Item: Cisco UCS Manager
Rating: 10
Author: Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Cisco UCS Manager

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

No issue but this is great management tool for UCS

Pros and Cons

Pros

Monitoring Blade Servers
Template assignment for consistency of the configuration
Logical codes / error for troubleshooting

Cons

Deployment Analysis
Recommendations relevant customer use

Return on Investment

The system allows for easy scalability to meet growing business needs
Certain maintenance tasks, like acknowledging a chassis, can cause temporary downtime, affecting network and SAN traffic

Usability

The automation capabilities of Cisco UCS Manager help streamline tasks such as provisioning, configuration, and monitoring, leading to increased efficiency

Alternatives Considered

HPE OneView

Its more aligned with our server state

Other Software Used

Cisco Application Centric Infrastructure (Cisco ACI), Cisco DNA Analytics and Assurance

Likelihood to Recommend

This is well suite for small deployments and changes are directly implemented on fiber interconnects

Using Cisco UCS Manager

Users and Roles

10 - Manage and maintain Technology / Infrastructure

6 - These Infrastructure engineers are responsible for managing and maintaining server hardware, including blade and rack servers and manage storage.
Network Engineers for network infrastructure, including routing and switching and systems engineer with focus on the integration and optimization of systems within the data center environment

Business Processes Supported

Integration with cisco Infrastructure
Manging and moniotring reliably
Easy of deployment

Innovative Uses

Edge computing
Devops
DR / BCP

Future Planned Uses

AI /ML
Integration
Hybrid cloud management

Likelihood to Renew

Cisco UCS Manager allows for integrated management of all UCS components, streamlining processes like server provisioning, networking, and storage configuration

Evaluating Cisco UCS Manager and Competitors

Products Replaced

Key Differentiators

Scalability
Integration with Other Systems
Ease of Use

Ease of use and also allows for integrated management of all UCS components, streamlining processes like server provisioning, networking, and storage configuration

Evaluation Lessons Learned

Probably a bit more focus on Infrastructure as code and AI /ML capabilities

Cisco UCS Manager Implementation

Implementation Rating

Implementation Details / Implementation Partner

Implemented in-house

Implementation Phases

Change Management Lessons

Change management was a big part of the implementation and was well-handled

Implementation Issues

Aci integration

Cisco UCS Manager Support

Support Rating

With right esclation issues were resolved and TAC understood the impact . Access to Cisco's expert support team for resolving complex technical issues is easy enough in my view.

Cisco UCS Manager Customer Support Pros and Cons

Pros	Cons
Quick Resolution Good followup Knowledgeable team Problems get solved Kept well informed Immediate help available Support cares about my success Quick Initial Response	Need to explain problems multiple times

Premium Support

Due to the criticality of this in business premium support purchased

Exceptional Examples of Cisco UCS Manager Support

There has been incident recently where mix of different blades in chassis case issues with storage template which was P1 and Cisco tac stayed with us till it was resolved.