Alcatel-Lucent OmniAccess Wireless Access Points vs. Cisco 8540 Wireless Controller

One of best use cases for using OmniAccess Wire Access Point is where we have dense no. of users as client associated capacity is very good. Also one of the use case is when administrator wants different PSK for each user for authentication. OmniAccess WAP supports in better way.

[Cisco 8540 Wireless Controller's] software quality has been shed in recent years. The only problem I have with it is its inability to work with older Cisco Access Points. However, that's to be expected for any deployment. While the controller's UI works well, some areas could be improved. API integrations lack flexibility. [I feel] it's time for policy redesign. It can be a little difficult to determine coding quality.

Incentivized

• Flexibility in terms of deployment, management
• Better security feature
• Application awareness ,WIPS
• DPSK
• Better client associated count

• The GUI on the Cisco 8540 WLC is much better designed than other Cisco products. Its easy to navigate between the different settings to find what is needed.
• The AP groups allows touching multiple APs at one time.
• It also allows us to create standard SSIDs that can be used at all sites that connect back to it, this saves a lot of time instead of hitting each site with a local controller.

Incentivized

• No of Interfaces
• must have a variety in terms of MIMO
• better throughput

• Code quality is a bit hit and miss. This will be great for a while, then things will be bad for a while, then we'll do it again. The UI of the controller works, but could do with a refresh, and I would like to see some improvement on layout and organization.
• The constant code/firmware upgrades and the QA of new code could be better.
• Maybe the compatibility with old Cisco Access Points could be improved, but it's normal in all kinds of deployments.

Incentivized

Very well made product. Very stable. We have had no issues administering the 8540.

Incentivized

It is a better product. The evolution is positive.

Incentivized

Have used Cisco Meraki access point earlier having management on cloud and is on license (subscription basis). But Alcatel OmniAccess Points have management on cloud, on premise as well which means to say flexibility in terms of management. We had one requirement where we number of user is large which is going to connect on access point but Cisco Meraki only supports 200 users per radio whereas OmniAccess point have better client associated capacity with 524 per radio.

We have [done] some work before with the Cisco 3504 product, but the more recent Cisco 8540 Wireless Controller provides a wider range of capabilities for managing the wireless network and each individual device [and] also being able to handle more users. Unfortunately, we didn't test and deploy equivalent products from other concurrent companies.

• Better Roaming
• Ease of Management
• Better performance

• The Cisco 8540 Wireless Controller allows you to reduce your hardware footprint of wireless controllers deployed in your environment. Instead of having a controller per site deployed, you can have a couple of 8540 controllers in your data center that can handle up 6000 Access Points.
• Some of the savings on hardware cost is offset by the cost of redundant WAN circuits. The access points will continue to function when connectivity to the Cisco 8540 Wireless Controller is unreachable, but it will not allow any new connections in that wireless environment.

Incentivized