We performed a comparison between Aruba Wireless and ExtremeCloud IQ based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out what your peers are saying about HPE Aruba Networking, Cisco, Ruckus and others in Wireless LAN."The artificial intelligence feature is very good."
"The most valuable feature of Juniper Mist is the Virtual Network Assistant, powered by artificial intelligence."
"The AI capabilities of Mist Wireless are superior to other OEMs."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is Marvis, the AI-driven network management system."
"The solution is pretty generic and easy to use."
"You can easily monitor, manage, and cover all your IT equipment."
"In terms of reporting, in terms of all the user reports, it's very rich."
"The simplicity is great."
"The solution has been helpful in improving the way our company functions."
"The wireless controller and access points are valuable features."
"AirWave is a valuable feature."
"The most valuable feature in this product would be the stability. You build it, install it, and it’s good to go, with no further tweaks needed unless adding or replacing APs."
"We were able to increase capacity very easily."
"With Aruba Wireless Controller, all our access points are connected to one controller. Through that controller, we can actually handle each access point; we can disconnect or connect that access point, and then we can tell, or see, or allow how many users are, or should be, connected through that access point."
"The stability of Aruba Wireless has been good."
"Denies inter-user traffic: It easily blocks traffic between users."
"Its configuration and deployment are the most valuable."
"The tech who handles Extreme IQ tells me it's easy to use and learn. He felt like it was pretty intuitive. It comes with solid training materials. He also has talked about the security features that give you as much or as little control as you want."
"The cloud-based controller through HiveManager is its most valuable feature. I can manage and configure changes to my access points from anywhere."
"Ability to assign zero trust policies from the user."
"Integrated Firewall in every AP (with DPI inspection) is a killer feature and it is included already in the price of licence (with others, this feature is an add-on licence)."
"The few times we have needed help, Aerohive has been there for us and I am confident that If I need them they will be there again."
"Whenever I have a concern, question, or just need a refresher the helpful staff at AeroHive is there to help me. By far, the ]best relationship I have ever had with a vendor."
"The cloud management gives us the tools and reports that we need to monitor and troubleshoot the network."
"Improving third-party integration is key for Juniper Mist's next release."
"They should include SD-WAN features to it."
"Juniper Mist Wireless Access Points’ support services need improvement."
"If you want to do more specific stuff, it's a bit limited."
"The solution is expensive."
"Juniper Wireless AP can improve by continually improving its reporting and integration with other systems."
"The pricing should be made cheaper."
"I need a bit more time with it before criticizing the features."
"Better integration with equipment from other vendors would ease the deployment process in some cases."
"Because it's cloud-based, it takes time for the floor maps and the heat map to load."
"I believe that Aruba's support could be improved."
"The ARM functionality does not always seem to perform how I would like. In some cases, I have had to manually assign channels to avoid channel confusion."
"Not cost-effective."
"The stability and management could be improved."
"Some additional reporting features about the clients would be nice when not combined with the AirWave management package."
"I believe it would benefit from more reporting, other than just a dashboard. It needs some type of report builder so you can have PDFs to show upper management what is going on in the wireless network."
"Need port aggregation on the 2384 switches to take full advantage of ac on the APs. I understand that is on their product road map."
"The dashboard and stability need to be improved."
"The certification costs from suppliers are getting out of control, and it's not just Extreme. We have the same problem with Cisco and Huawei."
"From our perspective, we would love to see Aerohive provide faster feature enhancement in their Virtual Appliance to match the features with the cloud solution more quickly."
"Lacks cyber asset tracking."
"For me, the only issue is the potential delay in the tool statistics updating in real time after making changes."
"An area for improvement in ExtremeCloud IQ is its technical support. Support could be better, especially when you need help concerning ExtremeCloud IQ and WinG."
"The Virtual Appliance crashed once while doing an upgrade. The good thing here is, even if the management system fails, all our networks and features still remain 100% stable and working."
More Juniper Mist Wireless Access Points Pricing and Cost Advice →
Aruba Wireless is ranked 1st in Wireless LAN with 138 reviews while ExtremeCloud IQ is ranked 5th in Network Management Applications with 73 reviews. Aruba Wireless is rated 8.4, while ExtremeCloud IQ is rated 8.8. The top reviewer of Aruba Wireless writes "The portal for centralized management and virtual controller for APs are very valuable". On the other hand, the top reviewer of ExtremeCloud IQ writes "Robust stability for maximizing network efficiency and security". Aruba Wireless is most compared with Cisco Wireless, Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN, Ruckus Wireless, Ubiquiti WLAN and Huawei Wireless, whereas ExtremeCloud IQ is most compared with Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN, Ubiquiti Wireless, Mist AI and Cloud, Cisco DNA Center and Ruckus Wireless.
We monitor all Wireless LAN reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.
I suggest Aruba. We've considered the same upgrade (APs + Switches) and I've settled with Aruba.
Aruba 505,515 (or other models) depends on the number of users and the area you want to cover.
Regarding switches, from what I could see, there isn't much difference though my experience is for Cisco so far. I haven't used Aruba switches to judge.
Aruba APs are very flexible: you can operate them in 3 modes: controller-less (Instant) where 1 AP acts as the controller for the others, with the on-prem controller, and cloud controller (similar to Meraki). depending on budget, you can go with a cloud controller (very affordable pricing in our region). then upgrade to an on-prem controller 1-3 years later to split the project budget.
Cisco isn't as flexible: you can either go with the controller-less solution, or on-prem controller if you buy the Cisco Catalyst APs or go with the Meraki cloud-only solution. But you can't migrate the solutions after buying them. As @Michael Fulton said: "Merakis are worthless without the subscriptions as you can't manage them".
I have also heard it from several people: Aruba is much better in wireless. Though, honestly, I haven't tried both solutions for myself to give any feedback (Currently, we have 802.11n APs from Cisco).
Depends. I have personally used both Cisco and Aruba so I am familiar with them. Extreme I am not, so unless they have some feature that I need or want, I wouldn't consider them.
Do you have experience with any of these brands? If so, based on your experience would you use that brand again?
Also what other equipment do you have on your network? Firewall? Router? APs? Security (Cameras, door locks etc.)? Are there any functions with one of these brands of switches that would enhance the products you already have? Sometimes you get more bang for your buck by sticking with the same manufacture as they will have features on different products that work together well or feed off of each other.
If all of that comes down to the same three brands still, then look at performance claims, features sets, cost.
We have the Meraki AP's and I like the cloud management portion of them. But if you don't renew with them to use the cloud then the AP's are worthless as the require the cloud management. But it is nice to have that central, visual representation and central management feature Meraki has to offer. I don't know if Extreme Networks or Aruba has that.
STAY AWAY from Arista Mojo
Most of the Wi-Fi properties come embedded in the chipset. So, there is not too much difference between different brand APs.
If you are redoing your Wi-Fi infrastructure because of new technologies (such as Wi-Fi 6), fine. If you are redoing it because of a bad user experience, then you should investigate possibilities of AP misplacement or AP configuration.
Cisco Meraki is cloud-controlled. If you are thinking about an on-prem Wi-Fi controller, you should concentrate on Aruba or Cisco Catalyst 900 series.
As far as I know, Aruba 515 has
- 4x4:4 antenna for 5 GHz
- 2x2:2 antenna for 2.4 GHz
Cisco, on the other hand, has either
- 2x2:2 antenna for both bands (9105 model) or
- 4x4:4 antenna for both bands (9115 model)
Of course, whether this difference in antennas will have any impact will depend on the client devices and whether they have matching antennas and whether they also have Wi-Fi 6 technology.
If you really want a differentiating factor, you should consider Ruckus Wireless.
Ruckus Wireless APs have;
- Adaptive antenna technology (called BeamFlex). This technology analyses different paths to reach the client and electronically turns itself to a directional antenna, choosing the path that gives the best performance to reach each specific client. If the client is mobile or if the environment changes (such as a warehouse) the selection of paths/direction also changes instantly.
Transmitting in a directional way allows a good Signal-to-Noise Ratio and also causes less interference for other nearby APs outside the path of the directional transmission.
- ChannelFly technology. This technology chooses the best channel based on performance rather than background scanning for noise.
- Polarization Diversity. This technology allows the clients not to lose signal strength when held at different angles (important for mobile devices such as tablets and telephones).
- Better receive sensitivity compared to the competitors.
None of the other brands have the features listed above.
To summarize:
- Features embedded in the chipset, and dumb antennas don't make any difference.
- Adaptive antenna and polarization diversity make a big difference.
I have Extreme and chose them years ago when they were Aerohive for one reason PPSK they are still the only company that has this. I put out a bid this year and was ready to forklift my entire extreme system because of their outrageous maintenance costs Aruba had a great maintenance cost but to achieve what I needed I would have to purchase clearpass an excellent product I might add. TCO for Aruba was about 10% of my original Extreme quote. The bid for extreme came in and they had dropped the maintenance cost to 10% of the original cost for 5 years. I would like to have purchased Aruba but I have 125 Extreme WAPs deployed so the cost of Aruba forklift would have been higher and the need to retrain techs on how to configure Aruba is now not an issue. If I was doing a system from scratch I would choose Aruba hands down for their service, price and ease of use. I have a full Aruba network of routers and switches as well as all HP printers so it would have been a good fit. I must add this is based on educational prices I am the network Engineer for a residential High School ASMSA. Your prices may vary. I have heard from other extreme users that their support is not what it was when Aerohive was a stand alone company, I have a very knowledgeable vendor so I rarely have to contact Extreme.