Excellent successor to 3850--far more powerful and feature rich, but beware UPOE+
December 04, 2020

Excellent successor to 3850--far more powerful and feature rich, but beware UPOE+

John Castillo | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series Switches

Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series Switches have been purchased as a replacement for our existing 3850 deployment. They address end of life as well as the ability to support new projects that include Wifi 6 and widespread POE of cameras and paging.
  • Multi-Gig support over copper ethernet
  • Higher power POE support for a variety of devices
  • Very high performance compared to previous switches
  • UPOE+ compatibility with existing devices. I had a very difficult time getting Avigilon cameras to work on this switch. Spent days with Avigilon and Cisco but we did finally get it working. UPOE+ is still fairly new, so make sure your devices are supported.
  • LLDP Support
  • Clear support for POE features
  • The introduction to our sites of Wifi is a great return
  • The length of time these switches will last with support is important
  • We have had to buy new racks in smaller IDFs, which increased our cost
These switches combined with Cisco DNA, Prime, and ISE can lead to some serious automation that can really simplify deployment long term; however, the initial setup would be very complex, time consuming, and require a great deal of expertise. We will not be implementing these initially. We do have Prime and ISE, which are key components, so we will be looking into this in the near future.
Similar to the deployment benefits the advanced customization and manageability, they have some complexity to set up and we have not decided to implement at this time. We will look into it in the near future.
I have used Cisco Catalyst Switches for many years, as well as other brands, but I have always stuck with Cisco Catalyst because they have been remarkably reliable. They are so widely used that the support community is excellent. They have leading features and third parties always seek the highest level of compatibility with them.

Do you think Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series Switches delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series Switches's feature set?

Yes

Did Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series Switches live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series Switches go as expected?

No

Would you buy Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series Switches again?

Yes

Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series Switches come in a very good variety of configurations to match your needs of Multi-Gig ports and power requirements. They also have excellent stacking configurations for both data and power. They are excellent to support POE speakers, clocks, etc. They are also perfect for IP phones and Wifi 6 wireless access points. They are very large when it comes to depth, so make sure your existing racks will support the switches. The power supplies with plugs stick out quite a bit and can cause issues. They are pricey, so if you do not have need of the higher end features, you may want to consider a lower model. Also there are new licensing requirements to consider.