Cisco Meraki

Great for a large range of businesses

Comments: Overall we are pleased with our Meraki purchase and installation. We used a system integrator to obtain it but looking back we could have saved some money doing it ourselves but the quick onboarding and initial setup by the integrator ensured we got running quickly

Pros:

Meraki is a cloud based product that controls on premises and remote hardware. The hardware is top of the line and includes all the functions you would expect from an exterprise offering. Given the broad number of options and the cloud based always updating nature of this product if fill many needs and be adopted by most organizations.

Cons:

Some of the navigation takes some getting used to and I wish it would flow more but there are so many features that building a fluid navigation gets tough, even for Cisco. The graphing could also be better and offer additional options when you need more details but generally it will fill most needs.

Robust MDM platform used for management of iOS devices

Comments: We started using Meraki SM when it was still being made available for free to small organizations. At the time, the system was simple, but provided us with what we needed. As the system grew and was improved upon, primarily as Apple released new management options for iOS devices, it became necessary for us to upgrade from the free platform to a paid subscription. The per-user pricing was very competitive, and the available management options were well worth the cost.

Pros:

Setup of an enterprise MDM was made easy with Meraki SM. The web administration portal was easy to use, and offered us all of the functionality we needed initially, as well as has provided us the opportunity to increase our use over time. The platform is well designed, simple to use, and responsive. The app management solutions provided through SM are excellent, as well as the user/device options for license assignment and updating.

Cons:

We have found the location mapping to be unreliable in Meraki SM, despite having our mobile devices all GPS enabled and configured to make location information available to the SM app. The location tracking tends to use cellular location based on IP addressing and tower locations rather than GPS coordinates provided by the device. Policy pushing over the air is hit or miss, and it can take multiple attempts to get a client device to receive the revised policies. The greatest restrictions of the Meraki MDM seem to lie with Apple not making as many centralized management options available as they should, since enterprise use of iOS doesn't seem to be on their list of priorities.

Expensive but overall worth it

Pros:

Ability to manage devices from anywhere. Creating and copying configs among other devices is simple and convenient.

Cons:

Cost is a little high compared to other similar products.

Lots of promise but not enough focus on the core

Comments: This software has great promise as an MDM solution but it lags behind other solutions. If you’re looking for free and iOS/Android this is for you. If you want to manage computers you may want to consider looking elsewhere. Systems Manager doesn’t scale well and provide advanced features.

Pros:

This is a beautiful MDM solution that supports all platforms which is great. There are some features not found elsewhere that make it easy to integrate security functionality with Meraki’s networking stack. Want WPA2 enterprise with TLS? Systems manager makes this seamless.

Cons:

Feature set prioritizes integration with Meraki stack. Features introduced by Apple or Microsoft at the OS level can take months if not years to finally be implemented. This can cause quite a lag as your user base upgrades. No real features to manage the patch level of devices aside from manually pushing updates each time. Licensing cost fluctuates frequently (it’s free, it’s paid, it’s mostly free but sometimes paid).

Cisco Meraki - The best solution for network management with a small team!

Comments: When we first began upgrading our outdated infrastructure, we decided on Meraki. As we continued from our MDF and worked our way out, the benefits of a full Meraki network became even more apparent. Our Meraki dashboard is our lifeline for knowing what is going on across our network from power outages to wireless health and bandwidth utilization. I love that we are also able to allow access to outside vendors and internal staff in a secure way with only the access the need and nothing more. The VPN client has allowed me to get my entire network up remotely after major power outages. I can't recommend Cisco Meraki enough for anybody who needs the flexibility and simple but secure anywhere/anytime access to their network. Cisco Meraki is a true enterprise level network solution that you can feel confident about deploying without having needing high level network engineering on staff or contract.

Pros:

Cisco Meraki allows us complete visibility into our network at all times. I can manage 95% of my network tasks from anywhere at any time. This has allowed us to keep network management in-house with a 3 person IT team for a large campus environment with almost 1,000 users daily. Adding new devices is simple and the support is immediate and on point. I do not have to wait for a response and escalation. The agent who responds first is the one who resolves the issue in a professional and friendly manner.

Cons:

The annual license renewal is costly. If you decide to co-term your licensing, it is not immediately obvious what the yearly licensing costs will be so it is important to consider this factor when forecasting your budget. For us, using Meraki offsets the cost of MSPs or another FTE for a network admin role so it is well worth the annual license costs to have the peace of mind that your network is always up to date and accessible to you from anywhere on any device.