Musing on the Cisco 3850 Switch
Modules Used
- Cisco Catalyst 3850 Series
Overall Satisfaction with Cisco Catalyst Switches
- Catalyst 3560-CX Series
- Catalyst 3850 Series
- Catalyst 9300 Series
The 3650CX is a great switch to for small or home offices (Fanless), the 3850 running 16.x code is a power house switch with great PoE resources and has all the bells and whistles. The 9Ks are great switch and I see these becoming the front line ordered switch and at some point replacing the 2960 and 3850 in the IDF.
- They meet the need in office on a desk to out on a warehouse or factory floor
- Have the PoE power to support everything a company will need
- have a matching product for your need from a few ports to 48 PoE port with uplinks that connect back a MDF or DC Distribution
- I am not a big fan of the way Cisco licenses their product, Smart Licensing to me misses the mark of easy of use, Client don't have a dedicated resource to learn and care for their licensing.
- I think Cisco needs to move to more of a security tie in with the switch, they have the horse power monitor and even move to enforcement controlled by single system across the board.
- Pricing seem to be getting more and more out of balance to Cisco competitor driving Small to Medium sized companies to request "other" companies product quotes with their Cisco quote.
- All the bells and whistles are there for the money its a good deal
- Having switching and WLC in one boxes help with recurring maintenance costs
- getting to a common CLI helps with training and staffing issue companies at running into.
The switch just meets the need and runs like a champ, Cisco put the homework into get the product where companies wanted/needed it to be and is a good choice for clients adding to an installed base or even a green field installation. The uplink options from 10-40G means the switch will be in clients networks for years and years.
The 3850 family of switch Models and Configurations cover everything the the average and non-average client needs to meet their networking needs.With support for SPF, SFP+ and even QSFP uplinks. Power supplies for options to power PoE on a few to all ports on a switch and with power stacking cables support from a power supple failure by sharing power across a stack of switches, Support for the coming wave of SD-WAN/Access that companies are moving towards.
For the company that wants options the 3850 family fits the bill it comes with the the horse power, the PoE power the uplink power and a CLI that does not need re-training of a companies staff to operate in it current environment. compared to other products the 3850 family covers a companies need now and in the future. .