention and another for configuration.

I believe that Citrix SD-WAN is a good investment, but I do not have the information to be more specific.

I am not aware of the details of the licensing cost in this case because I was only trying it out.

The functionality of Citrix SD-WAN is awesome and I fell in love with it on this deployment because it's so easy to use. It has everything that I need, I know what what works and what doesn't, and it has great flexibility in terms of management.

I would rate Citrix SD-WAN a ten out of ten.

Our use case was for a distributed network. We have customers around Russia, and a customer in the Far East had infrastructure with about 5,000 kilometers between each branch. We needed to create some kind of network that was distributed through data and media or big files. The Far East isn't very stable territory, so we had to use a low-level network and create a good result in data transmission.

It was a retail company, so there were branches, and the branches needed to connect to HQ. We provided HQ and each branch with Citrix SD-WAN. We tried to use it, and it worked well. The transmission was good, and they were losing less data.

The solution is deployed on our customers' hardware.

The stability is the main feature of Citrix SD-WAN. You can also upgrade the data packages or have less transmission.

The price is the only thing that could be improved. Citrix is not a cheap solution.

I have been using this solution for one year.

The solution was stable.

We haven't used the Citrix tech support because we have our own support.

I think the ROI is okay. You have to spend a large amount of money at first, but you could see ROI in 3-5 years. It's a good proposal.

The license was a one-time purchase. It's expensive.

I would rate this solution 10 out of 10.

It is used to get connectivity between our branches. In terms of the version, we are using version 10.1, and we have different SD-WAN devices.

The reliability of connectivity is most valuable.

I am happy with this product. If anything, its price can be reduced. It is a bit expensive.

I have been using this solution for about six years.

It is very stable. 

It is scalable. We've got about 250 users in the company. We don't have any plans to increase its usage.

They have been okay to work with. I am satisfied with their support.

We didn't use any other solution previously.

I don't know about the setup. I had a consultant set it up for me. For its deployment and maintenance, we just have one person.

It is a bit expensive. A cheaper product would be good, but everybody likes things to be cheaper.

We bought the devices up front, and then we pay for the annual support.

It is not a cheap product but it serves. I would rate it a nine out of 10.

Our primary use case is for stability and redundancy on connectivity from the branch offices to the company head office data centre. We have a head office and six remote branches. Most of the applications we deliver to the branches are through terminal services. This includes the EPR system, Microsoft Dynamics-AX. Everything is hosted on-prem. When a line between the branch office and the head office was down the branch could not operate. For most sales orders we have a 4 business hour turnaround time from order to delivery. So when a line is down we were losing sales. SD-WAN has prevented this almost completely. 

Downtime for branch offices is now almost zero. We have 100% real-time visibility into all of our lines. MPLS links have been replaced with lower-cost links, saving a larger percentage of line costs. Overall, I see SD-WAN as a must. And the Citrix SD-WAN product has delivered on expectations and exceeded them. (With later firmware updates we now have good firewall capabilities in the product too.). In one specific notable case that was an outage at an upstream provider that would have taken our Cape Town office offline. And this was on the first of the month when we process bulk orders. The branch did not even know the line was down thanks to SD-WAN. 

Lines run Active-Active. So we get better bandwidth usage i.e.we don't have backup lines sitting idle. We see the state of all lines all the time i.e. we don't have backup lines that are broken, that we only discover when a primary line fails. (This has happened even when we had an MPLS network). Downtimes on lines result in a loss of business. This is inevitable given that we run all applications through terminal applications from the head office data centers.  In the 4 years running SD-WAN, we have only had 1 branch offline due to line failures where the backup line could not cope with the additional load. 

The firewall reporting could be easier to use and filter. (It works well enough, but if I need to give an area for improvement, I think this would be it.). The built-in reporting on the product in this regard is not great. You can get a much more detailed reporting analysis using the SD-WAN center that is configurable with the product. If the additional reporting capabilities were bundled into the Master Controller Node, it would make the solution more appealing, and add better value from day one.

I have been using Citrix SD-WAN for four years. 

We have used an external consultant, (Troye) to complete the set-up. Between Troye and Citrix South Africa we were in excellent hands from beginning to end. The requirements were drafted between KOLOK, Troye the partner and Citrix South Africa.  We had very qualified consultants on site for the cut-over.  It was a smooth migration.  There were a few complex issues that came from how the ISP had configured routing in the MPLS.  These issues were resolved by Citrix.  We have subsequently removed all MPLS links. 

Easy under 18 months.

If I was going to look at this project again now, I would investigate the option of using virtual appliances rather then physical appliances. I don't know enough about this option, but I think it would have some cost and give better DR options.  

We looked at the Cisco product at the time. (Briefly). But we found the Citrix product to be better because it uses a packet by packet switching, where as the Cisco apparently switched session by session to the best line. This was some time back, and I have not looked at the Cisco product since.

I used to stress about line failures. MPLS was not working for me. MPLS gave me no visibility into the line redundancy. And MPLS is very expensive. SD-WAN was an easy choice for me.  Citrix has delivered. 

The primary use case of this solution is to provide interconnectivity between branches and optimize the connection.

The most valuable feature is load balancing. This feature allows for multiple links on one device which is a lifesaver when dealing with load shedding.

I would like to see more customization to adjust for the WAN lock-out due to our unexpected power outages.

I have been using the solution for one year.

The solution is stable. We only require two people for maintenance. 

The solution is extremely scalable.

The support is excellent with quick response times and resolution.

The initial setup is straightforward as long as you are familiar with the solution.

The implementation was completed in-house.

Before choosing the solution I evaluated Juniper Networks and Cisco Meraki.

I rate the solution ten out of ten.

The solution is brilliant, the way it calculates its paths and trails is great.

The hands-on customer support and load balancing that come with this solution are above all others on the market. 

I recommend the solution, especially for organizations based in areas that suffer from load shedding. 

We offer this solution mainly to retail companies that have many sites and want to connect between them without relying on an MPX or a fiber connection. With SD-WAN, they have all the features and benefits they need to send live streaming information to the database and to headquarters without requiring a server at each site. Our other clients have various sites with just one type of communication, say a radio or a mobile network. SD-WAN helps them to combine and get a better bandwidth to balance all their applications and services. I'm a reseller and I make demos with the product. We are partners with Citrix and our company is based in Ecuador. 

I like that SD-WAN allows you to combine two asymmetrical connections. Citrix provides more options than other solutions so you can balance the amount of bandwidth to any of your applications or solutions that need prioritizing, in addition to putting a hold on things that might block in a communication cut-off or some other event. It provides a more fluid experience to end-users when they're using their applications or desktops. It's user-friendly and easier to manage especially for those who don't have much knowledge about the minutiae of the product. I think Citrix is better than Cisco's solution.

I think the price can be improved, particularly in third world countries such as Ecuador where companies don't have the budget to implement expensive products. Citrix is a very complete solution, but the price is not in line with our market. It would be great if they could come up with a budget product. Cisco provides an inexpensive solution and Citrix could compete with that even if it doesn't have all the features of SD-WAN. I think it would catch on quickly in Latin America.

I've been supplying this solution to our customers for two years. 

The solution is very scalable. One of our clients started out very small and implementing didn't require any more of an investment than they would have had to make with another MPX communication system or a radio system. They worked with what they had, and then implemented more and more solutions and connected them to their headquarters with a good result.

Citrix support is tricky in Ecuador. The people assigned to our region are not very well organized. As a result, we now certify our technicians so they can provide support to our clients. They carry out the updates and any patching and deal with any configuration improvements that can be made. Our clients are very happy with what we provide and give us good reviews. We have clients who have bought Citrix from other companies but they come to us for support. 

For a certified user, the setup is very simple. I'm not involved in deployment but they say that it's very easy to implement. It only requires the setting up of some policies and the solution works. We have two engineers who deal with implementation. 

I would suggest getting to know your core business solutions, knowing which are the important solutions or apps that could be improved in terms of communications, and then just balancing it through SD-WAN with any kind of communication that they already have. It doesn't require a larger budget to put in place various symmetrical communications. 

Licensing costs aside, I would rate this solution 10 out of 10.

We use this product to improve the security of our network.

We also use it to monitor and control the endpoints that we have.

The best feature is the backup capability, where all of the users' computers are tied into a central data repository.

The documentation is good.

Citrix should continue to offer a perpetual licensing model because it is very important to us.

I have been using Citrix SD-WAN for eight months.

We have approximately 60 users.

I have not been in contact with technical support. We found that the documentation is adequate and we were able to follow all of the instructions.

We have not used another similar solution in the past.

The installation process is very easy and it does not take long to set up.

We deployed it with our in-house team. We have two software administrators in the team.

We have a perpetual license, which is very important because it allows us to manage our costs, rather than having a monthly or yearly subscription. A yearly license is okay except that we consider software an asset, which means that we need a perpetual license.

The price of the subscription should be cheaper.

I would rather pay three-to-five times more for a perpetual license than pay for a subscription because the lifecycle will be between five and seven years. After seven years, we will try to look for another solution. If Citrix is still top-notch then we would update to the most recent version.

Citrix is a good product so I have not looked at other options.

This is a good product and I recommend it. I'm going to continue using it unless something new is offered by a competitor at a cheaper price. I that case, I may switch.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.