"The most useful feature of Juniper Wireless AP is the reporting Marvis."
"The solution is pretty generic and easy to use."
"The simplicity is great."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"It's a reliable solution."
"Good manageability, and stability."
"It is a reliable and robust solution. Access and Mobility Groups are useful. We don't use anything very fancy."
"Cisco is one of the leading vendors and is at the top of many lists. The access software is robust, and the performance of the devices is excellent."
"We are using Cisco access point 2802, and they are very reliable."
"The integration is great."
"The most valuable features are mobility and security."
"Although there are a few steps, the initial setup is pretty straightforward."
"At the moment, particularly with the COVID-19 situation, the most valuable feature is probably the IPsec VPN, which is easy to implement with Fortinet."
"For me, the ease of setup and the rugged nature in harsh environments are most valuable. So, durability and ease of use have been its best features."
"The most valuable features are the roaming profile, the mesh, and the performance."
"Fortinet FortiWLM is good for tracking assets, monitoring, and overall management."
"The most valuable features are central management and the many other features available."
"The most valuable features of this solution are its speed, reliability, and integration with the firewall."
"If you want to do more specific stuff, it's a bit limited."
"I need a bit more time with it before criticizing the features."
"Juniper Wireless AP can improve by continually improving its reporting and integration with other systems."
"Installation is complex."
"Its licensing has been very frustrating. There is also the complexity of managing the product. These are probably the two reasons why we're looking at Aruba. The way they license this product is not simple. There are some good features in the latest version, but there are additional license costs as well, which is frustrating for us. It is not really a feature issue for us. It really comes down to cost and licensing. They should make it a bit simpler to manage. We find the overall solution a little bit more complex than we would like to deal with. Its troubleshooting is a bit difficult, and it does require a high skill set. Comparatively, Aruba seems quite simple. One of the benefits of the Aruba product is that it is cloud-managed. We don't have to manage the management platform itself, whereas Cisco is on-premise. Its user interface could also be better."
"Apple is definitely causing a lot of issues by turning on more security features on its equipment. It is causing more problems on the business side. One is what they call a randomized Mac address that Apple has put out. As far as I know, Cisco doesn't have a fix for that."
"It would be great if it is compatible with other products."
"It's very scalable, but when you shift gears sometimes, you have to do more work than people anticipate."
"Older versions used to be hard to deploy. The latest OS, however, has made things a lot easier. While deployment is much better, it could always be even easier."
"The stability could improve, there are some issues. We were told the version of the software we are using on all of the controllers is best for Cisco IOS, but we might need to update our software, this might fix the stability issues we are experiencing."
"The solution could improve by having an advanced model with a controller. Additionally, the solution could be more secure."
"In the next release, they could improve by adding a controller-less server, or architecture that is provided in other solutions, such as Aruba. This would be a great benefit for customers."
"Cost is something that could be improved, but you have to pay for what you get."
"The roaming of Fortinet FortiWLM could improve when comparing it to other solutions. We are missing some of the functionality in the controller. Additionally, they should offer more logs instead of using FortiAnalyzer because all the users will not be using the same thing."
"The interface could certainly do with some improvement. We have other customers with WiFi networks, and they always use Ubiquiti. With Ubiquiti, it's a much better user interface, and it is much easier to configure."
"Areas for improvement would be the compatibility with Apple products and cross-platform integration."
"They need to do more with their marketing. That's what's wrong with them. Nobody knows they do all this other stuff. I love the product. For an enterprise-level system, you never have to explain why you're recommending Fortinet, whereas you might have to do that if you want to use the Ubiquiti Professional or the new Netgear line, but you don't have to explain Fortinet. It has been remarkable to work with."
"When using the FortiGate as the wireless controller, you cannot have automatic user registration, which is something that they should offer."
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Cisco Wireless is ranked 3rd in Wireless LAN with 76 reviews while Fortinet FortiWLM is ranked 9th in Wireless LAN with 7 reviews. Cisco Wireless is rated 8.2, while Fortinet FortiWLM is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Cisco Wireless writes "Robust with a good level of performance and very helpful technical support". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Fortinet FortiWLM writes "Impressive manufacturing quality, highly durable, and very easy to deploy". Cisco Wireless is most compared with Aruba Wireless, Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN, Ruckus Wireless, Huawei Wireless and Mist AI and Cloud, whereas Fortinet FortiWLM is most compared with Aruba Wireless, Ruckus Wireless, Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN, Ubiquiti Wireless and Fortinet FortiWLC. See our Cisco Wireless vs. Fortinet FortiWLM report.
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All are good selections, and this question is difficult to answer without knowing your throughput requirements, as each vendor has multiple models within there series.
Personally I recommend looking at Arista Networks’ cognitive Wifi, where controllers are a thing of the past.
Ruckus virtual smart zone will be your best bet allowing up to 300k connected devices and 30k access points. furthermore, Ruckus has time and again proven best in speed, throughput in high density environments by independent studies. I have over a decade of working with this product and none of the other competitors can beat the layer 1 connectivity of Ruckus WiFi
Hi,
Every one of the mentioned solutions is good but you need to check the needs which are security since the firms you are working with need protection and tracking of data. For this reason, I recommend:
- if you have FortiGate installed then go for Fortinet Wireless since they can be integrated with the Fortigate without buying a controller and they work perfectly together and you will get the advantage of applying rules to the client himself whether mobile or computer, easily managed & monitored, more visibility over your network and incident notifications.
If the above doesn't apply then you can go with the best one that fits your budget and security needs which for me doesn't fall on the mentioned solution but to go with ARUBA Instant Access Wireless Solution and the reasons are as such:
- Cisco is too much expensive and you got to pay smart support with some complexity in configuration and you need to buy a controller
- Ruckus is good but when you want to have the security you need to buy a controller with licenses and it won't give you the security needed since it is just a wireless solution
- Huawei is not a stable company since it had many ups and downs and they can reach with you to have all the solutions nearly free so that you install their brand.
Whereas Aruba you don't need a controller in the Instant access points and you will get the minimum security with radius integration and what is important a lifetime warranty on the access points.
In addition, if the number of access points increased and you want more detailed management and more advanced configurations, you can buy a controller either on-premises or on-cloud with Aruba.
The above information is based on my experience with all the solutions and their POC.
If you need any more details and consultancy, kindly feel free to contact me.
Regards.
Hi Imad,
Thanks for your input. Do you have any POC data for Cisco and Aruba?
Thanks in advance
Boa tarde
As soluções cada solução que você indicou tem pormenores que podem impactar tanto no funcionamento quanto em caso de disaster recovery.
Fortinet: Possui bons access points, aliado às funcionalidades de segurança do próprio UTM, porém será mais um serviço para o appliance gerenciar, e dependendo do que está rodando nele, corre-se o risco de degradar a performance da funcionalidade principal "segurança", por que tambem está gerenciando uma rede wireless, além do fato se houver alguma pane no appliance Fortinet, tanto os itens de segurança quanto a rede wireless irão ficar indisponível. Dê a Cézar o que é de Cézar, deixe a fortinet focada em segurança, que é o que ela faz de melhor.
Ruckus: Excelentes Access points, confiáveis e com alta performance, possui no mínimo 4 opções de gerência, sendo, controlerless Unleashed, appliance virtual, appliance hardware e cloud, ambas as opções não trará prejuizo à performance da rede wireless, porque não há tunelamento de dados para elas, além de possuir várias funções de segurança inerentes à rede wireless. licenças são perpétuas.
Cisco: Excelente access points, porém solução muito cara para aquisição e renovação.
Huawei: Pelo que conheço, tem bons access points, e controladoras virtuais e appliance físico, mas conheço poucas redes com esta solução.
É lógico que uma tem um recurso extra a mais do que a outra, mas considero mera perfumaria, pois o básico para uma rede wireless segura todas atendem.
Eu já atendi a mais de 40 universidades federais no Brasil, todas com Ruckus, e não há reclamação da solução.
Como recomendação pessoal, vá de Ruckus.
Hi,
It is all dependent on the size of the controllers in question. Though I would suggest getting a cloud base technology so you are limited by any controller and have much better redundancy. Take a look at Arista Cognitive Wireless