Juniper EX Series Ethernet Switches Reviews

We are using the product as edge switches. We have a core switch in one of our branches also, a Juniper switch.

There's no specific benefit like I like this or I don't like it, however, it is just allowing us to have a multi-vendor environment. We have other switches also, like boundary switches which are Brocade switches. We are currently we are using a lot of Cisco switches. About 70% of our switches are Cisco.

The solution is stable and scalable.

It's a product that is simple to set up.

Of the current engineers that are working in Egypt, most of them are familiar with Cisco and not all of them used to work on Juniper switches. That's why those switches aren't very famous in Egypt.

The stability could be better. We find, for example, Cisco, to be more stable.

I've been using the solution for more than five years now.

The stability is good. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable. 

The solution offers good scalability.

It is a multi-vendor environment, so the total environment itself has about 1,000 users. They use various switches, however.

I've never needed to contact technical support. I can't speak to how they are in terms of the level of service. 

We also use Brocade and Cisco. While Cisco is more stable, it is more expensive as well.

The initial setup is straightforward and doesn't take too much time. It's a pretty quick deployment. 

For deployment and maintenance, we have two people who handle everything. They handle networking, switching, and routing. 

It is less expensive than, for example, Cisco. We pay a yearly licensing fee. 

In our environment, we are using a different vendor approach as we don't want to depend on a single vendor.

I'd advise other companies, especially if they are an enterprise, to not deal with a single vendor.

I would rate the solution a seven out of ten.

My primary use of this solution is for core switching and routing.

The most valuable feature is that Juniper is multiple kernels, so there's isolation, which means you won't get a process that runs away, creating problems across the whole platform. 

We had been introduced to MIST as a result or procuring 9 EX4600 switches and the associated MIST licenses.  Unfortunately we found out that MIST does not support legacy switches, namely EX2200 which we have 100 Plus, so this requires us to invest time and resources in order to learn the opensource alternatives for automation, or plan for an upgrade of the EX2200 which requires a significant investment.

Personally learning the open source alternatives is an extremely valuable skill to add to the toolbox, as well as move the District forward with automation.

I've been using this solution for two to three years.

Juniper's stability is solid - it suffers from some bugs, like any product, but other than that, it's stable.

There are no issues with the scalability - we went with this product because it supported ten gigs and the switches are stackable. You scale the platform to meet your needs, and it scales to meet our needs.

Technical support has resolved any problems I've had in a relatively quick amount of time.

I've have experience with Cisco, Brocade, Dell, and Foundry Networks, with inheriting an inventory of 150+ Juniper switches and investing time in learning juniper, a more to another vendor is not an option we are considering.

The initial setup isn't very straightforward at first - it took me a day or two to deploy my first Juniper switches. It gets easier with practice, but it's a steep learning curve for anyone who hasn't touched Juniper.

Implementation was in-house.

Juniper's switches have a lifetime warranty, so you don't have to pay for replacements for defective items (though you can't buy spare replacements). It's relatively affordable per switch and pretty similar to other vendors' costs for maintenance.

I started using Juniper two and a half years ago with zero experience, and it was a steep learning curve, but I've become a fan of this product. I would advise others to consider vendors other than Cisco, including Juniper. I'd give this solution a score of nine out of ten.

The solution is easy to use and has good integration.

In an upcoming release, Juniper Ethernet Switches could improve by having more microservices.

I have been using Juniper Ethernet Switches for approximately 10 years.

The solution is stable.

The scalability depends on the environment. For example, if the customer is in a healthcare environment then it is more scalable than other solutions.

We have approximately 30 large customers using this solution.

The technical support is very good. We can talk and have the support of the engineers who are developing the software and features.

We use many other switches, such as Aruba, Hewlett Packard, and Extreme Networks.

The installation is easy if you have certified engineers. You have to have some basic knowledge about the CLI of Juniper to do the installation.

The size of the team needed for the installation depends on the environment. However, we have approximately 10 certified engineers, which can do both, the installations and support of the solution. Additionally, we have architects, junior and senior consultants, and depending on the job we have to do, we can supply different types of engineers.

We have a partnership with Juniper and the price of the solution can be negotiated at a local or a corporate level with Juniper to meet our customer's needs.

There is a subscription payment model or you can purchase licenses on a one, two, and five-year basis. If you want decent support, the solution is not expensive.

I would recommend Juniper Ethernet Switches to others who want a well-integrated, stable, and easy-to-use solution.

I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a nine out of ten.

We use it across our whole environment. We use it for everything from our core to our edge. It is basically deployed everywhere. A good percentage of our Juniper switches are in a stacked array. For example, we do four 48-port switches for a wiring closet in a building. They're all stacked together, and they call it ActivChassis. Most companies, such as HP, ADTRAN, also do the same kind of thing. So, we do a virtual chassis formation in our wiring closet. For smaller buildings that only need one switch, we do a single switch at the distant end.

We have a lot from the 2300 Series. We have one 3300 and quite a few from the 3400 Series. We also have one 4550, and we have also been buying the 4350 series ones.

The thing that sets Juniper apart from most switches is that when you're in the command line and you make a configuration change, you just write the command and then say "commit confirmed minutes". For example, I'm configuring a switch here in my office, which is five miles away, and I say, "commit confirmed 5". If I can't get back to the interface within five minutes to be able to make sure the switch came up, it rolls back to the previous configuration. This way I do not get locked out, or the switch doesn't get messed up because of the incorrect configuration. That's an automatic feature, which is pretty slick. I haven't seen that feature with other vendors that I've worked with. That's probably my most favorite feature.

A nice thing about Juniper is that they also have a GUI interface, and it is a little bit better than most other vendors. Their GUI interface does more than a lot of other vendors.

Another nice thing about Juniper is that their training is available for free on their website. I wanted to get certified with Juniper, and I did it for free. On the entry-level exam, they pay for 75% of the exam if you take it through their website.

The negative of Juniper is that their command-line coding is a lot different than any other vendor, so there is a fairly steep learning curve to it. 

The initial setup for Juniper switches is complex. Juniper has a new program that solves that problem a little bit, but it is expensive, so I don't use it. It is Juniper Mesh, Juniper Wire, or something like that where you plug in a switch, and it goes out to their cloud, finds a config, and brings it down. So, you can do everything cloud-based, but there is a fee for that. It is expensive, so I've never used it. If we were starting, we would try to do something like that. It is more for a large enterprise for managing hundreds of switches versus what we're doing. They should make its price more cost-effective or include it for new or smaller companies.

One advantage that Cisco has is that there are a billion people who use it, so there are a lot more publications or books, whereas, with Juniper, you really can't find a current book. Everything that you have is from their website. They have a lot of documentation on their website, which is good, but if you're a person like me who likes having a hardback book, you're not going to find one that's current. If I wanted to be at home and learn something and read about it, I won't be able to do that. It is going to be a PDF, so you either have got to print it out, or you have to read it online. Sometimes, being older and having bad eyes, that's not good.

We probably started using it four years ago.

Its stability is good.

Its scalability is excellent. It is being used extensively. We're going to finish off other vendors this year. It is going to be all Juniper.

Their technical support is good. Our experience with them has been good.

We have been supporting three different vendors: HP, ADTRAN, and Juniper. Our environment was getting old. So, we just started replacing things that were ten or eight years old. This year, we're replacing everything so that we're just one shop, and we don't have to support three different vendors. It is tough to support three different OS, so that's why we are finishing others off.

Juniper's GUI interface is a little bit better than most other vendors, but Juniper's command line is tougher than HP. HP has the easiest interface. On an HP switch, you can just write a command, and it automatically knows where to go. Juniper has a very hierarchal kind of structure, and you have to be within that framework of what you're trying to do to make that change. That's why it is a little bit harder. Juniper commands are also a little bit longer, but it is easy to fill out commands by using a question mark or a tab. It'll then auto-fill if you're typing it correctly, which is nice.

Juniper is better in terms of if you make a mistake. When you make a command mistake on HP, you don't necessarily get to know. On Juniper, if you're using a command and you get it all set up, and then you hit commit, it won't commit if there is a syntax error or some other issue. It will tell you that there is an error and you got to fix it. It also tells you what it is, but knowing the commands is the hard part.

It was complex. The first few that we got were tough, and sometimes, they still can be tough. It has definitely a steep learning curve. If you are an organization that has never used it before, it is going to be tough.

If you know what you're doing, you can get a switch done in a couple of hours. If you're new, it is going to take you days to weeks, depending upon how much you want to get it to work. So, it is kind of complex.

I use SecureCRT to configure all my switches, which replaces Putty and is made by VanDyke software. It is not that expensive and costs around $90. Using SecureCRT has made things easier for me, and it has really helped me with Juniper. If you're familiar with Putty, it works really well. It gives you options to store all of your commands. So, when I'm building a new switch, I have all the commands that I normally use, such as the commands to set up the IP address or a route. I don't have to memorize the commands. I can just double-click the set route command and then just change a variable.

For the first two switches, we used the reseller from whom we bought the switches. Someone from their company came in and installed the first two switches. After that, we looked at his configs and figured out how to do it, and since then, we did it on our own. Our experience with the reseller was good.

Maintenance is handled by two of us in my department, but we do so many other things. We are Network Admins. 

Their prices are competitive and not bad. It is cheaper than Cisco.

We have a yearly license.

It has more features than I'm currently using. Their support is fine, and their prices are also competitive. It is cheaper than Cisco, so I would definitely recommend it over Cisco because of the price. 

Juniper provides training for free on their website. You can do all their courses for free through their website. I would highly recommend doing these courses. They are free, which is awesome. You're not going to get free Cisco courses.

I would rate this solution an eight out of 10. The only reason for not giving it a 10 is its high learning curve. In terms of capabilities and feature set, it is right up there.

A lot of our deployments are hybrid cloud that we do for clients. We are personally using an on-premises installation.  

Our clients' use cases for Juniper Ethernet Switches are pretty broad as far as the industries covered. There are clients that are urgent care facilities, physician's offices, legal offices, restaurants — it really runs across the boards as far as industries. The USDA has a number of Juniper switches that we put in for them.  

When you are doing switching for anybody — it could be Motorola or Sprint or a restaurant that is relatively small and has 45 employees — it does not matter. They all have the same PCI (Payment Card Industry) compliance needs. If they are in the medical industry in urgent care — like Duke Medical System or just a freestanding office — they all still have the same HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) compliance. When we are configuring switches, we are not only looking at port density in terms of the number of devices that are hooking to it. We are also looking at the VLAN (Virtual Local Area Network) configurations and a number of other things. Whether you are dealing with multilink, VLANs, being able to specifically control certain ports, control certain applications, or whatever, you are using almost every feature to some degree on every switch because the utility is valuable.  

One of the nicest things about Juniper switches is they work well with other vendor products. When you have to go into a situation where other vendor switches are present, you can make it work.  

Whether you are a Fortune 500 company or a small operation, you might have the same requirements for security features. There are security features related to Mac addresses that are present and high-end switches that lack some of the same flexibility in the lower-end switches. We may be talking about the difference between an EX2300 and an EX5500 model switch. It is the same manufacturer. It would be nice to have more of that security relevance in every level switch, regardless of the price tag or the model. It is just like the fact that you have the VLAN capability on all of them. I think the security features should generally be more available instead of scaled up and down with the product.  

Going into the future, you will probably see more fully meshed networks that have multiple internet-facing routes. These should go in an SD-WAN on a fiber-based VLAN. You may have coax services like Spectrum or Cox Cable providing internet avenues. Or you may also have a 4G or 5G modem doing the same thing in providing additional connection avenues. In the end, I think that the switching on that type of architecture and the routing needs to get a little more intuitive.  

Obviously, you can take care of the situation with routing tables and other methods. I think we are going to need to start seeing some kind of AI to assist with some of what we really want to accomplish from a policy standpoint to achieve better efficiency.  

I have been using Juniper switches for probably a little over 15 years.  

I love the stability of Juniper. I look for stability in this type of product. When I have to put my hands on something repeatedly because of problems — endemic or quasi failures, where the OS just kind of locks up and stops performing — I call them insanity failures. I rarely see that in Juniper or WatchGuard or any of those guys. I like that and that is why I lean toward using those products.  

Is there an end to the ability to scale Juniper? If there is, I have never seen it and I would know because I do data center design. Before I did what I am doing now, I was a director of new technology for Sprint PCS. We equipped to handle a lot of routing and I do not know if there is a scalability issue in the end.  

Our clients are a mix of industries that are small, medium, or large businesses. This product can service all of them. The scalability is really very good. 

You always end up using technical support here and there for something. I would give them a pretty high rating. Some of that technical support I reached out for has been in design implementation. I think once we did have a DOA (Dead On Arrival) switch. But things like that are rare and Juniper is very responsive. They are always pretty responsive. Overall it is a good company.  

I would give the technical support a nine. I do not know if there is any company that I know of whose technical support would rate as a ten-of-ten. I am saying they are a nine, but there really is nothing lacking compared to the competition.  

The installation of Juniper switches is pretty much straightforward.  

Juniper is less expensive than competing products and as much as 33% less than Cisco.  

Whether you are on the lower end of the business scale with a smaller portfolio, or whether you are a Fortune 500 or 1000 company, you can not go wrong with Juniper's back-end products. It is a cost-effective solution in comparison to the competition. I do not like to have to touch switches or routers or anything of that nature unless I am doing a new configuration or a firmware upgrade. The Juniper product helps me with that by having impeccable reliability.  

Saying that this solution is impeccable could be the entirety of my review.  

I have been a network architect for a long time. At one time in my career, I thought Nortel and Juniper were on par. They were the two best-engineered equipment supplier manufacturers out there from both a cost and performance standpoint. I had never been a big Cisco fan. The number one reason behind that is the per-port cost for Cisco is 30% higher than everybody else. Number two, they have too many proprietary protocols that are not friendly with what other technicians know. That is particularly true on their routers. I found that in practice, we had to reboot the Cisco products in enterprise and Fortune 500 company levels too many times. When you had 400 and 500 sites out there and you had to rebuild the routing tables, you were screwed. We did not ever have that same problem with Nortel or Juniper.  

So I got a bad taste in my mouth from Cisco many years ago. I spend a lot of time in cybersecurity and I find the Cisco IOS is one of the most vulnerable and most often patched by comparison to other high-end vendors, like Juniper. I have very few problems with Juniper products and they are easy to configure. They do a good job and they just continue doing it for a long time.  

On a scale from one to ten (where one is the worst and ten is the best), I would rate this product as a ten overall for where they are in technology, their solid engineering, and the product. That includes the software and the hardware.  

Even the lack of a few features is not a point to knock them down to a nine because we are on a road where we are taking a trip. I do not care what the literature says, SD-WAN is still new. We are still pushing the envelope on how we want to use it and how we want to design our systems to work with it. I can not mark Juniper down for being on the cutting edge of innovation.  

We use the solution to access insights for network activities.

The solution provides advanced switching features like voice VLAN and QoS. It has flexible functionalities compared to other vendors. Also, it delivers a good performance.

They should provide net features similar to Cisco switches. Also, they should integrate VPN functionality with the solution.

We have been the solution for more than five years.

The solution is relatively stable.

The solution is scalable.

The solution's technical support team is responsive.

The solution's initial setup is straightforward. The deployment process for a new switch includes connecting and configuring it to the management port and other VLANs. Also, it depends on the specific requirements, including integrating VLAN for users, IPs, servers, authentication, etc. When the configuration is simple, it takes 30 minutes to complete. But when it involves configuring advanced features like QoS switches, it consumes more time. Also, the duration depends on the team of executives as well. If they have prior experience working with Juniper, it takes less time.

We don't need to pay for the solution's features. We pay for its support service.

We use Cisco at one of the locations. Juniper is stable comparatively. It has the best hardware built quality.

The solution is easy to use. I recommend it to others and rate it as a nine.

Our office utilizes Juniper EX Series as part of its infrastructure to provide LAN access for connecting various devices such as PCs, servers, workstations, access points, printers, access doors, and wireless access points.

The Juniper EX Series's most valuable feature is its robustness. Additionally, it is easy to use and great GUI.

Juniper EX Series could improve the process and ease of updating the software. It is a difficult process.

I have been using Juniper EX Series for approximately five years.

The solution is highly robust and stable. It has been in operation for years.

We have approximately 500 users using the solution.

Juniper EX Series is scalable.

I have contacted the support from Juniper EX Series once. The response time took longer than I expected. Their public community support is limited, it is not similar to the community support Cisco has.

I rate the support from the Juniper EX Series a seven out of ten.

Neutral

The Juniper EX Series's initial setup is easy and takes a few hours to complete.

The price of the Juniper EX Series is reasonable. Cisco is a lot more expensive.

If you are not implementing ACI or a similarly complex deployment, it may not be necessary to use this solution for LAN access. Similarly, if you require frequent upgrades, it may be more appropriate to consider alternatives such as Juniper solutions

This is an excellent solution to consider due to its stability, scalability, and user-friendly interfaces, with even more features than a Cisco solution. It is highly reliable and does not require significant troubleshooting efforts.

I rate the Juniper EX Series a seven out of ten.

Juniper Ethernet Switches' best features are the high packer sorting and throughput, good uplink port capacity, and virtual setup.

Juniper Ethernet Switches would be improved by upgrading the uplink port in EX2300 categories service from 10G to 25G.

I've been dealing with Juniper Ethernet Switches for five years.

Juniper Ethernet Switches are very stable.

Juniper Ethernet Switches' architecture is very good for scaling.

Juniper's technical support is excellent.

Positive

Juniper Ethernet Switches are plug-and-play, so no setup is required.

Juniper Ethernet Switches' pricing is high, but that's reflected across the market.

I'd advise anyone implementing Juniper Ethernet Switches to go with Mist cloud so they can manage multiple locations from a single cloud account. I would give Juniper Ethernet Switches a rating of ten out of ten.