Meraki MX: An Engineer's viewpoint
June 08, 2023
Meraki MX: An Engineer's viewpoint
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Modules Used
- MX84
- MX100
- MX250
- MX85
Overall Satisfaction with Cisco Meraki MX
We use Meraki MX's as VPN headends at our smaller branch sites where IT staff aren't present. The more plug-and-play nature of the solution, SD-WAN features, and automatic VPN tunneling is desirable when IT/Networking staff are not local. We have MX's deployed at 30+ sites and makes up a majority of our WAN besides our largest sites.
- Automatic VPN tunneling
- Beautiful user interface
- On-box packet capturing and other troubleshooting tools
- Meraki MX's act as firewalls, but have no way of viewing L3 connection events. This is something I think Meraki NEEDS to implement before it can be taken seriously as a firewall/security solution.
- More options for logging on the initial deployment.
- Command-line interface, even a basic one.
Do you think Cisco Meraki MX delivers good value for the price?
Not sure
Are you happy with Cisco Meraki MX's feature set?
Yes
Did Cisco Meraki MX live up to sales and marketing promises?
I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process
Did implementation of Cisco Meraki MX go as expected?
Yes
Would you buy Cisco Meraki MX again?
Yes
- The on-box packet capture feature has saved me on a number of occasions. It should be default on all network devices.
- Lack of L3 connection events has caused firewall related drops and outages to go unsolved much longer than they should have.
- Simplicity of cloud-based wireless has made deployments much easier.
The beautiful user interface and troubleshooting tools has been great to work with. Once you get used to the caveats of deploying Meraki, it becomes very easy to work with. Sometimes the lack of information on what is wrong with the connection out to the cloud causes issues where a factory reset is the only option that fixes the problem, without a clear reason why.
Having the full Meraki stack at each location helps in making use of all the wonderful UI features that I've mentioned already. From the packet captures, to the client dashboard, to the visualization, it all works better when the full stack is present. Also moving from a controller based on-prem wireless solution to the cloud-based controller in Meraki helped to simplify things greatly.
Certainly easier for a junior or administrator to work with that isn't great with the CLI which is desirable depending on your staff.