NETGEAR Switches Reviews

We use this product for the entire IT network and for CCTV. We have many integrators and are resellers of NETGEAR Switches, and I design solutions for our customers. Our company is based in India, I'm an information technology professional and we are end users of this product. 

NETGEAR has most of the good security features that other switches have and it's cost-effective. 

I'd like to see a more robust solution. They need to focus on sustainability and security at the port level with more visibility and controllability of the switch. I'd like to see a warranty similar to that provided by other solutions. 

I've been using this solution for 10 years. 

The solution is pretty stable. 

The solution is scalable. 

The customer support is good. They are responsive, fast, and they're knowledgeable about the product. 

The initial setup is not complex in any way. There's no maintenance required once the solution is deployed. 

NETGEAR is competitive and cost-effective in comparison to Aruba and other solutions. It's not the most expensive, but it's not cheap. You're getting what you pay for. 

Compared to NETGEAR, Cisco has lots of other features within the switch where you can include lots of securities. The switches are very sustainable and can run for  years and years if the environment is okay. There are a few securities that we use to build a firewall or some other level where we can put lots of security on the port, as far as the loop and hacking goes. If anything happens in the network, there are lots of things that can be controlled at switch level. NETGEAR has less of these kinds of options. 

My recommendation of NETGEAR to a customer would be dependent on the kind of solution they have, their budget, network size and the length of time they expect it to work. The product is more suitable for medium size organizations. Enterprise organizations generally look for other solutions in that sphere. 

I rate the solution six out of 10. 

NETGEAR is our distribution switch for our local area network. We have about 80 data hosts connected to our network. They go through another set of switches into this distribution switch. From there they connect to our gateway and to our servers.

The switches are on our premise and there's no special software other than that it's just a network switch.

It has improved my organization because now the entire network is quicker. A lot of users tell me that things seem faster but they can't really elaborate. My guess is everything is just a fraction of a second quicker going through the network and that adds up at the end of the day.

SFP, speed, and 10-Gigabit are the most valuable aspects of this solution. We're an architecture firm and we sometimes deal with large files. Anything we can do to eke out even a fraction of a second less time to get something done over the course of a year adds up. If I can get 10-Gigabit running in my server room, which I am right now, even though we're only gigabit to the desktop, due to the client computers we have, I can get more performance from everybody. I'm ready to start bringing in 10-Gigabit Ethernet to the desktop once I get the hardware to do that.

It's easy to use once you actually read the instructions. There is some searching you have to do on the documentation to find exactly what you're looking to get done but it's all there. NETGEAR's forums were very helpful because people actually pointed me in the right direction when I had problems setting it up.

We use it for IT switching. It is the distribution switch for our network and then I have access switches that feed into this switch that are also 10-Gigabit. IT switching is very nice. I run my backups much more quickly. It works out to about as fast as I thought it would be. I'm quite pleased. It's definitely worth it for what you're getting; a lot of switches, a lot of networks. I looked at a lot of different possible models and products before I bought these and I settled on NETGEAR because I thought there was a good balance of price, performance, and features. And so far, it has worked out.

I have POE switches going into this switch, but I don't use this switch particularly to distribute power. The model I have is not a POE switch. It's just the data switch.

We have server aggregation. Our main file server is aggregated through two SRP interfaces on the switch.

We also have wireless access in our network, but it doesn't talk to this switch directly. It goes through one of our access switches.

The feature to change settings on the switch needs improvement. I understand why it's there, I can change the settings on the switch and I have to actually hit save to lock them in, otherwise, on a reboot, the changes revert to the earlier settings. I've forgotten to hit save a couple of times. It should have more of a big red obvious "You need to hit save" button to lock your changes in; that would have been helpful. There were a couple of times where things suddenly stopped working and I realized it was because I rebooted it and undid what I just fixed.

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.

I have been using NETGEAR Switches for three months. 

So far stability has been good. Now that we've gone live with them, I have not had to restart or shut them down at all.

If I had to do it again, I might've gotten a bigger switch with more ports on it because I'm using up more of them than I originally thought I would. But that's really not a scalability issue with the switch, that's just me not planning properly.

Only I am responsible for the maintenance of the switches. I'm an IT manager. 

In terms of size, we have about 70 employees, all of whom have ethernet connections through access switches to this switch. This is the core of our network.

I don't plan to increase usage much, if at all. This is what it's going to be for the next few years.

I have not used technical support. 

NETGEAR replaced some Nortel switches that were about 11 years old. They were end of life and they were not as fast. I had gigabit and 100 megabits switches. I am hoping to have these for another 10 years. I'm going to get 10-Gigabit and gigabit for my network speeds.

The initial setup was straightforward once I figured out what I was doing. It was fine once I acquainted myself with the switch and with some of the features. I was not pressured to get this done quickly. When the pandemic hit, we all went home so I had an empty server room in which to work so I could try to see if they worked and if they didn't, I could try it a different way. I did not have to risk taking down the whole network with people there. That was just a fortunate happenstance.

My implementation plan was to set up this switch along with my new access switches, which were also NETGEAR. I set them up disconnected from our live network. I put everything together, including the SFP uploads, in test client and test phones, and set everything up the way it was going to be. About a month and a half ago, I went in, unplugged the old switches, put in the new ones, and turned it on. It was very quick and easy but it took about a day and a half because we have a lot of cables.

In actual time, it took about a month and a half to deploy. But in actual work hours, it probably took about four days because we were doing it in fits and starts because we were trying to move out of the office when COVID hit.

There's a learning curve, but it's not as difficult as I thought it would be.

ROI is a soft benefit. It's hard to know. I don't know if the old switches would've died this morning. 

We have them for two purposes. One, to speed up our network. Two, to refresh with new hardware that isn't a decade old. So it's hard to determine.

Technology keeps changing so you don't need to buy something that's going to last 100 years. Buy something that you know you're going to have to replace in five or 10 years and price it accordingly. We were told that the Nortel switches we had bought would last for 10 to 20 years and that we would never have to replace it. Networking got faster in the years between and frankly, those switches got filled with gunk, they physically start wearing out, and fans die. As long as you know that it has a five to 10-year window, why would you pay 20 grand a piece for a switch? I just don't understand that.

There are no additional costs. We pay for licensing, hardware, and cables. That is it.

The pricing was definitely reasonable, I don't know if I'd say low. I think all networking equipment is more expensive than it should be. But NETGEAR had the price point that least annoyed me.

We evaluated Cisco, Juniper, Dell, and HP but they were all nearly twice the price of NETGEAR. I also had some hesitation to some. There seems to be some hesitation by some IT professionals to use NETGEAR for their enterprise and business networking, but so far, I'm happy.

We also considered Ubiquiti. We have a couple of Ubiquiti wireless access points. So I said, "Well, I'll just look at them." Ubiquiti was a possibility, but a lot of what this came down to was that there seems to be some hesitation in the IT world about using NETGEAR for enterprise and for business use. They do have a pretty large in-home user market. 

I have a couple of older NETGEAR switches that are at least as old as the Nortel ones that I just replaced. They have been on for 15 years and have never been down. I thought that if they're still going, they can't be that bad. I'll try it.

The primary reasons we chose NETGEAR over Ubiquiti, Cisco, and other products are because NETGEAR seemed stable and it frankly seems easier to set up, especially more than something like Cisco.

My advice would be: Don't rush it. Give yourself time between getting the switch and putting it in. That helped me do this properly. Have patience. Read the documentation. Be organized.

NETGEAR has the ability to label the interfaces and you can label different things on the switch in the web interface, while our old switches didn't have this feature. That helps me keep track of what's where. Being organized is really the key to all of this. When I am home I can dial into our VPN, look at the user interface of the switch, and I can tell you what's in every port on that switch.

I would rate NETGEAR Switches a nine out of ten. The only thing that would take away a point would be the user interface. The web interface sometimes needs refreshing and doesn't keep up with what I'm trying to do.

The primary use case for this switch was for when we were involving the more intensive AV over IP stuff, specifically the SDVoE products that NETGEAR has partnered with. The reason that we picked them over competitors was knowing that they were one of the founding partners of the SDVoE Alliance, which gave us a lot of assurances that the product would work well in this type of deployment. 

In our experience, any type of AV over IP stuff has always been plagued with some sort of network hiccuping, and there is always a big learning curve. Therefore, knowing that NETGEAR specifically worked with the SDVoE Alliance to make it work, this gave us a lot of confidence going into this project.

The use case was for a high school's distributed audio/video system. So, it ran audio/video in multiple gymnasiums, gathering spaces, and small collaboration rooms.

The reason that we went with SDVoE is the amount of sources and destinations were high enough, where if we were ever going to do it over traditional HDBaseT or some type of matrix switcher, then it would've been some crazy card loaded thing and I would've had to mix copper and fiber. It was enough that if we had to get into a 32x32 matrix switch, and at that price point, I was like, "This is silly, let's just go AV over IP, then we have no limitations or concerns with our inputs and outputs. We also have no risk of them adding a thirty-third input, then throwing out that switch and having to buy a whole new one."

In this specific case that we've used it for, we replaced a video matrix switch with it. The original design from the bid was to use a big 32x32 matrix switch. We decided that since we are doing a bunch of other network stuff here as well, in terms of control and audio, why don't we do audio, video, and everything over IP, putting everything on the same switch. So, instead of having 14 different devices to manage, I have five. It worked out really well in the long run.

We use M4300-96X and M4300 48-Port PoE 1Gb switches. At the moment, we are just using this with one customer.

If our company was going to buy a new office and deploy a bunch of stuff, it would be one of these switches that I would purchase, especially because you're able to stack different models and types, then manage it nice and easily. I could see, as a network administrator, the ability to look at your entire network from one page and have the ability to diagnose and fix problems in one area. That would be fantastic.

We did a deployment where we were running about a 10Gb video endpoint sources, so we were utilizing a much larger amount of backplane bandwidth than we were used to using. We used the 96X as the core switch, then stacked it with the other single gigabit switches. So, knowing that the 96X had more than enough of backplane bandwidth than anything we could throw at it now or in the future, makes us confident that we were going in the right direction. Not to mention, the 96X was one of the only switches that I could find that would do 10Gb with POE over copper, which was a hard fast requirement for our job.

Honestly, getting the 10Gb to work was simple. Just follow good termination practices in terms of your fiber and your copper, then it worked flawlessly. For us to have a system where we can run a 4K video source virtually anywhere in a building without having to worry about really expensive matrix switchers, etc., this is the way AV is going in the next little while. In this project, we knew that we were ahead of the curve, and there was no chance of running into bandwidth limitations, or anything like that.

It wasn't a feature that I knew I would need, but once we deployed it, it came in very handy. You can stack different models of switches. The fact that we can stack the 96X, which is the modeler switch for 10Gb cards or 40Gb. We can stack that with the 1Gb PoE 48 port switch. The ability to mix and match is invaluable. So, we didn't have to run massive super extensive switches in the data closets where it wasn't necessary. Being able to manage it all from one place, as all your network configuration settings went live across your entire building from one management console was really handy.

Since this is my first time working with this specific switch interface, the interface was pretty intuitive. The only area I found a little bit confusing was how they separated IGMP. So IGMP integration could be found both in the switching area of the switch, but also in the routing area of the switch. Therefore, it wasn't super clear which of those did which. As a beginner with the switch. it was a bit confusing at first to know, for example, "Where do I need to set this up? If I'm doing this, why does this work, and why doesn't this work?" Otherwise, the interface of the switch is pretty simple. I just found the IGMP a bit convoluted.

I was able to reach out to another guy who had used this particular switch in the past. He sort of explained some of the nomenclature that NETGEAR uses to explain things. It's just different from some of the other (especially lower-end) switches that I've worked with. It is just finding out how people explain their particular way to doing things.

The IGMP specifics of the web management console could use a bit of clarification. This is sort of a specific thing. Every switch manufacturer has their own idiosyncrasies, like managing Dell switches for QoS, I find to be really weird. However, QoS on the NETGEAR was brilliantly easy and super self-explanatory.

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. This is a very common feature on other managed equipment, like control systems, projectors, and certain power management devices. These have that email notification built into them.

A use case that I can think of is say somebody accidentally cuts an uplink wire between two switches. It would be fantastic if your core switch or one of the other switches could notice that disconnect and fire on an email to the manager, or the client, saying, "Hey, we've detected this problem. It happened at this time and date." Instead of having to run around the building trying to find out why things aren't working, you could have that information from a service standpoint ahead of schedule.

So far, in the year that they have been deployed, the switches have been pretty maintenance free. It does depend on your location. If it is in a dusty location, you will want to get in there and give it a cleaning every once in a while. However, the firmware updates and monitoring are nice and easy. 

The only issue that I have ever had was after a power outage. When the system came back up, the IGMP querier didn't elect properly. Then, I had to dive into the web console and disable it, then enable it for the querier to come back up again. That was the only hiccup that I found, where I could see the settings were correct in the switch, but for reasons that I couldn't quite figure out, it didn't actually elect a querier. So, this caused some broadcast storm issues on the switch. Once, I re-enabled it, it worked fine.

You are not limited in terms of stacking ports, and especially, if you're using the 96X as a core switch, the scalability, I could see this being very large. If you're using a type of a hybrid topology with a core switch going out to multiple switch stacks, or something like that, I could see the scalability of this being very good, especially considering the type of backplane switching capacity on the 96X.

Our customer uses it virtually everyday. As for expansion plans, it is used in an educational facility. Therefore, plans for expansion are always there, but they only happen when there is funding available. They are planning on adding additional display locations into other areas of the building and the ability to live stream from any of their sources out to YouTube and other sources. There is definitely talk of expansion and potential upgrades to the 4K sources and displays in the future.

We are using 15 percent of the switch's capacity right now. We are in no rush of maxing out the equipment.

My first experience with NETGEAR tech support wasn't fantastic. When I was having issues trying to get the IGMP sorted out, I called tech support. They wanted me to pay to talk to the tech support, and I had literally bought the switch two months ago. I expressed my frustration to that. I was like, "There is no warranty and no actual support for the product that you just sold me?" That is when I involved a a guy who was much smarter than me out in Toronto, and had worked with these types of issues before. 

Eventually, when I posted on the forums, however, I had great support. When I posted on their NETGEAR forums, I received some emails and phone calls from NETGEAR tech support. They had me to do some packet captures and send information. From what I know, they actually based one of their firmware updates on some of the issues that we were having.

My first instinct when I have tech support issues is to try to get somebody actually on the phone, and getting through to the right person on NETGEAR's general number was a bit challenging. However, when I reached out through their web forum, it was pretty good. Not only did I get some great advice and support from fellow NETGEAR users, but I also had engineers directly following up with me. Then, the same person that emailed me was also the person that called me, so I had a single point of contact from then on, which was nice. I wasn't caught in a customer service black hole.

The performance, expandability, and price point comparison, along with the redesigned part of the spec, made a convincing case to switch to the 96X. There was also AP over IP, in terms of how it manages audio and tracking from video. When we were able to show the cost and performance benefits to the client, they were onboard.

The initial setup was pretty straightforward. I don't have a lot of networking background, and I was able to get it up and running through either the intuitiveness of the web console or online documentation, which was pretty reassuring.

I spent probably about three days getting the network stuff configured, then another day doing deployment and commissioning. Setting up the switches was pretty easy, but making sure that the switches worked with the 47 different devices that I had a connected to it, that is where most of the time took.

When the SDVoE installations are configured correctly, the performance is amazing. Depending on the specific video equipment that you are using, the switching is either literally instantaneous or fairly fast and glitch-free. If somebody were to tell me this was video over IP, I wouldn't be able to notice. There is no artifacting, no compression, nor latecy. For mission-critical, high-end video, SDVoE is the way to go.

If it were just an SDVoE situation, I could literally plug it right out-of-the-box and go. In our particular installation, we were also using Q-SYS audio over IP, Dante, and some other control systems on the same network. Therefore, there is a bit of configuration to get all of those different protocols to play well on the switch in terms of managing QoS, managing different versions of IGMP, and making sure the filtering wasn't causing packets to get lost. However, once it was configured, it was nice and stable. It's been running for months without any issues and no downtime at all.

I had a consultant out in Toronto who helped me out with some of the more detailed IGMP configuration issues, but it's was mostly just me.

This switch isn't for the DIYer. A DIYer should get one of those easy cloud managed ones, like an Ubiquiti, etc. Because if you need this switch, you're probably doing a type of deployment where you need to have some network jobs. You don't need to be the guy who does everything through a terminal or certified network specialist in order to set up the basic settings, but some experience using managed switches is definitely an asset.

We had our goal: a multiroom rather large deployment. We shop tested everything before we deployed it onsite. We had all of the switches set up and linked with fiber and connected to as many of the devices that we could. We ran it through a mock setup and sort of torture tested it to see if it would survive power cycling, brownout, or devices connecting and disconnecting.

We wanted to do this because the site was rather large and having to do this type of servicing and testing when everything was deployed would have been really problematic. We found and addressed a few small idiosyncrasies that would have been very challenging onsite, because some equipment was stored up in ceilings or in areas which were hard to access.

The real return on investment is the ability of future scalability. Knowing if their building grows or as their AV and IP needs in the building grow that we can easily accommodate it. What is bad about the old way of doing AV is that when you max out your equipment, the only way to add more is to usually throw out that piece of equipment that you previously bought, and buy a new, bigger piece of equipment, then go from there. This has much higher equipment costs. There are the reconfiguration costs and the installation cost. If you're a dealer, it's always great to make a lot of money, but the way that we like doing business is to try to find the smartest, best, long-term solution for our clients.

For example, if they want another projector, then we will throw another projector in. This one is SDVoE compatible. Great, then we will just plug that projector right into our AV network, and we're done. There are no extra cards to buy. There is no matrix switch to switch out for something bigger. There are no worries about whether this device has to be Crestron, because we have a Crestron switch, then we have to have to buy a Crestron from now until eternity. The fact that SDVoE is an open standard will definitely make things much better in the future.

It was an initial, single purchase for us. For the three switches, because I had the 96X and the two 48 port single gigabyte ones, then all the cards, etc. The total price on it, which may be a little on the low side, for the client was around $16,000 or $17,000. 

In terms of the NETGEAR stuff, there weren't any surprises. The costs were definitely fair, especially considering what we were replacing. For the equivalent performance from a non-AV over IP solution, it would have been easily been in the $40,000 range. Comparing it to standard AV video switching, the price was very good, especially considering now they can add-on without any massive additional costs.

When I started looking around at other competing options, the price to performance for the NETGEAR M4300 was above everything else. For what we needed, especially with the 96X where we can add in additional cards later, this saved our clients easily thousands of dollars on this install. We only needed eight or twelve quarts of copper, but they do eventually want to add some more in the future. So, instead of having to buy a 10Gb switch with copper and PoE with 48 ports, which would've been an amazingly expensive devise, I could buy the 96X and put in the two cards and load the fiber that I needed. I could do fiber and copper in the same switch, which is just brilliant.

Depending on the size and scope of the project, we might use a different switch. For our smaller, simpler projects, we are typically using Luxul because they are very inexpensive and a decent performing switch. They also have some certain form factor things that we like to have, such as all their ports are on the back. With some of our clients, I would rather not have to touch their network, so not having anything to physically plug into on the front of their equipment practices is a big deal. Then, for some other QSC specific stuff, they have some preconfigured switches from Dell that we've used just from a warranty and service standpoint. E.g., if the manufacturer provides and preconfigures the switch, they'll warranty any switch issues, which is, for us as a company who provides service, a big deal.

For this project, I looked into a few other options, like Cisco. However, all the information that I could find on them, like their pricing, for what I needed was not competitive. Because this was an SDVoE project, I felt much more comfortable going with NETGEAR. knowing they are one of the founding partners of the SDVoE Alliance.

The advice I would give: Work with somebody, if possible to think about your backbone needs. Think about the network deployment and the design, because the last thing that you want to do is a four switch stack and run out of trunk capacity, switching capacity, or PV capacity. Even though the 96X is a more expensive piece of hardware than the other parts of the M4300, do not discount it as a great solution for a master or core switch.

There is one other guy in our organization who helps in terms of service and support, but for anything network-oriented, it's me.

I would rate the M4300 as a nine (out of ten). I was a non-expert, who felt fairly comfortable configuring and managing the switch. This is a big part of my rating. Also, the ease of doing things, like switch stacking and setting up trunks, which can be sort of confusing and scary, was great.

The available types of of hardware options for the 96X are amazing. In the same physical switch, you can put a 40Gb card, 10Gb copper, 10Gb fiber, and 1Gb copper or fiber, and you are able to hot swap it. It's just killer. There are not a lot of solutions which do this, and not anywhere close to the price point that NETGEAR does.

We are using it for a small to medium-sized office with over 60 users. We also had IP phones with firewalls and it was good.

The solution is reliable and it is easy to setup.

The problem with the solution is that when it is faulty, it doesn't indicate so and the Internet starts to drop. One needs to do a lot of troubleshooting before understanding that a switch is faulty. If a switch is faulty, it should give an indication.

The scalability and warranty should also be improved.

I have been using the solution for a long time. We are not using the most recent version because when we checked it, it was out of warranty.

The solution's stability is good when the switch works fine.

It is not a very scalable solution. We have an office with 60 users, including IP phones.

I have never contacted the technical support team. I have to go to the local reseller for any issues or queries.

The solution's initial setup is straightforward.

The deployment takes three to five minutes. We need to confirm our company via email first. It takes months to be configured.

The deployment was done by an in-house team. We did it on the Internet because we had qualified switch controllers and technicians. Everything was done efficiently.

I recommend this solution. Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

NETGEAR Switches is great because it comes preconfigured and designed specifically for AV and that suits our needs. NETGEAR offers multiple port options, is simple to configure, easy to handle, reliable and stable. The most valuable feature for us is the reasonable price. 

I expect we’ll continue to see an improvement in the configuration which could be simplified further. I would also like to see switches with more ports that provide room for new protocols of communications. It would be great to have more bandwidth.

Our primary use case of Switches is for work with a data protocol for audio or AVB protocol for audio. We also use the AVoIP, Dante, and Control.

NETGEAR is a preferred partner for our company which has offices nationwide and offshore. I work as a project engineer for an audio video integrator company.

The solution is stable and scalable. You can link multiple switches and create a bigger network.

We recently used Araknis and sometimes also use Cisco or Extreme Networks. Araknis is about the same price or even cheaper than NETGEAR, but they do not offer as many options as NETGEAR.

Licensing cost depends on the model and number of ports, whether it’s POE, POE Plus or POE Plus Plus. There are certain Cisco switches that are about the same price. 

AVB licensing is required to purchase separately on NETGEAR and Extreme Network.

I rate this product nine out of 10. 

We provide solutions for our customers who use this product for a variety of reasons but the main use case is for network connectivity. We are system integrators based in India and I'm the founder and managing director of the company. 

The company provides a lifetime warranty which is the main advantage for us. It's also easy to configure. 

This solution doesn't have a CLI interface. Cisco, for example, has this feature. If I don't want to use a web-based interface and I have to configure using CLI, it's lacking in NETGEAR. 

I've been using this solution for almost 12 years. 

This is a stable product. 

The scalability is good. 

The technical support is good, they are responsive. 

The initial setup is relatively easy. 

The cost is based on a per unit model. I believe it works out to be the Rupee equivalent of around $350 per unit. It's comparable to what Cisco or Ubiquiti charge. 

We evaluated Cisco which has more features than NETGEAR. As a brand name, Cisco carries added value and more brand awareness than NETGEAR. Cisco doesn't offer the lifetime warranty we get from NETGEAR. The choice between the two is really about an organization's requirements. If you're dealing with audio and video products, then Cisco is definitely the way to go. But if you're dealing with data and camera networks, then NETGEAR comes out on top. 

I rate this solution eight out of 10. 

We're a network integrator and supplier for our clients. We've installed these switches for various scenarios. We have installed them for core switching and remote switching, and we have also installed them in various standalone organizations where there is no core or distributed switching. There is just the main switch, and that carries the whole network.

In our previous deployment, we've had three NETGEAR 48-port switches that we installed as standalone switches. They were basically managing everything, such as the internet, firewall, switching, and then distribution to the other network.

In terms of the version, I have worked with GS724.

Its setup, usage, and access are most valuable. It is a very easy switch to set up. 

It is easy to do VLANs, software upgrades, etc. It is also easy to integrate it with other NETGEAR products.

One thing that NETGEAR does very well is that their switches come with a lifetime warranty, like HP. If a switch has not been neglected or misused, NETGEAR will replace your switch if it fails, which really helps.

Its integration with other products can be improved. A lot of time our clients have got an existing access point solution, but they want NETGEAR switching. They don't want to buy NETGEAR access points. The third-party integration would be a big assistance.

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.

I've worked with NETGEAR switches for the last six years.

Its stability is very good. I've never had a NETGEAR switch fail during all the time I've used them.

It is very scalable.

I never had to use NETGEAR's technical support in all the time I've used it. I presume it's good, but I never had to use their technical support.

Its initial setup is straightforward. Deployment is usually fairly quick because it has a very straightforward setup. Your cable runs will obviously take you longer, but deployment is very quick.

The deployment strategy is always to connect switching first, and then as we terminate our points, we connect our points so that people immediately have access to the internet. The strategy is always to first install a firewall, then install a switch, and then install cabling. This way when your cabling is up, your people are already protected, and they're behind the firewall. 

For its deployment and maintenance, you don't need a lot of staff members. Usually, two members are enough. Specifically, if I've got a cabling team, there may be three people, but I don't need a lot of people to do an implementation. I can usually have two people on-site, and they'll implement and sort the switching out themselves. They are usually cable technicians and network technicians.

You get what you pay for. From a price comparison, there are cheaper switch makers on the market that are definitely less expensive than NETGEAR. They give you the same functionality, but they don't come with a name. 

There are solutions like Ubiquiti that are very good. They have the ease of setup, and I find NETGEAR battling a little bit in comparison to Ubiquiti.

Cisco is obviously very expensive, and for a lot of people, it is usually for their core network.

If you're new to switching, then obviously, there is a learning curve, like with any product out there. If you're an existing user of the equipment, it is really easy to use. It is easy to implement and work with. It is easy to run. It is a nice system to work with.

I would rate it an eight out of 10.

AV over IP: Sending video and audio over the network. We use this solution as part of commercial AV large format displays, video walls, and high-capacity HD real-time displays and monitoring.

In most applications, we are only using a couple of switches. Primarily, they are trunched. We have switches in different locations. E.g., we will have an endpoint inside of a classroom or with devices directly connected, but also with a main switching infrastructure and IDF. That is one of our use cases. 

Another use case is in our medical environment with some of the 10 Gigabit applications. We will have switches remotely located in an IDF in a data closet where we will have fiber run back to those switches. We have just one per operating room, but then we will have lags in-between switches in order to pass video from one switch to another in the event that we need to share video to other systems.

We primarily have been using it in testing. It has been implemented by our audio-visual group on two projects now with the Crestron NVX AV over IP solution. One of those projects used two switches connected, and those have been stacked for port count. Then, the other implementation was just a single standalone switch.

That the switches can save a configuration or even import a configuration via CLI is largely beneficial. It's similar to our current workflow with Cisco switches, so it doesn't require much of a curve as far as implementing those features or implementing a configuration that way. It is straightforward.

The ability to use the web interfaces is a big plus. For implementation, our company can quickly update firmware and not having to worry about licensing, which is a big deal. That's a big difference from some of the Cisco products as well as the Extreme products that for specific features require licensing. Not having that with the NETGEAR product is great. This aids us tremendously, as a company, to roll out these switches on multiple projects.

• The new IGMP Plus is a handy feature. There is no configuration out-of-the-box to be able to pass a multicast video. This is probably the most beneficial feature of it.
• The web interface is nice.
• The overall usability of the switch seems to be going well.
• One of the things I like most is the different variations in models. We have 24 SFPs and 24 copper ports (24 by 24). The flexibility of that switch is really good for our medical systems use case.

The ease of use of these switches is very good because of the Cisco CLI. If you are familiar with CLI, then you can configure the switch that way. It also has a relatively straightforward web interface. Using the web interface is good for beginners or people who aren't familiar with Cisco CLI. However, having a common command line interface method is great for some of our more advanced guys who are familiar with it.

The cost and ease of being able to roll out similar implementations of specific use cases is very beneficial. Plus, the ease of setup with the IGMP Plus feature to naturally support what we do on a daily basis is a huge benefit.

I have noticed one thing where we have taken up the multicast group interval time. We have needed to increase that setting. What we found happening were streams would stop until they were reestablished. By taking up multicast group interval time, it resolved that issue.

There has been talk in the roadmap from my conversations with the NETGEAR product development guys about a more streamlined web interface that is more friendly to audio visual personnel, such as general technicians. It would be comparable to a package type web interface. That is one of the conversations that we have had that would be beneficial to having a more streamlined web interface.

Something that we have also spoken about were VLAN profiles. E.g., preconfigured VLANs that would have a multicast traffic configuration applied where you can select a VLAN that is already preconfigured for standard 1 Gigabit IGMP based video, and then another VLAN that is configured for Dante audio. That is beneficial to where you can check port by port or VLAN by VLAN, enabling a specific protocol. It naturally sets QoS settings as well IGMP settings for that VLAN according to the type of traffic.

Another thing that would be a big ask is audio video bridging (AVB). Being able to pass AVB traffic over these switches, that would be a huge add. There are not many switches out that support that. The GS728TP NETGEAR switches used to or still do support AVB, but it would be ideal if the 4300 Series could support it as well.

I have been using the 1 Gigabit series of the 4300 for eight months. I have also been using the 10 Gigabit version of the 4300 for almost a year.

The stability has been fantastic. I have had zero failures.

Video is passing as expected, so I haven't noticed any issues with the switches failing due to bandwidth issues. No news is good news on this front. If it works, then that is great.

Software Defined Video over Ethernet (SDVoE) installations seem to work well. I haven't noticed any failures there. The ease of use for SDVoE is great. The IGMP Plus feature comes with the switch configured out-of-the-box. To be able to pass that traffic, that is a big plus for AV installations.

I haven't had any issues with the 10 Gigabit switching. So, it works great. I'm able to pass around 18 gigs worth of signal over Ethernet ports and SFPs without issue. No news is good news. If it works, that's great. 

Maintenance is typically done through our service department.

Its scalability is one of the big pluses. There are different models of switches in the M4300 Series. The modular based switch is typically used as a spine switch all the way down to 48 Port 10 Gigabit switches. The different models of switches with various sizes and form factors make this switch line very mobile.

We do have plans to increase usage for these switches in our organization.

Typically, commissioning engineers are standing these up. These are our engineers who go to a site with systems in order to commission. They range in experience. For some of our newer guys, we put them on more simplified projects, then for some of our more experienced guys, we put them on the more complex, larger scale projects.

The technical support is much better than it was. That used to be one of the pain points. It took a lot of effort to get through to support and be able to get the support that we needed. Our relationship has been getting better with NETGEAR support.

We are typically a Cisco house. We still use Cisco quite a bit. Our in-house network group primarily supports Cisco. However, especially with these switches utilizing Cisco CLI, it is easy for us to cross implement. 

We chose NETGEAR due to the form factor, scalability, and price. It was a combination of those features put together as well as their focus on audio-visual solutions. Their initiative to make switches work well in an audio-visual environment, that's what we do. So, it makes sense for us to utilize a more cost-effective switch that is specialized to our type of traffic.

The initial setup for these switches was very straightforward. Being able to navigate through the web interface is quite easy. Everything makes sense. The flow from left to right in the web interface makes sense. There are a couple things that were tricky, like setting up DHCP scopes. That wasn't very self-explanatory, so it required looking at a manual. Some added information like little help popups to guide or direct how to set up those settings would help. A little streamlined interface on the homepage with a couple of suggestions would be beneficial, such as:

• Enabling IGMP, which already has a default with the IGMP Plus as a feature. 
• Setting up a DHCP on specific VLANs.

On average, we're able to configure the switches within 30 minutes. That is for most of our use cases, which are streamlined and straightforward. As they get more complex, that is where we are trying to segment more traffic to different VLANs and create DHCP scopes inside of those VLAN. Then, it takes a couple of hours. For most of our systems, we can be setup within 30 minutes or less.

As a company, we are working on creating a uniform implementation strategy. We're working on implementing a procedure for different types of projects to have a quick little start guide.

You do not need to be an expert, but you do need to know your terminology to understand basic things, whether it is IGMP or how to set up a DHCP scope. You need to understand what those are in order to set the switch up.

We haven't been implementing these switches a ton. Our ROI isn’t much at the moment, but the solution is something that we're looking to utilize more often.

The price to performance of the switches is excellent. The price point of these switches is great compared to big brands, like Cisco or Extreme Networks, with approximately the same functionality. 

Licensing is always a hassle and a pain point.

We find the cost of NETGEAR hardware and additional services to be below average compared to the top tier. There are still cheaper products out there, but they lack in functionality.

We have used Extreme, Cisco, Pakedge, Luxul, and Aurora switches. Though, we typically use Cisco and Extreme.

NETGEAR won us over with its scalability, pricing, and specific implementations within AV switching.

We're testing it up against Cisco Catalyst and Extreme Networks 440 and 700 products without having any issues. We can pass the same video over these switches, though the functionality settings are a bit different. Some of the settings are not named specifically the same. So, there is a bit of a learning curve. However, we're able to get video to pass properly functionality-wise.

We're getting into maintaining our network more. From a service standpoint, we do maintain networks. On rare occasions, we have uplinks to clients' networks where a client starts to maintain networks. Typically, if that is the case. It's not part of their workflow to upgrade firmware or make any changes to switches. They just like to monitor the status of the switches.

It is valuable for the AV use case. Test it in the environment that you're looking to utilize these switches, then create a process and procedure going forward on how to implement. Fortunately, there is not much of a process. That would be my suggestion.

I would rate them highly. I would go with a nine (out of 10).