Cisco 9000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 9000) vs Cisco Small Business RV Series

Likelihood to Recommend

I can recommend this ASR 9000 Series model for the locations which are very Big like data centers, large offices, and service provider networks. Which will enhance the performance. We cannot use this router in small deployments. This is an advanced technology model which has many features like orchestrating services across a converged network and enabling on-demand service capabilities.

Read full review

Mohd Shahid Ali

Pre-Sales Network Consultant

Al Khalili GroupInformation Technology & Services, 51-200 employees

View all 14 answers on this topic

It's best suited for small offices 10-25 users. Any more and its best to move away to a more higher tier. It will be less appropriate for a mid level company with a large staff. It's best for a small business with a limited budget and less strenuous security functionality.

Read full review

Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology

Information Technology & Services Company, 11-50 employees

View all 9 answers on this topic

Pros

[Cisco 9000] Series [Aggregation Services] Routers are exceptionally reliable when compared to other market options.
One strength of Cisco routers, in general, is their compatibility with any standard market tools from other vendors.
[It is] unmatched in terms of sheer performance.
[It] comfortably supports very strong throughput requirements.

Read full review

Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology

Information Technology and Services Company, 10,001+ employees

View all 14 answers on this topic

Cisco Small Business RV Series is aimed for SMB use cases
Simple setting and easy deployment
Can be integrated with Cisco security on cloud such as Umbrella
Provides advanced security features with license

Read full review

Budi Ezeddin

Senior Technical Specialist

Synnex Metrodata IndonesiaInformation Technology & Services, 201-500 employees

View all 9 answers on this topic

Cons

[The] upgrade process [is] overly complicated compared to NX-OS or IOS. New images and the current configuration need to be compiled into "golden IOS's". If you don't include the configuration, you will have a clean device with no configuration.
[There are] major bugs in every release. We have had to cycle through all of our routers 3 times in the last year for updates due to show-stopping bugs that did not come to light until after the changes were made in production.
[It has] terrible documentation. You have to mine their site to get to any documentation for recent versions of IOS-XR. If you make the leap from 32-bit cXR to 64-bit eXR, then the documentation is more or less non-existent. Due to the internal architecture of hardware itself, technical specs can change from software version to software version, so don't expect any sort of firm scalability numbers. You'll have to rely on your sales engineer for that.

Read full review

Verified User

Engineer in Engineering

Information Technology and Services Company, 501-1000 employees

View all 14 answers on this topic

Wireless is slower than a dedicated wireless module.
Some of the lower-end Cisco RV models can't handle high traffic load.
GUI interface is really slow sometimes.

Read full review

Verified User

Professional in Information Technology

Consumer Goods Company, 51-200 employees

View all 9 answers on this topic

Pricing Details

General

Free Trial

—

Free/Freemium Version

—

Premium Consulting/Integration Services

Yes

Entry-level set up fee?

No

Starting Price

—

General

Free Trial

—

Free/Freemium Version

—

Premium Consulting/Integration Services

—

Entry-level set up fee?

No

Starting Price

—

Usability

Cisco 9000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 9000) 9.1

Based on 1 answer

[I am] always impressed with Cisco products, from the functionality to the customer support.

Read full review

Verified User

Team Lead in Information Technology

Military Company, 10,001+ employees

View all 1 answers on this topic

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Support Rating

Cisco 9000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 9000) 5.5

Based on 7 answers

In some ways, the platform is a big improvement over our previous IOS and NX-OS devices: They offer version-controlled configuration staging/commits. They have a robust portfolio of network protocols and features even beyond datacenter devices. Due to the use of NPUs instead of relying entirely on ASICs for forwarding, new versions of the software are able to improve hardware performance and capacity. Unfortunately, I have run into more bugs on IOS-XR than I ever did on IOS or even NX-OS (which has a shocking number of bugs of its own) and you have to be a licensing guru to get your order right the first time.

Read full review

Verified User

Engineer in Engineering

Information Technology and Services Company, 501-1000 employees

View all 7 answers on this topic

Cisco Small Business RV Series 7.7

Based on 2 answers

The features are good. The support is good. The resources to deploy, manage, and operate it are good. Customer's feedback and testimonials are good. The updates in terms of zero day vulnerabilities are good and timely. But, I still give an 8 out of 10 because I think the pricing, licensing, and GUI can be improved more.

Read full review

John Patrick Duro

Security Analyst II

AsurionInsurance, 1001-5000 employees

View all 2 answers on this topic

Alternatives Considered

Each has its own strengths and weaknesses. Juniper was more security/less routing and Cisco was more routing/less security. Redback was Ericsson which is easy when creating VRFs known as contexts. When doing [the] show command, it would give you all the information within that context. In Cisco, you need to perform 3 or more commands to get the same info.

Read full review

Verified User

General Manager in Other

Telecommunications Company, 501-1000 employees

View all 14 answers on this topic

Cisco's power really stems from its brand reputation and honestly not much else. No one ever got fired for deploying Cisco, and that's why it stands out. The Cisco Small Business RV Series is no exception there; the unit is built well and does the job. However, much more powerful alternatives for routers are out there—the biggest competitor being Ubiquiti. The UniFi routers are significantly more powerful in all regards, including routing speed, IPS/IDS speeds, and VPN functionality. Support for those is admittedly rather lackluster though, so if your network is critical, you are effectively self-insuring your equipment. For some that may be fine, but for others, that risk of extended downtime is just not worth it.

Read full review

Verified User

Team Lead in Engineering

Media Production Company, 51-200 employees

View all 9 answers on this topic

Return on Investment

Higher reliability has significantly reduced the need for manual intervention.
Lower downtime ensures better top-line figures.
Although it may be difficult to quantify, I am certain that the higher performance does have an impact (maybe indirectly) on other business functions. High-performance routers are like the oil that keeps an engine running smoothly.

Read full review

Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology

Information Technology and Services Company, 10,001+ employees

View all 14 answers on this topic

Remote sales staff easily make use of the included VPN
Wireless access is built in and convenient
The form factor contributes no noise and negligible heat to our data closet

Read full review

Verified User

Administrator in Information Technology

Chemicals Company, 1-10 employees

View all 9 answers on this topic

Cisco 9000 Series Aggregation Services Routers (ASR 9000) vs Cisco Small Business RV Series