Meraki MS Switches Reviews

I am a customer of Meraki. 

A good feature of Meraki is that you can access a single pane of glass and you can configure all the devices via the same access and just change the menus.

This product doesn't enable a local configuration without internet access. If you compare this product to Fortinet the granularity of blocks that you can do related to the firewall and reports that you can deliver and control about blocking all access on Fortinet is more than Meraki. And when you talk about number of WANs that you can put on the device, Meraki can have only two WANs and when you have Fortinet you can have at least six sources of WAN.

I rate this solution a 10 out of 10. 

There are many use cases for the solution. We implement them mainly for SMEs.

The switches, overall, are very good.

The newest switches, in particular, are excellent.

The initial setup is simple.

The problem that we saw with some customers is that it's very hard to train them to manage everything on the cloud, and some customers don't want this. 

The firewall is not very powerful. The other week, one of the switches only gave one gigabit of output. It's become a concern for our customers.

It is very difficult to know what we should do. There should be a queue available to connect over the VPN. However, there was a lack of an image in the other queue. Once, when a customer wanted to tour the system, there were issues with connectivity to the VPN, which was offputting. 

The solution is very stable. We've tested it extensively and it's very good. It's also quite fast. A company doesn't have to fear reliability with Meraki. They shouldn't expect to deal with bugs or glitches. It's reliable.

The scalability is very good on the backend. We've even run some stress tests to see how the solution would hold up to expansion and have had great results. If an organization needs to scale up, they can do so with Meraki. It's not a problem at all.

The solution offers okay technical support. Users need pretty good access to senior engineers on the technical support team. Sometimes you have really bad errors on the site and you need very advanced help. A more junior technical support staff member will not be able to assist. Meraki needs to continue to work to ensure senior staff is available to deal with those levels of calls as they happen. A user expects to have a senior engineer to take the question from the beginning to the end if big issues arise.

Last week or last month we had an issue where we really needed a senior engineer and the support staff we got originally didn't know how to answer our questions. We had to pay for a more senior engineer.

We also use Aruba and HPE switches. We use a combination.

We've found the setup to be very straightforward.

On the promotion side, the marketing team will help when something goes wrong. You can write to someone at the company and they can help troubleshoot any issues as soon as something comes up.

Typically, it only takes about one day to deploy a switch. For a simple deployment, we just take it and connect it to the new port, and then we just connect everything to the computer. It's very easy. We haven't had issues or complications.

We're an integrator; we implement the solution for our clients.

We typically sign contracts for years as opposed to yearly. One year might be a bit expensive, but if you choose a long-term contract, it's very good. The pricing is very good. It's quite competitive in the marketplace. There are others that are much more expensive than this product. It's affordable, even for small companies.

We're an integrator. We tend to test things before we send them to our customers.

We are a very small company, we are constantly looking for competitive pricing, as we don't have big budgets to throw around.

The solution is very good. From using the software to deployment, Meraki is good. Even enterprises would benefit from using the solution. Although we typically deal with smaller companies, I'd pick Meraki every time.

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten. I would rate it higher, however, we have unique needs for the VPN, and require complex software features

The solution is a cloud-based switch that we use for our networks.

Easy access to the solution is the most valuable feature.

The price of the solution has room for improvement.

I have been using the solution for three months.

I give the stability a ten out of ten.

The solution is highly scalable.

We have around 1,000 people accessing the solution per day.

The technical support is good.

The initial setup is straightforward. We only had to prepare the template early to deploy.

The implementation is completed in-house.

We have an annual subscription for licensing and it is expensive.

I give the solution a nine out of ten.

Meraki MS Switches makes work easier and I recommend the solution.

We are using these switches to provide internet access to our users. They connect the access points.

The dashboard and the interface, in general, are good features. We can work globally and anybody can log in from our web-based console to use it. Everything from switches to access points can be used from a single dashboard.

We had some dashboard licensing issues, maybe because their method of collecting data from the user needs to be more streamlined. It seems that they have collected information from the vendor, but perhaps there is not a proper SOP regarding this.

They collected some vague information that was registered and when it came to us, we found out that they didn't use our proper email address. As a result, licensing became an issue. It was only resolved after we contacted them and changed the details of the registration. Consequently, there was a long delay before we started using it.

When I registered the system in India, there was no problem. However, in the UAE, the vendors were not collecting and properly verifying the details. The need to streamline the licensing data collection process to fix this.

As a manufacturer, or OEM, they might be doing their part correctly, but the vendors might be losing the data. So, they need to be strict on their vendors to collect the information properly. Or, they need to at least contact the people, the end-users, and verify that it is correct. As it is now, they just depend on the vendors' data. Before they register it, they need to contact the customer directly with the data and verify it. Ideally, some kind of SOP should be there.

With no SOP in place, the question becomes one of what happens when Cisco takes the data from the vendor and registers the product, but doesn't verify it by contacting the customer. This can happen in cases where the vendor is in a hurry to sell the product. In fact, they might fill in bogus data and give it to Cisco. Then, once the customer gets the product and starts to configure it, they get the licensing issue like we did, which is the first step in the process. The fails only because the data given by the vendor is wrong, and it's not the fault of the customer.

If instead, Cisco verified the details with the customer again, once they receive the data, it would be better. As I suggest this, it might seem like a slow process, but in today's world, it is not. They can contact the customer directly, using the provided email or mobile number. They can call them, verify the details, and it will be good for both Cisco and the customer.

We have been using Meraki MS Switches for approximately six months.

It is pretty stable so far, but we really only just started using it so I may have more comments in another year or so.

Scalability is something that we'll determine in the long term. At this time, we have between 30 and 50 users. It can scale up to 60.

I have not yet dealt with technical support.

Previously, we used MR access points and we liked the user interface. We wanted to extend that to our switches. At the time, the switches were web-managed but they were not under the same dashboard. Switching to Cisco and Meraki brought everything together, from switches to access points, into a single dashboard.

I was involved in the installation and found that it was straightforward. The deployment took between one and a half and two hours, although we still had the problem with the licensing. That was a long wait.

Our deployment team consisted of three people. There was one person on-site, another in India, and one in the UK.

We are just about to do some configuration with these switches.

This product is quite expensive. The vendor might be cashing in on the dashboard because it's attractive, and nobody else is providing such a sophisticated dashboard. It has the IP, switches, routers, security cameras, and everything else included in one place. So, while the product is expensive, the features they provide are unmatchable.

This is a product that I recommend for others.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

We are a system integrator and this is one of the solutions that we provide to our customers.

This is a very easy solution to deploy.

The management is cloud-based so you do not have to be on-premises to work with it.

It is easy to configure using the cloud-accessible web-based interface.

The licensing would be improved if shorter terms were offered.

There is not much training available for this solution.

Better online and remote support is needed.

I would like to see support for IoT.

We need to be able to add an access point without requiring an additional controller.

This solution is quite stable but you must coordinate with a remote site where engineers have administrative access to the features. This makes it easy to repair in case of an emergency.

I have two or three projects that are using this solution. One of them has twenty-five hundred users.

The initial setup of this solution is straightforward as long as you have a good technical person. 

The DNA subscription is a three-year minimum term.

This solution is better than the Cisco Catalyst switches.

This is a solution that I definitely recommend but since it has limited information available on the web site, it is a bit difficult to configure the licensing.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

Our primary use case of Switches is for controlling and monitoring the clients. I'm a senior consultant and design engineer and we are partners of Meraki. 

A valuable feature is the console of the dashboard which is pretty integrated. It's also easy for the client to monitor their dashboard. 

I think the cameras should be better integrated so that clients can review real time images on the dashboard. That's a basic feature.

I've been using this solution for a year. 

It's a pretty stable solution and there was no difficulty integrating the products to one dashboard. 

The scalability of the solution is excellent. 

It's somewhat difficult to contact technical support, there are several manual steps involved. If you don't know the process, it can take time. 

The initial setup was not complex. 

I would rate this solution a 10 out of 10. 

Our primary use case of this solution is for connecting desktops to LAN.

I like the feature that allows us to copy conditions from one port to another.

I would like to see some automation and better integration with the editing tool.

The solution has been very stable so far.

For our current state, the solution has good scalability. We have around 400 users in our company. We use five people for maintenance. We don't have immediate plans to increase our usage, but perhaps after four or five years. 

The technical support is a good four out of five. Sometimes it takes some time for them to respond. Perhaps because of a backlog. But they always deal with the issues. 

The initial setup was straightforward and the entire process took maybe four or five hours. We did it ourselves.

We pay an annual subscription fee.

My advice to others would be to try the solution. Most of the features are cloud-based so it's easy to manage it from anywhere - even from your mobile. I rate the solution an eight out of ten. There are still some developments that need to be done. It's not perfect. But from a personal perspective, I can say that they are a good eight. Additional features that I would like to see included in the next release of this solution, is if they could create different teams for different standards, some API integration solutions, and other different applications. It could be easier to use and easier to implement. Perhaps they can also add automation.

We deploy the solution on-premises.

The solution is very stable.

The pricing of the solution can be improved.

We have been using this solution for approximately two years and are currently using version MX64.

The solution is scalable. There are currently seven people using it in our organization.

We have had a good experience with customer service and support.

I rate the solution seven out of ten. The solution is good, but the pricing can be improved.