Aruba ClearPass Reviews

My clients primarily use the solution to control access to the network or their sites. If a computer is not recognized by ClearPass, it won't be able to gain access.

The solution is extremely stable.

We find that at the end of the projects we manage, all functionalities perform quite well. We've tested it a lot and find it to be overall a very good solution.

It's excellent in terms of securing local networks for our clients.

The solution needs to upgrade its user interface. Right now, it's not so user friendly, and it's an aspect that my clients' wish was improved upon.

The solution is quite large and complex in scope. If a person isn't familiar with the solution, they can quickly get overwhelmed with everything.

I've been installing the solution for one to two years now. The last project I worked on was around six months ago. 

We have never experienced any bugs, crashes, or glitches. In my opinion, everything is stable. It's excellent. I'd say it's quite reliable in that regard.

The solution is very scalable. A company will be able to expand the solution to meet their needs as necessary.

In the past, we have reached out to technical support. During the implementation process, all the way through the project, we only had just one or two specific instances where their assistance seemed to take a long time. However, overall, I would say we are completely satisfied with their level of support.

While the installation itself is not difficult per se, the process you need to go through before installing the solution is complex. There are a lot of configurations to do on the firewall network and it can take a while, depending on the company. 

While it's tedious before the installation, once you come to the actual installation itself, you'll realize it's not too bad.

We're working on a project right now that has ten deployments and that's taken us about four or five months. For this project, there have been five people involved in the deployment process.

We handle aspects of the implementation for our clients.

We've partnered with HPE and Aruba.

I work at a service company. I go and install solutions for customers. I just handle the install for my customers. I don't use the software myself every day or on a regular basis. My role is one of a project technician and director. I'm an architect.

Our organization handles all sizes of companies from small to large enterprises.

If there's a company out there considering the solution, I'd just caution them to be ready.  There is a lot of configuration to do on all of the infrastructure. Other than that, it's an excellent solution. It's great for securing a local network. Security, at the end of the day, shouldn't have a cost. It's imperative to protect your business and to not worry so much about price tags, because it's even more expensive when you are unprotected and things go wrong.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten.

The most valuable feature for us it the granular, logic-based nesting of objects which gives highly customizable control over AAA for TACACS+ and RADIUS.

Device profiling for basic/intermediate NAC is also highly useful.

Providing granular control over which devices are permitted to join our corporate wireless network, as well as in-depth AAA (accounting, in particular) for TACACS+ sessions, is huge. We can refer back to these logs at any time, which are especially useful when we undergo organization-wide audits.

Having a global business presence, CPPM helps us to ensure all sites are compliant with a unified set of standards passed down from our corporate headquarters.

• I'd like to see greater ability to customize backups – locations, transfer protocols (SCP/SFTP, etc).
• Small tweaks like scroll bar distances within large Enforcement Policies. More customization for SNMP traps (types), a well as published MIB files so that we can utilize our network monitoring environment more heavily with polling specific aspects of CPPM.
• Hardware requirements for VM templates we use (CP-VA-5K) are, quite frankly, absurd (very high disk storage requirements).

I've used it for just over three years.

I don't recall any issues with deployment.

I don't recall any issues with stability.

I don't recall any issues with scalability.

Technical support was not all that great, actually. They are responsive, but oftentimes are VERY reluctant to initiate a screen-sharing session or give in-depth answers. URL links to knowledge-base articles are very typical for initial answers, which (1) slows resolution, and (2) increases frustration.

It seems, in general, that technical support is more interested in closing new cases than they are in actually solving the root issues. 90% of the questions I’ve had I’ve had solved (for free, mind you, without any maintenance fees) using Aruba’s Airheads online user-based forums.

The solution was implemented before I gained ownership of it. I'm not sure of the history behind it.

A local vendor was used.

Do your due-diligence in understanding how the product works before you deploy. CPPM (and many like it – Cisco ISE and ACS) are very complex in the way they are configured and operate.

If you can design the solution before implementation, you have a much better chance of scaling well, easily, and with little down-time as you grow the product throughout its life cycle in your organization.

Our primary use case is providing services for this solution. We've done a big proof of concept for Clearpass in our company. And another recent case I prepared was a proposal for one of our biggest customers regarding a solution for network access control. Clearpass was practically the heart of that solution.

My position in the company is independent. The company sells end products and services from various vendors and Aruba is one of them. We do the implementation. 

One of the most valuable features of the solution is the maturity of the product and, of course, the functionality is also very good. 

Possibly some of the functions could be improved, but it's hard to say. Generally, Clearpass is considered the leader in its field and it's a very good product. 

I've been using this solution for about half a year. 

We have quite good support from local representatives and we have our own team in the company for maintenance. A lot is available online.

Initial setup of the solution is relatively straightforward. There are a lot of videos and documentation available on the internet.

We looked at Pulse Policy Secure as a possible option. In some areas it has more flexibility than Clearpass but Clearpass came out on top in the end. Policy Secure has some ability issues and lack of good support. 

I would rate this product a nine out of 10. 

The most valuable features are planning and analytics.

It is simple to deploy.

It is transparent for the users to come in through ClearPass.

In the future, I would like to see plugins for AI and machine learning. If it did pattern analysis then it could help to determine our requirements automatically.

We have been using ClearPass for a couple of months. 

ClearPass has been very stable and there are no hiccups or any issues that we are experiencing.

It is modularly scalable and I don't see any issues with it.

I've got a lot of people connecting to my facility from outside of the organization, and they all connect through ClearPass. The combined external and internal user count is around 500.

The support that I have had from Aruba on this solution has been very nice. It's very easy to access support and the documentation is self-explanatory. You won't need much guidance from the Aruba team.

When it comes to the initial setup, as a customer, you need to prepare your own decision matrix. Once the matrices are in place, the rollout of ClearPass is seamless. It is easy. However, if you don't do your introspection and homework then it could be a challenge for an organization.

This is a solution that I would strongly recommend.

We are very happy with the support and the product overall. Although it meets our satisfaction and requirements 100%, you can never give a 100% mark. There is a little bit of room for improvement in all things.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.

Aruba ClearPass could be deployed on-premise in the cloud.

Aruba ClearPass is a simple solution for customers to see what is happening on their network.

I have been using Aruba ClearPass for approximately five years.

Aruba ClearPass is used for our clients to control and access their network.

Aruba ClearPass is stable.

I have found Aruba ClearPass to be scalable.

We have approximately three to four clients that are using this solution.

The support has been good for our customers.

Aruba ClearPass is complicated to install. Before our clients can use the solution they typically do a POC and we loan them some equipment for them to test with.

The projects from negotiation to acceptance take approximately three to six months.

The implementation can improve because it is challenging to explain some of the concepts to the client.

We do the implementation of the solution, and the time it takes for us to do the deployment depends on the customer's size.

The starting price of Aruba ClearPass is 200k Hong Kong dollars. The licensing is based on the endpoints. For example, 100 - 500 endpoints. 

There is a subscription for the support from the vendor that can be bundled together.

The solution can be expensive because you might have to train the customer.

I rate Aruba ClearPass a seven out of ten.

All of the features work in concert to provide secure on-boarding for guests and bring-your-own-device users.

I implement this for other companies and they all greatly benefit. It's worked well in many sectors, such healthcare, financial, corporate, and transportation.

Helping streamline the setup and more in-depth tutorials would be helpful. The product is very complex and therefore the more info and tools that are available the better.

I've been using it for three years.

I feel the product is stable.

I feel the product is scalable.

Customer service is top notch.

Very technical. The techs always help until resolution and will escalate quickly when you ask.

It's the first AAA security product of its kind.

Whether the setup is straightforward or complex will depend on how you need to apply the product. It can be streamlined or be quite intricate.

I am the consultant who installs this for end-users.

Can come from the security or the ease of management it provides

It may be a little expensive or complex for very small clients.

It's very powerful, but the individual needs to have a lot of knowledge across several IT disciplines.

It's a reliable solution for our guest network access as well as mobile device registration.

The key functionality we're using is Active Directory in unison with device authentication, so every 45 days a user has to log in their password on their mobile phone so that you can use WiFi services in the office. We're going to be looking at ClearPass to do device authentication, which means the users will only have to register the device once and never have to re-enter the password again.

It was a complex solution to set up because of its newness. We needed a third-party implementor to help us.

It's a brand new installation for us, and we've only had it for a month.

So far, we haven't had any issues with deployment.

From what we've seen it's been pretty stable.

Right now, it's scaled. We're using it for guest internet services and it seems to be working pretty well. Our next phase with that would be to roll in for device registration as we roll out to our mobile device strategy.

10/10 for HP and 8/10 for the third-party.

We haven't really run into any support issues yet. On the integration side, there's obviously some expertise with the vendor, which is going to help us take care of some issues in the future, but it hasn't really been a difficult product to support.

We decommissioned other options. We had another, but we've since decoupled it and are now using ClearPass to do that.

Because of its newness it was complex, but the end result was pretty straightforward.

We did need a third party to come in and help us do the implementation. We had some initial help from an HP engineer on the Aruba side who spent some time with us, showing us an evaluation version of it, but when we went into production we had to get a third party to help us.

We're not really calculating ROI for the service. It's a necessary service delivered by IT to the corporation.

We're currently doing an entire refresh of our access point network, which is approximately 80 access points across the country. We've recently acquired all new hardware. We're refreshing the entire footprint.

Because Aruba was our primary vendor for our access points, it just made more sense for us to try to consolidate more services towards the new strategy.

It's only providing a very small service to us right now. It's not like we're looking at ClearPass on a very full-blown basis. My advice would be to just make sure to do a proper spectrum analysis, and each of your properties are areas that you intend to put WiFi, because it will be critical to where you put APs and how closely you put them together.

A major feature that I deploy and all my customers enjoy is the On-boarding function. Once properly set-up, it is very easy to configure and maintain all on boarded devices and users associated with those devices.

The feature that I use the most is the Access Tracker. It displays all relevant information of each authentication request and troubleshooting is a breeze on how the data is displayed.

I have deployed ClearPass in a number of organizations that have been using any number of outdated and obsolete security protocols for their wireless security from WEP and PSKs to MAC based authentication and global user names and passwords. Deploying ClearPass allowed these organizations to move from weak security protocols to industry standard security protocols.

Every deployment of ClearPass I have run into a bug or a feature that is not as user friendly as it could be. This can be easily improved upon by providing documentation and guides of proper syntax inputs. I have gotten around these issues by purely trial and error.

I have used ClearPass for the past five years and have deployed all the features that ClearPass has to offer. I have deployed it in school districts, hospitals, government agencies and all major industry verticals.

It is not as user-friendly and intuitive when first using it as it takes some time to know were everything is.

I have deployed Clearpass in environments that require over 500,000 authentications per day and have not had any issues.

I have deployed Clearpass in environments that require over 500,000 authentications per day and have not had any issues

For 90% of troubleshooting and basic configuration the Technical Assistance Center has always been very good, once the issue becomes a unique case specific to the customer that’s when resolving issues may take longer the three hours. Overall, Aruba Networks is really good in supporting ClearPass.

The basic network set-up is straightforward to get it on the network. Activating the licenses and getting the subscription key for ClearPass is a bulky and compression process with very little guidance or documentation. If there is an issue with the license, the only solution to almost always call Aruba tech support. Once the licenses are sorted out an upgrade needs to happen and the size of the update is 1.4Gb or more and based on the customers network, may take a long time. Finally, after ClearPass is on-line and fully updated, the configuration and basic troubleshooting is pretty straightforward. If it’s the first time someone is looking at it there is defiantly a learning curve.

I am the system integrator if it would be done in-house. If the person that is deploying ClearPass has experience with radius servers, deploying it would take three to six times longer than to hire a system integrator. Unless the in-house IT team has the time and resources to learn to deploy and troubleshoot ClearPass out of the box, then I definitely recommend getting a systems integrator. They would know how the system works, what questions to ask and troubleshooting techniques.

There are a lot of questions need to be answered before answering the real ROI question correctly, the biggest questions are how secure is your current network? Does it meet the industry security standards? Can you afford to have your network infiltrated or have loss of data? And can you afford to lose data? If not then pricing and licensing can be worked out.

Before you buy licensing know how and way you are using clearpass. I cant count how many times a customer has perched the wrong license or to many or not enough.

It can easily handle all types of authentication methods and has a large amount of flexibility, which can cover all scenarios. However it is lacking in third party integrations and little to no documentation on customization. Aruba assumes that you have working knowledge of their CSS tags, JavaScript, REST API integration and others.

If you are looking for a NAC solution ClearPass is one of the best all in one solution it covers all authentication methods and has a large flexibility that can be easily customized to fit any scenario in any industry vertical.