Cisco Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms deliver secure, high-performance SD-WAN built for hybrid work, multicloud access, and 5G-ready networks. Powered by Cisco IOS XE, these devices combine flexible routing, SASE integration, and cloud-native agility to support AI-driven networking and edge computing needs.
With the flexibility of sizing options, the Cisco Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms has worked to deliver solutions for our various needs. Smaller systems offer strong connectivity for office developments. Mid-range options have served our larger campuses well. Our data center deployments of the larger systems have provided up to 100G connectivity and advanced routing solutions. The Cisco Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms continues to meet our needs and exceed our expectations.
Cisco FabricPath seems to be well suited for larger datacenters where you need the scalability and flexibility that's provided. We've been able to provide our customers with much more bandwidth than they previously had throughout our datacenter and with applications generating much more east/west traffic now rather than large volumes of north/south traffic FabricPath and the nexus switches have given us the ability to provide our customers with the bandwidth that's needed to serve today's applications.
It's been fairly easy for people to learn and work with.
It has simplified network administration by utilizing Fabric Extenders which are all configured from the same switch and treated as an extension of the switch rather than as a separate entity.
Because I have had no issues with this product line and have grown go really trust in it. One of the besr thing is that this has had less vulnerabilities that the past cisco router that I have dealt with. In my line of work needing to upgrade code is always something that needs to be done after hours and most likely on weekends.
Either you deploy those routers as a standalone, or as part of the SD-WAN fabric, the amount of features and settings you can configure on them, is well beyond any other vendor or product on the market. While this may bring some configuration complexity, availability of support for variaty of different protocols and features allows you to solve almost any network challenge you may face
I have always had great response time and have never been let down by cisco support. I have had issues where the person who was assisting me was not able to provide a resolution but by utilizing his team members they where able to come together to provide a answer and resplve the situation.
Compared to the Cisco 2000 Series Connected GRID Routers, CGR2010, the Cisco Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms is more powerful in processing, and it has the capability to do the segment routing. It is easier to install physically and occupies less space in the rack, consumes less power, and saves more for the company.
In comparison to Cisco ACI, Cisco Catalyst, and Juniper EX Switches the Nexus switches have stood their ground and we've been fairly happy with them. I like that similar to Cisco's ACI and the Juniper EX switches that I've worked with I can manage multiple chassis from one place. ACI can do this on a much larger scale though. I think Juniper limited the number of devices in a single virtual chassis to 10 or less depending on the device type. ACI can do a few hundred leafs plus their fabric extenders so if you're looking for one place to manage all your devices it can scale well beyond either the Cisco FP or Juniper EX series switches, but it also has a much steeper learning curve and completely different interface. The loop prevention built into FP has been a great improvement vs our old Catalyst switches.
FabricPath is easy enough to learn that the adoption on the team has been fairly quick. This allows us to quickly troubleshoot and allows us to meet and beat SLAs that demand we maintain 99.99%+ uptime for our paying customers.
