Aruba Wireless Reviews

The primary use of this system was to provide the best possible WiFi experience for students, faculty, staff, and guests of our campus. We had 88 APs throughout 14 buildings on campus. During the academic year, we could have hundreds of users connected to the APs at any given time. 

Compared to what we previously used to have, this product has enabled us to have more devices connected to our WiFi network. 

The feature that I love the most is being able to broadcast different SSIDs with different protocol requirements. 

AP signal strength and price. I know this is a competitive market, but APs should not cost so much if they do not cover a large area. 

The system was very good, but we needed to upgrade in order to adapt for our needs, and doing so with Aruba would have been more expensive. 

No issues.

We used a network vendor to work with us whenever we had an issue, so they took care of everything for us. 

With our previous system, we had to delete users who had not connected to our WiFi for a period of time. With this system, we did not have to worry about that. 

We used Cisco and switched because of the price. In order for us to get what we needed from them, it would have been too costly. 

Initial setup was very straightforward. We set up the switches and APs, then took it from there. 

Besides paying for the APs, you need to pay a license each year for their use. Therefore, watch out for that and do the best you can to keep costs down.

I can't remember, but we probably did.

It is a great product if it has what you are looking for. 

There are a couple of valuable features of Aruba Wireless for us. First is ClearPass, which is an authentication product, and second is AirWave, which is a reporting function.

AirWave allows us to do different reporting on WiFi utilization at our different campuses so I can break down different areas of the college and find out how many users are using the network at any given time. I can find out the utilization of different access points, which allows me to do capacity management.

It needs the ability to perform mobility device management. They should have some kind of mobility device management built into the product.

You need to make sure that the controllers at the access points have the capacity to handle the additional licenses. Otherwise, buying additional licenses won't necessarily scale.

We're very happy with the Aruba. We've been using them for about the past five years.

We've had no issues with deployment.

For the most part, stability is excellent.

All you need to do is buy licenses for the access points that you have on those campuses.

9/10. The customer service we get from our sales rep is excellent.

Technical support is always going to take more time. If there's any kind of issue it needs to be replicated, it needs to be taken away and examined certainly more than customer service.

We were using another vendor to provide WiFi capabilities. Although it didn't have any limitations, Aruba integrated better with our existing equipment.

It's very easily set up.

I don't know what the ROI is on this. It's difficult to value the experience that the students have and the staff have, so to put an actual number on that is going to be very difficult.

We looked at other vendors before deciding on Aruba.

Make sure you're fully aware of all the products around WiFi and capitalize on any ones that are out there that would help your specific environment.

Integrated firewall, integrated WIDS/WIPS on the controllers and the ability to tunnel LAN traffic from the switches through the controllers to set consistent 802.1x and access controls that are consistent across both wired and wireless LANs.

It improves security by helping us to centralize access controls and dot1x and set common policy across both wired and wireless LANs without having to install additional components.

The controllers used to include heat map functionality. This was removed in a recent release. To get this functionality now, you need to be using Airwave (AWMS), which adds additional cost. On the other hand, Airwave can be used to manage a multi-vendor environment, so there may be some other benefits to having it deployed, but it would be nice to have the heat map back in the controller.

I've been using it for five years.

No issues encountered.

No issues encountered.

No issues encountered.

It's excellent.

It's excellent.

Default settings are sufficient to get a functioning wireless network up and running fairly easily. Complexity increases add vLANs, security policy, dot1x, redundancy, etc.

At my previous employer we had a relatively large wireless installation so we worked with a vendor team. The network at my current employer is small enough that I could handle it myself.

Licensing has improved. In the past all redundant controllers required licenses for all the access points. They've not implemented a centralized licensing model so that you only need to license your access points once.

We evaluated Cisco. Cisco's solution, at the time, required additional components to provide the same functionality. For example you'd need external firewalls, IDS/IPS, and authentication servers. Aruba controllers had all this built in. I haven't looked at Cisco's current offerings, so this may not still be the case.

I'd recommend you do the training.

I have a small office with about five APs. It has a good central management system to help manage my wireless devices, just to ensure that everything is working correctly.

It makes things easier because it's SD-WAN. With the central management system, I'm able to access each device. I can configure one device and then it provisions all the other devices with the same configuration, rather than my having to configure them one by one.

The central management system. It's called Aruba Central, which allows you to manage the APs, the switch, and the controllers, etc.

The management system would be better if it were more polished, if it had a better interface like, for example, Meraki.

Scalability is pretty good. I believe they recommend having up to 50 APs per cluster, but it can scale even more than that. I don't really need that in particular, although it's an enterprise-standard product. The throughput is pretty good.

I haven't used technical support as of yet.

I used to use Meraki but with Meraki, if you stop paying for the licenses, you basically don't own the device. Once you stop paying for the licensing, the device is pretty much dead.

The initial setup was pretty much straightforward to be honest. You only configure one AP and when you plug the other ones into the network, it recognizes that that AP is the master and gets the configuration off that.

I did look at Ubiquiti because the price point was cheap. But after looking further into it, the main reason I chose Aruba was because they have a lifetime warranty on their APs.

My advice would depend on the needs. It depends on what size of business you have and what you are looking to accomplish. In general, I'd recommend Aruba Wireless. 

The only other thing I would let you know is that, if you want a centralized management system that is able to manage all your networking devices such as the wireless, the switch, the routers, and the firewall, then Aruba may not be the one, because Aruba doesn't do firewalls. For example, with Meraki, you can have a full Meraki network with the switches, routers, firewall, APs, all managed on one central network. With Aruba, if you have a firewall, you'd have to use a separate management system to manage that.

The most important criteria when selecting a vendor would be

• support
• durability of the device
• brand reputation
• ease of use.

I would rate Aruba Wireless at about eight out of 10. I haven't had any issues with it to date, and it's a pretty robust product. The reason I won't give it higher than that is because of the GUI. They need to make it more polished like Meraki's. But other than that, I've been pretty happy with it and I like all the additional features there.

We use Aruba wireless APs to provide wireless services for a private high school campus which is located on a 60-acre campus in Rockford, IL, with an enrollment of nearly 900 students.

Increased productivity with mobile devices has improved by expanding wireless coverage throughout the building. While our building has been covered by the Aruba APs throughout the years, we are now replacing older APs to increase bandwidth to support an increase in the number of users with dedicated devices. Nowadays, the end-user devices require faster bandwidth from APs, and the newest APs obviously support faster standards and improved bandwidth connectivity.

We appreciate that the Instant models do not require a dedicated "controller" to manage the APs. This cost saving allowed us to purchase more APs in our initial order. We started out small and slowly added more APs as each annual budget allowed. We still have the possibility of adding a dedicated controller which affords us more options, but at this time we haven't needed it.

The web interface to manage the APs is intuitive and makes managing the system easy. 

Firmware updates are quick and do not require much downtime.

Customer service really needs to be improved. If the customer support was better, I would recommend it to others more than I do now. I say that even though we are upgrading to newer units this summer.

Stability of wireless services provided by the Aruba APs hasn't been an issue. If there have been any issues, they've been minor and have been resolved by firmware updates.

No issues with scalability. Scalability has been one of the easiest aspects of the Aruba Instant product line. As long as the models are compatible, you can simply connect it to your network and it will learn the settings from the other APs on the network and join the AP network. This is one of the best features of the Aruba Wireless Instant product line, besides the fact that you do not need a dedicated "controller."

The first level of technical support is frustrating, and I stated that technical support was the one area where Aruba Wireless needs improvement. Higher levels of support are better. Considering that you have to pay yearly for support, I expect a higher level of support. On a scale of one to 10, I'd give their first level of support a four. They have to improve.

We did for a very brief time, it was a consumer "off-the-shelf" product to get us by in strategic locations in our building. It was not intended to be a long-term deployment.

Initial setup was straightforward. We followed the very basic instructions (connect to the new WiFi network, then go to a website, make some simple changes, save, reboot, done); updated the firmware, and we were on our way.

Pricing is competitive. Licensing is needed to maintain access to the latest firmware, which wasn't made clear originally when we started with Arbua (or things changed, I'm not sure which). I would just say, make sure you budget for it. In addition to the licensing, you do get "support," for what its worth.

No, we received guidance from others in our community and stuck with Aruba.

We currently utilize the Aruba Instant 205 and older Instant 105 models. I would give both models a rating of an eight out of 10. We will be upgrading this summer to move our Instant 105 models out of circulation and will be implementing three new Aruba product lines.

Make sure you get the maintenance licensing, don't skimp on the models. If you can buy a more powerful unit, get the more powerful unit, it will be supported longer and offer a longer ROI.

I sold both the Aruba hardware and software, primarily the IAP 100, 200 and 300 series, along with AirWave as well as ClearPass to SMB clients primarily with less than 500 employees. At the time, I worked for PGH Networks, a local MSP and Aruba certified partner.

I used this solution for four years from 2013 to 2017.

Aruba provided a great product offer for clients of all sizes and scopes. Everyone needs WiFi. Aruba allowed for the detailed control and management of an entire WiFi network from a single screen backed by a support team with local SEs who work with business partners to ensure the product's success.

• Instant access points and ClearPass
• IAPs could be deployed without a controller, solving sticky clients by peeling away users crowding one AP and can have settings pushed from a master AP.
• ClearPass and AirWave gave highly accurate detailed reports of who used which applications when and the ability to throttle users if they were bogging down the network with superfluous activity.

Larger network for Aruba users and partners. I would have liked to see more manufacturer driven events and outings to drive brand recognition and familiarity.

We primarily use the solution for the wireless services for the entire campus.

The wireless service is pretty much standard. 

We like the centralized configuration and monitoring. 

We like the performance of the access points as they're not easily interfered with by other wireless devices. 

The initial setup was straightforward. It's really easy.

The documentation is great.

The pricing and licensing structure are great.

It's very easy to work with.

I would like to see a faster web interface in the controller and more troubleshooting tools, including real-time troubleshooting tools.

The stability is quite good. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze.

A lot of people use the solution. We have about 120 access points and more than 1,500 clients who use it daily.

In terms of scalability, it is very easy to expand the network. We build new schools and buildings all the time so the usage is always increasing.

We haven't used technical support yet; I really am not qualified to answer to how helpful or responsive they are.

That said, the forums are quite helpful if you need assistance or to gain insights into usage.

We previously used HP Access Point and LANCOM Access Points. The HP series was discontinued and the LANCOM is very outdated. Therefore, we switched over to Aruba.

The initial setup is straightforward and not overly complex. A company shouldn't have any trouble handling the process. 

We had it up and running in a day or two. The deployment is fast.

We have installed and configured it by ourselves. We did not need the assistance of consultants or integrators. That said, we had the access points, however, we needed some education, some training. The company who sold us the access point really spent two or three days training us and then we configured it ourselves.

We had a very good experience with them. We were satisfied with their level of expertise.

The license is not that expensive. The access point comes with a perpetual license. That's a very big deal in this kind of market. For example, Cisco charges annual licenses in comparison. Aruba Access Points come with perpetual licenses. It could be one license and you have it forever. There is no need to renew or buy something extra.

The pricing is very attractive. I'd rate it at a five out of five. 

You buy the controller. You buy the access points and the licenses and that's it. If you want to have technical support on the controller, you have to buy subscriptions. However, the licenses and the warranty of the access points are free and forever. There's an unlimited lifetime guarantee.

We are a university, so we have the whole community using this product.

We are using Access Point 305 with the Aruba controller 7210.

It's a very good solution. We have our problems, however, all wireless products have their problems. We haven't used state-of-the-art wireless solutions like Cisco or Huawei, so we're not able to compare everything together. That said, we are very happy with what we have.

I would rate the solution at an eight out of ten.

I use Aruba Wireless to manage and monitor mobile users.

It has helped in making deployments easier despite the configuration's complexity.

I have found the Access Point (AP) group profile feature extremely useful. It makes deployments look easy.

• They should simplify the configuration flow. 
• Additional detailed reporting for client traffic would be a great addition.