We also use Enterasys for the reasons already mentioned by others. I recommend adding them to your list of vendors to talk to.
Greg Briggs Network Manager Pacific Lutheran University 253-538-5666 On Wed, Mar 13, 2013 at 6:45 AM, Benjamin Parker <[email protected]>wrote: > We also currently use Enterasys wireless and have for several years > through several products. We currently have around 300 of the 3610 AP's and > 60 or so of the older Trapeze re branded products. We are very pleased with > the access points and with our support from Enterasys as a whole. All > support is handled by Enterasys themselves and located in the US. > > We are currently looking at a budgeting a refresh where we upgrade and add > additional access points to hopefully anticipate needs for the next several > years. I have answered a couple of the other comments inline. > > > On Wed, Mar 13, 2013 at 12:01 AM, James Andrewartha < > [email protected]> wrote: > >> Hi Joshua, >> >> We use Enterasys wireless and switches, as well as their NAC product and >> Netsight management system (which does switches as well). We have 100 >> APs currently, which will rise to 150 when the new 3710 AP comes out >> (April I'm currently told). Right now we have just under 1000 clients >> associated >> >> On 12/03/13 03:26, Joshua Strohschein wrote: >> > 1. How are the reporting features? >> >> The wireless reporting is actually a little lacking compared to Airwave >> (which we used with our fat Cisco IOS APs, we had ~40 1231s and ~50 >> 1252s), but they're actively developing their web reporting site OneView >> which is good. For wireless auth logs I actually use the NAC Manager >> (which is basically a FreeRADIUS server with a nice GUI). >> > You can also get advanced wireless services that provides wireless IPS, > additional mapping and reporting on top of what is already available. > >> >> > 2. Is the interface easy to use? >> >> NAC Manager is a bit baroque, but the wireless controller Web UI is >> quite good, and OneView is good too. There's also a command-line, which >> I only use to put config dumps into RANCID and is pretty much equivalent. >> >> > 3. Are upgrades easy? >> >> We bought redundant controllers (you only pay the base price of the >> controller, you don't have to buy each license twice). So you upgrade >> one, the APs fail over to the other, then upgrade that one and APs fail >> back. Note that APs will usually upgrade their firmware on association, >> so the fail back is when they'll reboot and upgrade. You can control the >> fail back however, so as to do it when you want. There's a scheduler for >> the controller upgrade, I don't think there's one for the APs. >> > There is a way to schedule AP upgrades. Wireless Settings > Global > Settings > AP Maintenance > Controlled Upgrades allows AP software testing > and scheduled upgrades. I have successfully used it to resolve some of the > iOS issues. > >> >> > 4. 802.11ac early support? >> >> Definitely not, they've had 6 months of delays on their latest 802.11n >> AP, and Enterasys is a bit of a slow mover in general. I'm a bit dubious >> about the benefits of 802.11ac over 40MHz 3-stream 802.11n channels in >> 5GHz, which would give you 450Mbps today, with a suitable client. Note >> that iPads are single-stream devices, and prior to iPhone 5/iPad 4 only >> support 20MHz channels, which basically means 802.11g speeds. >> > The last I have heard is support of 802.11ac will come in 6-8 months. The > delay for the most recent iteration was apparently due to the FCC flagging > something and holding it up. > >> >> > 5. What are your experiences with support? >> >> We initially had a problem with Bonjour not working, which kept on for a >> few weeks until it got escalated and an engineer came on site (from the >> US, and we're in Australia, although he was here for another customer). >> He was a switch engineer, but did help solve the problem with remote >> assistance from their L3 wireless engineer. So their L1 wasn't so great, >> and in retrospect I should have escalated it quicker, but once it was it >> got resolved pretty quick. >> >> Addresses this above, but exceeds expectation and the support of any > other company we have worked for. > >> > 6. How expensive? >> >> Pretty cheap, although how much of that was special pricing for us to be >> an example school I don't know. Even so, I've heard it's pretty cheap at >> regular education pricing. >> >> For education, depending on quantity we have been able to see ~25 to 50% > off list for educational pricing. You should be able to find list pricing > by googling, also make sure you find a channel partner at a gold or > platinum level as they have access to better discounts. > > > 7. How does it compare with Cisco’s offerings? >> >> A lot cheaper, and a bit nicer too, based on my brief experience of >> their WLC while doing performance tests. Cisco's WLC still doesn't seem >> fully in to the 802.11n world, a lot of their rate bins in config and >> graphs are based on 802.11g speeds. >> >> Their new (still unreleased) 3725 AP has a third radio purely for >> intrusion detection, which compares favourably to Cisco's CleanAir. It >> does require 802.3at PoE, but their other APs are strictly designed for >> 802.3af. We had to use power bricks for the 1252s, and while I think the >> newer Cisco APs (and those from other vendors) are 802.3af in theory, >> Enterasys claims they may draw more over long runs or in high load >> (Aruba's definitely guilty of this: >> >> http://www.educause.edu/discuss/networking-and-emerging-technologies/wireless-local-area-networking-constituent-group/aruba-ap-power-issue >> ) >> >> Cisco is now all about Unified Access and the same policy across wired >> and wireless - Enterasys have been doing this for years. It works best >> with their switches, but works with any switch that supports RFC3850. >> This is perhaps more relevant for your dorms, although I see they're out >> of scope. >> >> Not sure, but I see lots of problems on this list with Cisco issues that > we have never had to deal with. > > >> > Any other valuable insights are welcome! >> >> We were heavily tilted towards raw performance, but beyond that (and >> ultimately deciding) was the user access control management (NAC). If >> you do go Cisco, you'd be looking at ISE, Aruba have ClearPass, and >> there's third-parties like Bradford and ForeScout. The killer feature of >> Enterasys was them writing integration with our MDM, Casper, for our >> iPad fleet, but I imagine this would be less important for a university. >> >> We evaluated Aruba, Cisco, Enterasys, Ruckus, Meru and Aerohive. >> Aerohive got knocked out for poor performance, hardware failures in 2 of >> the 4 test APs and poor local support, but I don't know what they're >> like now and in the US. Cisco were expensive and Cisco (ie hard to deal >> with), Aruba were good but also expensive. Ruckus worked beautifully >> (their engineer showed up, put up the APs and read his email while I got >> great speeds without any tuning) but didn't have the enterprise features >> we wanted (we could have bought Enterasys NAC to put on top, but then >> why not buy Enterasys wireless too?). Enterasys we bought on the promise >> of the new AP performing well, plus the integration with our switch >> network and MDM software. >> >> We technically ordered through a partner, but all our support has been >> direct with Enterasys because they want to use us as a demo school. Like >> any technology project, you'll want a good partner - that was one reason >> we didn't go with Cisco, as that partner had done our CUCM install and >> left us in the lurch a bit. >> >> To sum up, the wireless tech is important, but so are all the parts that >> surround it too, so work out what else you want from the wireless first. >> >> I'm not sure if I should post this to the list as we're a K-12 school, >> not a university. If you have any other questions, let me know. >> >> > Not sure, let me know if you have other specific questions and I will be > glad to answer them. > >> -- >> James Andrewartha >> Network & Projects Engineer >> Christ Church Grammar School >> Claremont, Western Australia >> Ph. (08) 9442 1757 >> Mob. 0424 160 877 >> >> ********** >> Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent >> Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. >> >> >> > > > -- > Ben Parker > Senior Network Engineer > University of Mount Union > Phone: 330-829-2866 > Twitter: @BenParker82 > ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE > Constituent Group discussion list can be found at > http://www.educause.edu/groups/. > > ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/.
