We performed a comparison between Brocade Ethernet Switches, Cisco Ethernet Switches, and NETGEAR Switches based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, HPE Aruba Networking, Ubiquiti Networks and others in Ethernet Switches.
"The initial setup was really straightforward and easy."
"The most valuable feature of Brocade Ethernet Switches is the good range of access it provides."
"The reliability of Brocade is the most valuable feature. The solution has been up and running for over ten years without any fail, fixes required, or breakdowns. It is a very strong piece of equipment."
"It has good integration with HPE Primera. They have smart zoning in which the administration is very easy. You don't have to do anything. Zoning and other things are done automatically if you just enable the smart zoning. That's one very good thing in HP."
"The switches last for a very long time."
"I have not had any issues with our Brocade switches."
"The technical support is good."
"There's a zone for each server and services in the storage."
"These switches are both stable and scalable."
"It's all-encompassing and can help you in all these different areas. If people realize that they want something that's going to work, that's pretty foolproof, then Cisco's always worth the investment."
"Cisco Ethernet Switches is a very stable product."
"The features that I have found most valuable are the core reliability and the switching group. All the features are very generic switching features with high reliability. That is the main key point I can highlight."
"The most valuable feature of Cisco Ethernet Switches is its hardware."
"The features that I have found most valuable are that it is easy to use and it has good technical support."
"We can expect Cisco Ethernet Switches to last for years without issue."
"The greatest advantage of Cisco switches is their reliability. For example, we bought some 500 series switches back in 2002 or 2003, and they ran 24/7. I never had an issue for seven years."
"The remote troubleshooting is pretty easy. You can turn off a port that might have a network loop created, or where there might be a bad NIC card that is creating issues. Being able to turn off that port remotely is fantastic, instead of having to replace the whole switch. Remote management is really easy."
"The ability to manage them is the big valuable feature. The ease of use is great."
"As far as remoting into it goes, it is very efficient because I can do it from anywhere, through the remote software. I can get right into it, I can change settings really quickly, if a customer needs to add another device into it or if I need to make changes on the VLANs that we created."
"The initial setup was straightforward."
"It's nice, if there is an issue, to be able to go in through the remote. The fact that the remote doesn't require a static IP... is nice. They initiate the contact to the outside world, without requiring a static to get in."
"The most valuable feature is definitely the fully functional IGMP snooping and querier, out-of-the-box, that the switch provides. With most if not all switches that we've worked with previously, at a minimum you have to enable a couple of different options... It's really a good feature to have that stuff enabled and fully functional out-of-the-box so that [AV techs] don't have to worry about configuring any of that stuff."
"Netgear switches are highly reliable. We haven't done anything particularly sophisticated with them."
"The cloud management has just been huge for us. We have 80 clients and they all have switches... With the cloud-managed Insight ones... we know more information without having to do complicated SNMP traps. We get nice emails, we get a web interface, and we're not having to wait for our RMM tools to get SNMP traffic to notify us. We don't have to do complicated configurations."
"Brocade Ethernet Switches could improve by having better compatibility with web management of older versions."
"Brocade Ethernet Switches need a better interface and centralized management."
"No graphical interface."
"There are some performance issues."
"It should be simpler. There are still some things that can be simpler in the Brocade switches."
"The solution could be more secure."
"These switches are no longer supported."
"The initial setup can be simplified."
"The initial setup for on-prem versions is complex and requires a trained, certified engineer."
"We need more management tools for the solution."
"We'd like the pricing to be lowered."
"The pricing should be reduced so that they are more competitive."
"The price is an area with a shortcoming in the solution."
"It would be nice if they had higher wattage for PoE+."
"The management of the solution could improve."
"There's a lack of chips and, consequently, a lack of deliveries. They're out of stock at their European warehouse."
"I would like an email notification in case of errors or failures. If it was possible for the switch to email out an error log or notification note, especially in cases where we have the switches offsite (on the other side of town), then if something was to go wrong, it would be great to know about it before our client goes to use it for a big event, and it doesn't work. While I know that it does do SNMP, which is sort of standard, in the AV world, that is not always an option for us. We are usually running our own little network box and don't always have access to an SNMP server. We may just have simple Internet access or something similar."
"The web interface has been a little sketchy on occasion. Sometimes I have to reload the page to get things to show up properly, but the switch itself seems fine. The web user interface is a little wonky at times."
"This product lacks a CLI interface."
"The management of them, itself, is not so good. You have to go between many different browsers, even some super-old browsers, to be able to do it. That is a super pain."
"The tool's price could be better."
"There are some design issues on which they really missed the boat. The problem has to do with rack mounting them because the lights and jacks should all be on the front, and the power on the back. The way they did it makes it really difficult to use them in a rack environment, because when the lights are on the opposite side of the jacks... you usually can't see the back side of a rack. You can't get back there to see, so it's just crazy."
"There are a lot of systems that are moving into different areas. There are a lot of cloud-based things happening. One nice feature that I've seen in other switches is artificial intelligence on the actual porting. They've got AI technology that will tell you when a port is down. They not only tell you when a port is down; they also tell you when a port is running slower. You can do a cable-fault check, or you can do other checks. It would be nice to have this information in NETGEAR. This feature might already be there in a new release of the NETGEAR's firmware, but I haven't seen it."
