Cisco Aironet 1500 Series Access Points (discontinued) vs. Fortinet FortiExtender

Cisco Aironet 1550 Series Access Points is very useful for outdoor locations that are more exposed to the wilderness or the weather, which provides uninterrupted wifi access during high winds and bad weather. It also is useful for hazardous locations that are prone to danger or wildlife. Unfortunately, it would not be appropriate to get a Cisco Aironet 1550 Series Access Point if it is only needed for basic wifi use, or indoor use, as the extra features and price would not be necessary.

Incentivized

Fortinet FortiExtender is well suited to delivering fast 5G and LTE service. The cloud-based system is great so that our agency can manage the cloud from anywhere which is great during remote work. The Fortinet FortiExtender was easy to deploy and the system has been easy to manage. The Fortinet FortiExtender is less appropriate when it comes to the cost to implement and the customer support could be improved.

Incentivized

• Outdoor mesh bridging of access points brings significant cost savings to many of our production facilities. Deploying mesh APs is a significant cost reduction over trenching conduit to connect remote areas via fiber.
• Cisco APs are extremely resilient, with a failure rate of below 5% in some of our harshest environments.
• Cisco APs have the intelligence to identify wireless interference sources with Clean Air technology

Incentivized

• Failover protection by supporting multiple bands.
• Cloud based management helping to manage the system from anywhere.
• Integration with the Fortinet firewall.

Incentivized

• In the facilities where we operate, we had to put a reinforcement on the ceiling to avoid problems due to the weight of the access point.
• On the appearance, it could be smaller and lighter.
• As for the hardware, I think it's incredible, I don't see any points to improve.

Incentivized

• It is good when any problem occurred in our fiber cables but when it gets problematic then there isn’t any way out for us and its graphic interface is not helpful.
• Its support team is useless and didn’t help in any regard.
• The price is not in our favor.

Incentivized

There is no other better option than this. It's the line between the commercial Cisco grade AP's and industrial ones.

Incentivized

Everything clear and easy to use

Incentivized

The Cisco Aironet 1560 Series Access Points served their function well. They were reliable, provided decent speeds, resisted the elements, and provided a good investment. The only downsides were mostly appearance which doesn't matter that much. However, I believe that the tech in the access point is not future proof which is why I did not give it a nine or ten star rating.

Incentivized

Initially I had a problem with the regulatory and channel selection, it was a bug on the AP as it was fairly new, solved by TAC on engineering release, and since then it has been performing flawlessly.

Incentivized

Making the decision to use Aironet is more related to the type of scenario that you have. We chose Aironet because we mainly manage all the network internally and already have Cisco products to integrate with Meraki which is a good option if you are starting from scratch.

Incentivized

By looking at the market of similar devices, we quickly recognized that Fortinet FortiExtenders are very reasonably priced; however, they provide top-level functionality that even some of the competitors don't have.

Incentivized

The software of the Cisco Aironet 1560 is highly scalable, the software is very powerful so that the APs can be customized to the maximum and achieve the best performance of the network at the wifi level. The use of it is very easy for people with low knowledge.

• With only a few DOA's or failing devices, the AP's are of very high quality.
• We expect them to run stable for many years, which is why our initial investment will be an intelligent choice compared to installing a cheaper product.
• Although the AP's from Cisco is cutting-edge technology, the 802.11ac standard will be considered legacy in a few years, meaning that its a balance to purchase a well-designed product that won't outlast the tech that it provides. Imagine having an investment in a large fleet of high-quality 802.11b AP's 20 years ago. Although they would still be working flawlessly due to their good quality, the bandwidth would probably be unacceptable to most modern consumers.

Incentivized

• Backup connectivity is helping us in many ways especially at times when connections run out and we have to perform any action that is essential to be done at times.
• It provides a secure network.
• With direct management, we can monitor and add and remove unwanted devices.

Incentivized