Cisco Embedded Wireless Controller vs. Extreme Wireless Access Points

Overall I could see myself recommending these to others if they have the right set of circumstances at their place of business. Those would be like ours, if they had a location that couldnt be served by a WLC. Once setup they are easy to manage and self healing as in they wont go down when one is offline.

Incentivized

The Extreme access point solution has been used in the cooperative scenario with VLANs for employees in access through 802.1x authentication and also for guests through the captive portal that allows access of people for a limited time and prior registration. The equipment has great performance and connection speed and supports a high density of users connected at the same time without lag and crashes. The management of this equipment is being carried out through software with cloud management and is accessed by our infrastructure team to configure and monitor alerts.

Incentivized

• Offers enterprise-class security that keeps the network protected
• Cost-effective connectivity
• Deploying WiFi 6 network without complexity or added expense
• Controlling access points and clients

Incentivized

• Extremely easy to provision new devices, once the profiles are set up, due to centralized management
• Very quick provisioning of new devices, due to centralized management and predefined profiles

Incentivized

• Some bugs in the interface.
• Issues with licensing and Cisco DNA integration.
• Frequent software patches needed,

Incentivized

• In my experience, licensing has become a nightmare. Licensing must be tied to a device, they also won't let you activate used units from other companies if they are donated or purchased third-party.
• Customer service is outsourced overseas.
• In my experience, technicians are incentivized to close tickets quickly - whether the issue has been fixed or not - which can be frustrating to work with.

Incentivized

It has worked for us as advertised with little technical issues. The system has been stable with no major downtime.

Incentivized

Support was always responsive and willing to help, but at times did not know when to call it and send a replacement to stop the bleeding. I respect that fact that they wanted to get the solution working, and the wanting to learn more and understand, but at times you cant do that at the expense of the customer.

Incentivized

Cisco Embedded Wireless Controller provides the ability to manage and deploy the wireless network from a web UI or mobile application, and without the expense or complexity of a wireless controller appliance.

Incentivized

The Aerohive wireless devices are comparable to Cisco's wireless solution, in regard to performance, features, and management. But the cost of utilizing Cisco Wireless Access Points versus using the Aerohive access points is staggering. Since our wireless access points do not maintain a constant heavy load, we chose a more cost effective solution and have not had many issues with them.

Incentivized

• Makes having remote sites less problematic when it comes to managing AP's
• Saved money on managed AP's as they're found cheaper
• Takes more time to manage additional controllers versus a WLC

Incentivized

• Less downtime to our business units that use Aerohive
• Radios are very compatible with most wireless devices out today
• I spend less time managing Aerohive than any other wireless product

Incentivized