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Dell PowerConnect Switches [EOL] vs NETGEAR Switches comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Dell PowerConnect Switches ...
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
8.2
Number of Reviews
34
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NETGEAR Switches
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
56
Ranking in other categories
LAN Switching (4th), Ethernet Switches (4th), AV Over IP Switching (2nd)
 

Featured Reviews

Hasan Haseeb - PeerSpot reviewer
Excellent support, good pricing, and easy setup
I expect it to be a zero-touch or a plug-and-play device. To some extent, it is, but we need to know the architecture, and we need to know what exactly we are doing. It is not so easy to implement. It depends on what exactly we are doing and it is still not a plug-and-play or zero-touch device. In the upcoming version, they can make it zero-touch, where we can just power it on and start using it. They can have some templates for different scenarios, such as when you are using it for the data center or adding it to your existing infrastructure.
Umang Shah - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient routing and access control with an easy setup
We use NETGEAR Switches for networking, particularly for switch-to-switch connectivity. We connect them with core switches, especially for camera installation NETGEAR Switches have increased the throughput and speed of internal communication, and have improved our network efficiency. The most…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Its throughout and compatibility are the most valuable."
"Dell PowerConnect Switches are very easy to configure with the GUI. Dell supports the solution even though it has been discontinued."
"PowerConnect Switches' stability is satisfactory."
"It's easy to set up. We can put it in production in a couple of minutes."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is simplicity."
"Dell offers very good support."
"The solution's most valuable feature is its good integration with solutions from other vendors."
"Dell PowerConnect Switches have a VTL feature similar to Cisco's VSS. With VTL, using this technology, you can cluster two switches together to increase redundancy in the environment."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten. I have not faced any issues with the product whatsoever."
"I'm satisfied with the stability of NETGEAR Switches."
"NETGEAR offers a competitive pricing structure, which is beneficial for cost management."
"With this, you literally just log in to a website, see all your clients, all your NETGEAR switches, and you can manage them all right there: the VLANs, powering on and off individual ports, rebooting the whole device, the firmware updates. Everything can be done remotely..."
"Comes preconfigured and designed specifically for AV."
"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 kind of backplane switching capacity on the 96X."
"The solution helps transfer data."
"The remote troubleshooting features provide a single pane of glass where I can see my all my clients' equipment. If they're reporting a problem, I can go to the Insight Pro interface online and I can bring up that client and I can see all their devices and the status of all their devices."
 

Cons

"What's lacking in Dell PowerConnect Switches is SD-WAN integration, and this is what needs to be improved in it. All enterprises now move towards SD-WAN infrastructure, and because Dell PowerConnect Switches don't currently support SD-WAN, the product would be replaced, considered a secondary switch, or linked up to a different switch. Integration or support for SD-WAN is what I'd like to see in the next version of Dell PowerConnect Switches."
"More stable firmware releases would be an improvement because we have had them randomly power on and off."
"Accessibility and management could be improved."
"A big issue with this product is that when our customer migrated the data center, one cluster blocked the whole network and because we had a new approach, some commands were not compatible with the new version."
"Not a ten because I have to do a lot of testing on it. The correlation is okay."
"A user can take care of the product's installation part, but it may not seem to be an easy process."
"It would be great to have modules that integrate with SDN solutions such as Cisco ACI, Arista SDN, Huawei Agile, and IBM."
"We've only been using the solution for half a year. We haven't run into any issues, but maybe over time, that may change. It's too soon to tell. Offhand, there aren't any features that are lacking."
"NETGEAR Switches could be more secure. Scalability could also be better. This infrastructure is a bit old, and we need something that will be more secure. Something that will introduce WLAN, and we will need the knowledge to go with that. Some of the switches were used for more than seven years. I think it was just their lifespan that was exhausted. But other than that, there haven't been any issues that required us to complain or get concerned."
"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."
"NETGEAR Switches must look into their competitors since they have all available models."
"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."
"Though the tool's useability is good, it has certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
"There is a lack of documentation, and the documentation I have is unclear, so I have to rely on Google for information."
"The IGMP specifics of the web management console could use a bit of clarification."
"There's a lack of chips and, consequently, a lack of deliveries. They're out of stock at their European warehouse."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Cheaper than its competitors"
"I would rate the pricing as a seven or eight."
"The price of these switches is okay."
"The product has a low price for the features it provides."
"The product is cheaper than Cisco and licensing is yearly. We have to pay additional costs for support."
"The initial cost was high but since they have lasted for over ten or twenty years they are worth it."
"This solution is much cheaper than comparable products by Cisco."
"Inexpensive"
"Another issue, when it comes to NETGEAR's competitors, is that other companies are offering the cloud management at no extra charge, whereas NETGEAR charges for it. You have to pay per-device for licenses."
"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."
"We used HPE previously. The reason I switched to NETGEAR was because of pricing differences, which are huge, when you go into 10GB networking... The pricing is quite good... The total cost of the deployment was about 11,000 euros or so. If I had gone with HPE it would have been at least twice as much."
"There are two parts to the pricing. There's the pricing of the device itself, which is good. Their licensing model needs work, though. The licensing model doesn't fit the way MSPs do business."
"I would rate the tool's pricing a nine out of ten."
"The product has the best price in the market."
"It is a slightly expensive product."
"It's cheaper than Cisco. For the features it offers, the pricing is good."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Government
8%
Educational Organization
8%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
7%
Retailer
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Dell PowerConnect Switches?
Dell PowerConnect Switches have a VTL feature similar to Cisco's VSS. With VTL, using this technology, you can cluster two switches together to increase redundancy in the environment.
What needs improvement with Dell PowerConnect Switches?
Some proprietary commands available in Cisco are preferred by users accustomed to Cisco systems. These users might hesitate to switch because they want to continue using familiar commands and see t...
How do NETGEAR switches compare with Cisco ethernet switches?
NetGear switches have a lot to offer. They have high availability, zero-downtime stacking, L2 and L3 functionality, and are AV-over-IP ready. NetGear switches also have a command line interface and...
Which switches are better - Ubiquiti Unifi or Netgear?
Ubiquiti Unifi offers a great set of features. For starters, it is easy to configure and implement, and also doesn’t require a learning curve because it is easy to use. It is also simple to reconfi...
What do you like most about NETGEAR Switches?
Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten. I have not faced any issues with the product whatsoever.
 

Also Known As

PowerConnect Switches
NETGEAR Insight Managed Switches, NETGEAR GC Series, NETGEAR M Series
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Amerijet Holdings Inc., CGD Securities, MavenWire, Tulane University
Blaze Networks
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