Cisco Meraki equipment is easier to configure, setup, and deploy as well as manage. The only thing I will say for the other gear is that they have their special niche requirements, protocol options, and special configuration options that not all Meraki gear has. Meraki gear …
Meraki MS switches don't offer the very high-end configuration options as Cisco Nexus switches, and we needed some of those high-end options in our core switch stack. So we bought the Cisco Nexus for our core and bought some engineering time from a contractor to help us set it …
I am able to go deeper into analytics and troubleshooting. A lot more updated and features that are far different than others evaluated or had used previously on the network
Cisco Nexus Series Switches are built perfectly in terms of scalability and efficiency. Performance monitoring and the planning of new networks and excellent tools. Although Cisco Nexus Series Switches are costly they are worth the money.
Cisco Nexus switches are the Cadillac in switching. All the other switching we have and use is for lesser demanding requirements and for most cost effective implementations.
Great for a small office or for organizations that have minimal IT resources or needs. If you need a secure, easy-to-manage, set it and forget it solution, Meraki is definitely worth a look, though I would not consider it low budget. Be careful if you need layer 3 advanced features, DHCP server functionality, etc., as these features are found in the "higher-end" models.
Fairly stable and easy to operate - but I haven't any experience with other brands, so I don't have anything to compare with. Fairly fast in the OS. Easy to upgrade - but with some SW issues. Sometimes clearing of log folders is needed. Access to bash is cool. Tips & cool tricks for operations could be nice to share.
Meraki MS switches are wonderful at allowing a network admin to configure a VPN mesh network without having to have highly specialized knowledge. Unlike Cisco switches, there is no CLI, there is only a GUI, and Meraki support helps you set it up as you add nodes to your network.
Meraki MS switches are easy to deploy. Full stop.
They can work with any firewall or ASA but I would strongly recommend using the Meraki MX security appliance if you are going to use Meraki MS switches because they were made to work together.
They easily stack. It's all done for you in the Meraki cloud control panel.
They will get an address from your admin VLAN's DHCP scope and keep it. Even if you unplug it and move it, you will not have to worry about addressing it.
The GUI is online and you can reach it from anywhere, so as long as you have the credentials, you can manage the network from any device that has a browser.
Maintenance, upgrades, and software certification can be performed without service interruptions because of the modular nature of NX-OS and features such as In-Service Software Upgrade (ISSU) and the capability for processes to restart dynamically
FabricPath:
Enables each device to build an overall view of the topology; this is similar to other link state routing protocols. Each device in the FabricPath topology is identified by a switch-id. The Layer 2 forwarding tables are built based on reachability to each switch-id, not by the MAC address. Eliminates spanning-tree to maximize network bandwidth and flexibility in topological configurations, as well as simplify operational support and configuration. This enables a tremendous amount of flexibility on the topology because you can now build FabricPath topologies for Layer 2-based networks the same as for Layer 3-based networks
Overlay Transport Virtualization (OTV): Enables the Layer 2 extension between distributed data centers over any transport Layer 3 network
Implementing jumbo frames on interfaces of its fabric extender series (N2k, etc.) by editing the network QoS does not have to be a global configuration that would affect all its interfaces. It can be improved to become just an interface configuration.
Licensing on the NXOS is a bit complicated and expensive. I understand that the Nexus is made for core data center switching but it does not have to break the bank.
OTV technology is for Nexus only. Based on the advantage of the technology, it should be made vendor-neutral to accommodate other vendor devices.
Being on the cloud its very easy to manage. We have layer 7 visibility and Cisco has introduced stackable MX switches which is even better! The Meraki portal can be accessed via SSO which is important to my organization (although it was a bit difficult to get that implemented initially!)
We will use it for a long time, since they are switches with great capacity and positive results, they promote the perfect operation of our data center, I always recommend them, because they are switches with good results.
In our environment (and especially during COVID and the Work From Home era), I would really like our network devices to be more resilient [against} errors in remote configuration. Having a standard, easy to use, configure, commit/deploy, rollback system should be installed, but it's not there. Other companies have been providing this for over 20 years, and Cisco does this on some of their devices. Why not all?
These switches are very fast. They've been designed to work within the data center. We connect them to Cisco UCS-B Mini servers with the storage being directly attached. They are able to handle the data traffic pretty easily. We can also move servers pretty fast from data center to data center without overloading them. This has allowed our company to stay running during any kind of conditional outage. We have come to really rely on them for business continuity.
Cisco support for the Meraki products is great. I have a dedicated representative who I can reach out to at any time. They offer numerous online resources and easy to follow tutorials to help the most novice user feel like a pro. When I need support they were ready and quickly helped me solve my problems.
Overall, Cisco has great products and I believe that they believe in the philosophy of a great customer experience. Although there have been a few technical support issues that caused a lot of company anxiety, in most cases, Cisco has gone above and beyond in making a valiant effort to help the customer solve any issues.
I think that Meraki stacks up well against the competition. I have not found a situation where it does not meet the needs from speed to security. I think that this concept of how it is designed will become a trend of the next few years and the competition has something to learn.
The Cisco 9000 stacks up quite well against the Cisco Catalyst 3850 switches. The additional features available in the Nexus 9000, such as VPN, FCoE, 40 gigabits, give us the ability to support the future needs of the company in our data center. The Nexus 9000 allowed us to condense our core and aggregation environment that comprised of 2 Catalyst 6504 and 2 Catalyst 6509 to a port of Nexus 9000. Although the Catalyst 3850 would be sufficient to handle routing, those features in the Nexus 9000 made it the clear choice for us.
I give Cisco Meraki gear a near 100% rating for any business in the small to medium-sized business scenario. Only large organizations have certain business needs that Meraki gear may or may not provide the 99.9% uptime IT professionals and management would demand. Cisco Meraki gear is very scalable as an organization grows and makes it easy to scale up and scale out as needed.
The Nexus 3000 series switches are data center switches, so I would say they have similar security ability to other switches in this segment. I don't have a lot of experience doing more than basic ACL security on switches, but I know these can be integrated into other security solutions like Cisco ISE and 802.1x authentication. It could also be integrated into an ACI solution to add micro segmentation, which would bring in other security functions.
One critical business objective was a worry-free network. This is it!
Another business objective was to be able to manage my entire network from a single interface. Meraki delivers again! Not having to be in the building to monitor, manage and configure networking equipment is worth the weight of these devices in gold.
I wanted to be able to see everything that was happening on my network. Meraki enables that. I can see every device, what each is doing, set alerts for when individual ports go down or the device that is attached stops sending packets, etc. The visibility into my network's performance and security is unprecedented. I never knew what I was missing and I do not want to go back!
