Juniper EX Series Ethernet Switches and Fortinet FortiSwitch - Data Center are competing in the network switch market. Juniper leads in flexibility and security features, while Fortinet excels in network visibility and integration with FortiGate.
Features: Juniper EX Series offers the Junos operating system, Virtual Chassis capabilities, and interoperability for diverse networking needs. Fortinet FortiSwitch provides enhanced network security through integration with FortiGate, central point management, and strong port analytics features.
Room for Improvement: Juniper EX Series faces stability and support challenges, with improvement needed in documentation and pricing. Fortinet FortiSwitch struggles with complex VLAN management, integration issues, and requires better automation and user interface improvements.
Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Juniper EX Series sees deployment across various settings but experiences inconsistent customer support across regions. Fortinet FortiSwitch offers versatile deployment but also encounters reliability issues with customer support, though generally maintains a favorable reputation.
Pricing and ROI: Juniper EX Series is often seen as a cost-effective solution compared to others like Cisco, providing good long-term ROI despite high module pricing. Fortinet FortiSwitch is positioned as less expensive versus Cisco with reasonable pricing, offering satisfactory ROI for many clients.
The integration of Fortinet infrastructure, including FortiSwitches, is cost-effective compared to Cisco, especially when paired with Fortinet wireless solutions.
Compared to other low-end switches with similar features, these are more robust and offer better scalability, which justifies the higher cost.
Technical partners provide responses within a day for any technical queries.
Customer support needs improvement in terms of speed and reliability.
On a scale from one to 10, I would rate the technical support of Fortinet an eight.
I have not faced any hardware issues requiring support due to the stable nature of their products.
I find them very competent.
Local partners and local distributors cannot open direct tickets, but any level of partner with other OEMs such as Cisco can open a ticket directly, which is a connectivity advantage that Juniper lacks.
When used in a dedicated Fortinet infrastructure, FortiSwitch scalability is better than some other switches, like Cisco, Meraki, or Arista.
Scalability is generally good, with transitions from gigabit to ten giga, twenty-five giga, and forty giga.
Adding another switch to an existing setup turns them into a single virtual switch.
The EX series supports scalability well, with newer series like EX4100 offering stacking of up to eight switches.
I would rate Juniper EX Series Ethernet Switches a seven in terms of scalability as it could be more scalable and requires some improvement.
There is room for improvement as it sometimes takes over an hour to push configurations onto the devices from the management tool.
They have separate control and forwarding planes, which enhance scalability and stability.
During peak time at nine, the traffic passes through the switches perfectly.
Juniper EX Series Ethernet Switches proves to be an equally good switch.
There is room to improve the integration between FortiSwitch and other third-party solutions, as challenges arise when integrating with different vendors.
Sometimes, customer support does not provide prompt assistance, leaving projects hanging.
The commercial aspect presents challenges, particularly with pricing, as customers often ask for Juniper or Cisco, brands they are more aware of, which makes awareness about Fortinet FortiSwitch - Data Center another weak point.
One area that can be improved is the handling of power interruption, as it can cause the platform to crash.
Some integration with AI could be a good idea since I heard that Juniper already has systems to deploy AI within the EX device, but I haven't had the opportunity to try that.
With other OEMs, customers or partners can directly open tech tickets.
The Fortinet switches come with no additional cost as they are open source, with only hardware warranties applicable.
Pricing is competitive, although it's not the cheapest option.
The switches have become more expensive than before.
It is rated high on the scale, and I would say it is definitely on the high side, confirming a rating of one, which means it is very expensive.
In terms of pricing, the Juniper EX Series is cost-effective compared to competitors like Cisco.
This feature allows the switch's ports to be used as firewall ports, enhancing network security by enabling IPS and network profiling directly on the ports.
It allows me to create VLANs, implement security measures, and push configurations using a single tool.
The main actual benefit that Fortinet FortiSwitch - Data Center brought to my customer's environment is secure connectivity while minimizing downtime from unexpected traffic or broadcasting.
We are using the Juniper MX 104 L3 switches and SRX 1500 firewall since 2019, and we have not faced a single failure.
Juniper EX series switches offer great technology, particularly their Virtual Chassis technology, which is an excellent feature for stacking switches and functions like a single virtual switch.
They feature a separate control and forwarding plane, which enhances performance during heavy traffic and attacks.
Product | Market Share (%) |
---|---|
Juniper EX Series Ethernet Switches | 2.9% |
Fortinet FortiSwitch - Data Center | 1.9% |
Other | 95.2% |
Company Size | Count |
---|---|
Small Business | 16 |
Midsize Enterprise | 5 |
Large Enterprise | 4 |
Company Size | Count |
---|---|
Small Business | 38 |
Midsize Enterprise | 17 |
Large Enterprise | 24 |
With 10 or 40 GE access ports and a high-throughput backbone, FortiSwitch Data Center Switches are ideal for the top-of-rack (ToR) server or firewall-aggregation applications. The high-speed switching fabric is also well suited for enterprise network core or backbone network installations.
Juniper Ethernet Switches are made up of the EX Series product line. These EX Series Ethernet Switches provide branch, campus and data center networks with access, aggregation and core layer switching solutions. The end result is secure, fast and efficient application and data delivery.
Today's enterprise networks increasingly demand mobile access, optimal availability, virtualization, and unified communications. The Juniper Ethernet Switches EX Series caters for all of these requirements, ensuring business continuity, network flexibility and maximum productivity.
Juniper EX Series switches are AI-driven, operated and managed using the Mist AI cloud from Juniper. This gives EX customers simplified operations with insights, anomaly detection and automated troubleshooting, empowering IT teams to deliver the best user experience across the wired network.
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