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Cisco Catalyst Switches vs. Dell Compellent (discontinued)

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Cisco Catalyst Switches

    Score9.1 out of 10
    N/ACisco's Catalyst is one of that company's brand of network switches.N/A

    Dell Compellent (discontinued)

    Score8 out of 10
    N/ASince it's acquisition in 2011 Compellent became a Dell product line of storage solutions (e.g. Dell Compellent Storage Center). Compellent products became part of the Dell EMC SC Series of enterprise flash and SAN storage devices and are now EOL.N/A
    Pricing
    Cisco Catalyst SwitchesDell Compellent (discontinued)
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Cisco Catalyst SwitchesDell Compellent (discontinued)
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Cisco Catalyst SwitchesDell Compellent (discontinued)
    Considered Both Products
    Cisco
    No answer on this topic
    Discontinued Products
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    98%
    Would buy again
    600 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Delivers good value for the price
    96%
    Delivers good value for the price
    531 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    98%
    Happy with the feature set
    600 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    97%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    490 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    98%
    Implementation went as expected
    568 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Features
    Cisco Catalyst SwitchesDell Compellent (discontinued)
    Enterprise Flash Array Storage
    Comparison of Enterprise Flash Array Storage features of Cisco Catalyst Switches and Dell Compellent (discontinued)
    Feature
    Cisco Catalyst Switches
    -
    Ratings
    Dell Compellent (discontinued)
    8.3
    3 Ratings
    7% below category average
    Flash Array Performance00 Ratings8.03 Ratings
    Flash Array Integration00 Ratings8.03 Ratings
    Data Compression00 Ratings8.03 Ratings
    Non-Intrusive Upgrades00 Ratings8.03 Ratings
    Simplicity00 Ratings9.03 Ratings
    Power Savings00 Ratings9.03 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Cisco Catalyst SwitchesDell Compellent (discontinued)
    Small Businesses
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    RUCKUS Ethernet Switches
    Score1 out of 10
    Everpure FlashArray
    Score8.2 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Cisco Ethernet Switches
    Score9.1 out of 10
    Everpure FlashArray
    Score8.2 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Cisco Catalyst SwitchesDell Compellent (discontinued)
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.0
    (774 ratings)
    9.0
    (6 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    8.9
    (40 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    8.6
    (46 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Availability
    8.8
    (14 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Performance
    9.3
    (14 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    8.5
    (38 ratings)
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    9.0
    (5 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Online Training
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.0
    (12 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Configurability
    8.8
    (10 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    8.1
    (9 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    9.2
    (14 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    7.9
    (36 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    8.2
    (37 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Cisco Catalyst SwitchesDell Compellent (discontinued)
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Cisco
    Well-suited for big companies like mine, where we have a lot of users that we have to connect together. Getting all the switches into one big stack that you can just manage all at one time is fantastic for ease of use. Not suited for maybe smaller mom and pop shops or smaller companies that don’t have as many. They could probably go with something much easier to manage.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    All in all this series great in addressing issues applications that need flash storage as a backend storage supply. It addresses the need for fast, responsive servers that need to boot quickly. It is easy to use and for the most part there are few issues and none that can't be addressed/fixed quickly.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Cisco
    • Easy-to-use management interfaces. The CLI commands go across the whole Cisco Catalyst Switches 9000 series, so it makes it easy, the code being the same on the 9000 series. Just being able to do port channels, trunks, and connecting up edge switches to it with the Cisco Catalyst Switches 9000 Series.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • Dell Compellent support (Co-Pilot) and the add-on service (Optimize) are critical services that Dell Compellent does very well. Alerts from the array are sent to Co-Pilot where tickets are automatically generated and customers are notified of events. Of greater importance at times is the proactive support Co-Pilot and Optimize provide by contacting us of inefficiencies in the array and consulting on resolutions.
    • Enterprise Manager (Dell's "single pane of glass" management framework) is a useful tool for configuration/evaluation of the array and other Compellent products.
    • Ease of management. From firmware upgrades to managing server volumes the process is much simpler than with other arrays.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Cisco
    • One thing is that these, every time Cisco gets a new switch, they just make an amendment to the power supply, so they'll just put a knob on it. So let's say if you lose any power supply unit, you'll have to purchase another one, which costs a lot of extra money because we have a lot of another power supply units from the redundant, which we can use, but we can't now because they have just tweaked the modeling of that. Which makes no sense, particularly to me because it's an extra money making machine kind of a thing. But that's fine.
    • Another thing is these ports, I believe they are a bit less of, if I can say the quality of the oldest switches, they were quite sturdy. As I said earlier, the new switches, they're very light and when you lift them you feel it. So that's one thing, which I think the quality or the material which we are using has gone down.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • The GUI could be a little more updated with a lot more information regarding usage.
    • There could be some assistance with high I/O times where snapshots go to consolidate. There seems to be issues when that attempts to occur, and there will times where the virtual machine stuns due to the I/O intensity.
    • Modification of multiple volumes or the creation of multiple volumes is a pain in the DSM management console.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Cisco
    They are consistently reliable and this switch in particular is a very affordable solution. We can place the Cisco Catalyst 1000 Series Switches gear in areas that we normally would not place a switch because it is affordable enough to make it justifiable. And because it is a reliable solution, we are confident it will continue to provide service over the long haul.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Cisco
    Cisco by and far does a great job with the Catalyst line. From a layer 2 dumb switch all the way up to ISP carrier grade switching within the Catalyst portfolio. The best part about it is command parity among the various tiers of product. The only differences are going to lie in what features are available per switch.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Reliability and Availability
    Cisco
    We have very few is any outages due to a Cisco hardware failure. Some of our gear is exposed to some pretty harsh environments, and they keep on ticking!
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Performance
    Cisco
    No, the packets flow. Sometimes you will see collisions and broadcast storms can happen which will slow performance but that can be fixed and the packets will flow.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Cisco
    We rarely have issues with the product. I have only had to contact support one time since we put it in and that was to see if another vendor was giving me accurate information on an issue I was having.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    This is not solely based on the support engineers themselves but more so that the logging and gotcha's that their array has. There have been multiple times where logs are pulled, but the folder is not large enough, and it crashes the array. Other times there are certain aspects that support either does not know of or isn't knowledgable about how to look at particular issues that could be causing problems.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    In-Person Training
    Cisco
    Cisco Networking Academy partners with many local Colleges and High Schools to provide great hands-on training. You do need to drive to learn the topic. The in-class session only go so far. You really need to apply this to the real world. Cisco makes it easy for business to connect via CLC or Cisco Learning Credits.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Online Training
    Cisco
    My own personal research to get the information I want is very handy and helped me many times
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    Cisco
    The implementation of the Cisco Catalyst 1000 Series Switches is fairly seamless, especially if you are familiar with Cisco products. We have had Brocade switch gear in place too, and the differences between the manufacturers [are] not a major issue.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Cisco
    2960s, 9200s, 9400s, 3650s, 3800s. I think that this product is a lot better. I know I just complained about the noise, but it’s still much quieter than our other ones. So we do have a couple of public deployments, and once we swap these out, they complained less. Sometimes we have small offices that get the gear in with them, and these sound less like a jet engine. And yeah, these are a lot easier to manage as well. Everything in the same family. It’s a lot.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    We selected Compellent solely based on price. Honestly I would rate it only slightly better than a QNAP we used (which was even cheaper). If performance and reliability are factors in your decision (and they should be) I would recommend looking at something like a VNXe.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Scalability
    Cisco
    We are exclusive Cisco at our organization. In truth part of the reason is, with one type of switch and one manufacturer, it is easier to support. It is also easier to give consistent training to our staff in our tech department
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Return on Investment
    Cisco
    • energy costs dropped by around 11 per cent on the access layer
    • management has become easier with DNA Center
    • ISSU software upgrades and fabric deployments have significantly reduced "planned" down times
    • network speed has increased, latency is at an all-time best within our own LAN
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • The SC9000 has been able to serve our current and futures needs well enough to not need to upgrade anytime soon.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Cisco Catalyst Switches Screenshots

    Product screenshotScreenshot of Catalyst 9200 SeriesScreenshot of Catalyst 9300 SeriesScreenshot of Catalyst 9400 SeriesScreenshot of Catalyst 9400 Series Additional ViewScreenshot of Catalyst 9500 Series