Meraki SD-WAN Reviews

Our use cases are mostly in the financial sector. 

The classifying of the applications, for example, has been a very useful feature. It helps in contract service, in traffic shaping, and in controlling the balancing between the links that they have over the internet. They have the intention of DI, the direct internet access, as the agencies on the remote side have direct internet access to be able to consume some applications in the cloud.

The product does have a variety of features we can work with.

There's a good balance between 4G and LTE. There are backups to keep the connection going. The MPLS link we had, for example, is just for a backup in case one of the two links goes down.

We have had some problems doing the implementation. We had to open a case with Cisco. The deployment was solved with Cisco's tech help. 

In terms of the applications, the policies that we configured didn't work as expected. However, Cisco's tech also helped us deal with this as well. 

Meraki has a limitation in the number of links that it can work. For example, in Cisco, we can work with many, many links if you link with Viptela, however, in Meraki, we just get to work with two links or a maximum number of three links including the LAN link. It was a problem. When clients need many links and you have just two links it's a problem.

I've worked with the solution for a while. I've done POCs with five or six different clients.

Technical support is quite helpful in general.

I have worked for the last 15 years, more or less, with Cisco. For the last eight years, I have worked with Cisco and Aruba, especially with Cisco in data center technologies, in SDN technologies like ACI, like SD-Access, or SD-WAN, for example. I have worked in design as well. For example, in the design of data centers, in the designs of WAN networks, LAN networks, and Wi-Fi networks.

I have experience with Cisco Viptela, and Cisco Meraki with the MX series, which I have basically worked with within Cisco Meraki.

In wireless, I have worked in Cisco with the Cisco Ethernet, for example, and in Meraki as well, and I have worked with the MR series in the Cisco in Meraki.

We implemented, for example, Meraki in eight places in a banking environment. We implemented the MX series and we did approach the provisioning that has the solution to develop the implementation in many places. We implemented it in more than 2,000 places - wherever they have services.

We struggled a bit with the implementation, however, we did reach out to Cisco and they were able to help us get back on track.

Cisco technical support did end up helping us with the implementation, however, we mostly did it ourselves. 

I work in a company that is a partner of Cisco and we sell the Cisco Meraki SD-WAN solution.

We have implementations both on-premises and in the cloud. 

I'd rate the solution a seven out of ten.

I'm able to access various ports for simple switches and then check things, like the information that I've gotten. We use the solution on a day-to-day basis. 

I like the part with the accessibility to the switches, the access point, and the firewalls. Having to set up a closed system singlehandedly and a lifetime guarantee on the equipment is a valuable part of this solution.

The area I think this solution should improve is the pricing.

I have been using this solution for about five years.

My impression is that this solution is quite scalable. There are around 800 users of this solution in our company right now.

My impression is that it was quite easy to set up this solution. Our model of deployment is hybrid.

When we were first looking to implement this solution, we were looking at pre-systems as we handle this one. Even though it was the priciest one, the day-to-day basis and the security were the best.

It was all done through a two-person team. Another member who wasn't on-site is an administrator and I was someone who is on-site. For example, the administrator sets up a new server from scratch and I take over from there, so we worked in collaboration all the time. I am also the person responsible for maintaining this solution.

I would rate the pricing of this solution a seven, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

When it comes to giving advice to other people looking into this solution, I'd just say that this system is easy to maintain and quite secure with good quality equipment.

I would rate this solution as a whole a nine, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

The solution has the ability to jump from one ISP to another with minimum downtime.

The speed at which we can change from one provider to another has been great.  

The added security has been useful. However, we are barely using all the capabilities of SD-WAN.

It's easy to set up. 

The solution is stable.

The scalability has been good.

The feature that we are interested in is working perfectly. It's a matter of cost and expenses that we may take some issue with.

We've used the solution for a while.

As far as we can tell, the stability's great. The speed is great. We didn't experiment with it that much to have the opportunity to really see any faults. We've just come in and tried to catch up with everything that was going on.

The solution can scale well. 

We plan to increase it as much as can once we feel comfortable with the features of the product.

We did not previously use a different product. We tried Meraki first.

It is very straightforward to set up. We have two firewalls connected to the device. We're using Meraki since we're a Meraki user, and it makes sense to start with what we have. Basically, we take it from there. We have all our sites on Meraki, so it's the basic starting point.

The licensing is very expensive. 

The fact that it does not recognize our cost from the previous licenses is a big drawback. The price covers the licensing and the box itself. 

We are looking at other options right now. 

We deal with a reseller. We have 58 different networks. However, none of them has a particular server. We're using it to interconnect. We're using it all over the state. 

I'd advise potential new users to understand the costs that are likely involved first. 

I would rate the solution nine out of ten.

We mainly use Meraki SD-WAN for connecting sites.

The most valuable feature of Meraki SD-WAN is the Auto VPN.

Meraki SD-WAN could improve by adding wireless access time-scheduled and overall capabilities.

I have been using Meraki SD-WAN for approximately six years.

The price of Meraki SD-WAN could improve, it is expensive when compared to other solutions on the market, such as Aruba.

We have approximately 50 customers using this solution.

The auto VPN feature is important because it automates many tasks, making things simpler and faster. It helps with setting up devices and changing configurations without manual effort.

Meraki SD-WAN helps save money by monitoring applications and ensuring service levels. This gives businesses a clear view of how well their operations are running and whether service providers meet their needs.

The Meraki SD-WAN has been mainly focused on Wi-Fi in the past, but with the introduction of the client, they're likely to enhance their AI-driven initiatives. This could mean providing more predictive insights to customers, but it might take time to develop fully.

The tool has challenges with features like multiple-link support, which currently only supports up to three links. Additionally, it doesn't offer router integration, and forward error correction is another missing feature. The scalability of Meraki SD-WAN is good, but there are limitations to the performance of the concentrator devices, especially in larger deployments. While the cloud scale is not an issue, the performance of the devices in branches and data centres is limited.

This can be an issue for larger customers with high traffic volumes. The roadmap includes plans to improve scalability, but progress may be slow.

I rate the tool's deployment a ten out of ten. 

The tool's support is not very good. The process is ongoing while they are not fully integrated with Cisco TAC. 

Neutral

Regarding pricing, Meraki SD-WAN is quite competitive, especially compared to solutions like Fortinet. However, it's essential to consider that Meraki requires cloud orchestration, which adds to the overall cost. Overall, it's one of the most competitive solutions from Cisco for SD-WAN.

Meraki SD-WAN is one of the best and easiest solutions to implement. It's very user-friendly, making it simple for users and partners to sell and deploy. Additionally, it offers a range of security features and the ability to integrate with SaaS platforms. However, compared to other vendors, it lacks some important features, and although they're on the roadmap, they're taking a bit longer to roll out.

The product is successful in various environments, especially in retail and specific industries like finance. Retail accounts for around 30 percent of its usage. I would rate the Meraki SD-WAN a nine on a scale of one to ten. It's simple to use, scalable and offers easy access to the API. However, it's not a perfect ten because it lacks some important features, and it is slow in terms of rolling out these features for customers. 

We implemented Meraki SD-WAN to replace our traditional WAN infrastructure, particularly for our email and messaging system (referred to as MLSP).

We have successfully transitioned to SD-WAN. So, it's primarily used for connecting our remote sites.

I like it because it works. Moreover, the solution is pretty easy to configure.

Meraki SD-WAN had trouble prioritizing traffic for VoIP calls, specifically for Microsoft Teams. They faced challenges for sometime when you set up QoS on Meraki's access points. There are profiles available for different services, such as Microsoft Teams, which effectively put all the rules in place for you. During their SD-WAN deployment, these profiles were not accessible to them. It's possible that Meraki has since introduced them. Therefore, having profiles for different services would be beneficial.

Meraki SD-WAN could make the license cheaper; the licenses cost a fortune.

I have been using Meraki SD-WAN for a year. 

We've had a few minor things where it's gone down, but it has been stable most of the time.

I rate the solution’s stability a nine out of ten.

Meraki SD-WAN is pretty easy to scale. You just buy more devices; it is easy.

I rate the solution’ scalability a ten out of ten. We have about 150 users using this solution.

The customer support has been very good. The Cisco account manager named, Luke Brennan was really very helpful. If you ring him, he'll answer, and he'll tell you what you need to know. They are good.

The initial setup was pretty simple. We were able to do it in a day.

We did have an integrator to help while setting up.

We've got one person in the team doing the maintenance, although we have somebody else who knows quite well that we do lean on external parties quite heavily, a company called Lixcel. Overall, we have a team of two people for maintenance. 

The solution is expensive. I rate the solution’s pricing a six out of ten, where one is expensive, and ten is cheap.

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

The best feature we're using is the packet shaping. We can feed the traffic shaping rules according to our requirements, so if we need application-based packet shaping, we can configure it. If we want URL-based traffic shaping, we can do that too.

Also, we can enable per-client bandwidth according to our requirements. 

The solution can only support two up-links, so if you have three internet lines, there is not a provision to connect the third internet line. There is a provision to use the cellular data like a dongle, and you can use that dongle to connect the third line. We need that feature because we need to have three internet lines. The product should be able to support more than three internet lines.

I've been working with Meraki for the last four and a half years. 

It is stable for my business requirements. Some of our locations are assembly branches, so we use MX60 at those locations. We use that effective product for user compatibility, and we haven't had any issues.

The solution is scalable. We have 100 locations using this solution. 

We had a licensing issue, so we contacted the support team and got a response. I would rate their help as a four out of five. 

Previously, we were using the MPLS network. We then removed the MPLS network and installed Meraki products, which are compatible with this technology, so that's why we're using this product now. 

The initial setup is very easy, you just need to configure the IP addresses, gateway, subnet mask, and DNS. Once it's connected to the internet, you have to claim the device on the dashboard, and then the dashboard will automatically show if it's online or not. Once it is online, you can configure the policies, as per your requirements, through the dashboard. The remaining part of the setup can be performed and configured on the dashboard.

It takes around 15 to 20 minutes to configure it. 

We have a yearly license. 

You can use this solution for SMB branches according to your requirements. At this time, you cannot use Meraki on a single device, so suppose you have a core suite, distribution suite, and access suite. If you're a data center, you cannot use the solution at this point.

I would rate this solution as an eight out of ten. It is very user-friendly, and it doesn't take much time to configure the simple dashboard.

We have multiple ISP's connected, usually it's two. Two ISP's per site and we have to make sure that the site-to-site connectivity is managed and is maintained — the redundancy has to be maintained. 

The different services that we offer from different offices are available wherever we need them. That's the purpose of going with the Meraki SD-WAN solution versus another company. It's very straightforward. Their full mesh network just works. That's important.

The seamless end-to-end setup is really what makes it beautiful; that's why Meraki is good. It's much easier than some of the other vendors to manage and keep track of what's going on because you can see it in real-time on the portal. I don't really feel like VALO Cloud gives you a good idea of what's going on. VALO Cloud devices don't work nearly as well, in my opinion, as the Meraki devices.

I think they should enhance the security. I feel like the security is decent, but some other people that I work with say there are better options available. Cisco requires you to upgrade the firmware to custom firmware on the devices you want to go beyond Diffie-Hellman five. DH5 is in the lower part of the spectrum. Other devices, even Cisco devices are using DH15 or higher. I think DH24 is the highest that's currently available. 

The feature set right now requires a firmware upgrade that's custom to enable that kind of encryption. They should just have it in a dropdown. If they could fix that, I could tell my other colleagues, "Hey, look, Cisco can do it right out of the box." To enable higher-end encryption, higher than Diffie-Hellman five, DH5, requires a custom firmware. If they could make that built into the standard firmware as an option, I would love that. 

I think that from Cisco's perspective, they've chosen not to do that simply because it requires more performance.

That's how they keep it because they say, "Oh, look at the performance. It's the same as the other guy." Yeah, but the other guy's using DH15 or DH14 and you're using DH5. The level of encryption means more horsepower required from the processor on the devices so that's why it increases the footprint. The more CPU, the hotter it gets and then it doesn't last as long; the performance is not as good because it's using more resources, etc. Cisco should definitely sell equipment with better processes or better performance for our processes because that would give us a higher level of encryption on our firewalls.

I have been using Meraki SD-WAN for roughly four to five years.

The setup time is excellent. The ease of setup is excellent. It's a set it and forget it solution. Once we created the mesh network, if we have to change an ISP, it doesn't mean we have to change an entire configuration. We just unplug it, plug the new one in, change the IPs and it works. Some SD-WAN providers give you a valid internet IP address as part of their solution, and others don't. A lot of the SD-WAN providers that provide internet access use Meraki devices as a black box. They just hand off one interface to the client-side and that's it.

Overall, on a scale from one to ten, I would give Meraki SD-WAN a rating of eight. If they could do better on the performance side, that really would make a difference.