We performed a comparison between Fortinet FortiSwitch - Secure Access and NETGEAR Switches based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two Ethernet Switches solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."It is easy to set up."
"With FortiSwitch, you can easily identify who is connected to each port, disable ports as needed, and retrieve configurations from FortiGate when required."
"The technical support has been very good."
"It is very user-friendly. There is no need to use command lines to configure it or to do anything in it. You hardly use command lines, which makes it different from Cisco. In Cisco, the CLI is your best friend. Fortinet has the lowest TCO, so you can use its integrated components without having to buy additional licenses. They provide centralized management without needing to buy or acquire additional licenses. You have an integral or complete vision through a single pane of glass, and you can see everything from one single console without having to buy additional licenses, which is a plus. It works the same way when you add wireless. You can see everything from FortiGate. It has a security processor, which is another plus. It does not have a standard desktop processor. It has a multi-threat security processor, and it is built by Fortinet. So, all the components that you include in a Fortinet solution are proprietary and work in an integral way. It has one single solution, whereas other brands, such as Palo Alto and Check Point, have been acquiring certain solutions, and they're not fully integrated. With Fortinet, everything is integrated. If you start building on Fortinet, everything that you expand to the local LAN or WAN is integrated. You don't have to pay for professional services and other things to do that. Their technical information is also very good. Most of their information is based on how-to, and it can be found online, which is something my clients like."
"The most valuable feature would be network management, separating the network management component from security. It can do both but we promote it on its own. It's a good solution to do network management."
"Deploying the solution is a breeze, even a novice can do it."
"What I actually use in this deployment are Forti APs (Fortinet Access Points). So, I can see all my office infrastructure from a single console, which is handy. One FortiGate, one FortiSwitch, and five access points, everything under good control. It's really nice to see it all together like this."
"The product is a total solution with the FortiGate, switch, and access point. It is integrated with FortiGate, allowing us to manage all the equipment through it. You can handle everything from a single point."
"The most valuable feature is definitely the fully functional IGMP snooping and querier, out-of-the-box, that the switch provides. With most if not all switches that we've worked with previously, at a minimum you have to enable a couple of different options... It's really a good feature to have that stuff enabled and fully functional out-of-the-box so that [AV techs] don't have to worry about configuring any of that stuff."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is easy to use."
"The solution helps transfer data."
"Comes preconfigured and designed specifically for AV."
"The tool is stable."
"The remote troubleshooting is pretty easy. You can turn off a port that might have a network loop created, or where there might be a bad NIC card that is creating issues. Being able to turn off that port remotely is fantastic, instead of having to replace the whole switch. Remote management is really easy."
"The company provides a lifetime warranty."
"One of the biggest benefits of the remote management is that it's easy to use and you can use it from a mobile device or tablet with the app they've developed... If one of my engineers is out in the field at a client and an alert comes in from another client, that engineer can take that alert and look at it in real-time."
"FortiSwitch requires periodic firmware updates. It can be a little difficult because the switches aren't connected to the internet, so you cannot upgrade the firmware remotely. You need to go to the site and do it manually because it's a closed network."
"Its cloud features could be better."
"The central management needs improvement. The initial setup could be easier."
"The initial setup is pretty easy; we have built a knowledge base. But there's a learning curve for beginners."
"It could be simpler but compared to the competition, it's not so bad."
"The product could use more security related features."
"The range of products could improve from Fortinet FortiSwitch - Secure Access."
"It would also help if they lowered the cost of their service."
"Centralized monitoring is there, but competitors like Cisco Prime are at a higher level of centralized monitoring."
"If they could come up with ways to look at metrics on it while the video is capping through the system, that would be nice. There could be some interesting uses for that, but it's a long way off."
"The scalability and warranty should also be improved."
"The solution needs centralized management and centralized configuration."
"Their old firmware was a problem for us and we're still working on it. It didn't apply correctly so it took about half of our switches offline, which meant we couldn't use some of the functionality like the firmware updates. Unfortunately with that firmware, which they've sorted out, if you don't go through all the firmware and make sure it's past that point and back online, that's an issue with them. It's something to cautious about"
"The main negative thing is the speed. When you use the portal, if you have a lot of customers and locations in the portal, and you need to scroll through those clients or those locations, it takes a pretty long time to load those pages and to select the client. That's the problem in the portal on the laptop, and it's the same problem in the portal on the app."
"There are some design issues on which they really missed the boat. The problem has to do with rack mounting them because the lights and jacks should all be on the front, and the power on the back. The way they did it makes it really difficult to use them in a rack environment, because when the lights are on the opposite side of the jacks... you usually can't see the back side of a rack. You can't get back there to see, so it's just crazy."
"The technical support could be more helpful."
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Fortinet FortiSwitch - Secure Access is ranked 7th in Ethernet Switches with 40 reviews while NETGEAR Switches is ranked 4th in Ethernet Switches with 50 reviews. Fortinet FortiSwitch - Secure Access is rated 8.2, while NETGEAR Switches is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Fortinet FortiSwitch - Secure Access writes "It's a strong product that's easy to manage and costs significantly less than competing solutions ". On the other hand, the top reviewer of NETGEAR Switches writes "You can stack different models of switches which makes the scalability great". Fortinet FortiSwitch - Secure Access is most compared with Cisco Ethernet Switches, Aruba Switches, Meraki MS Switches, Ubiquiti UniFi Switches and Juniper EX Series Ethernet Switches, whereas NETGEAR Switches is most compared with D-Link Ethernet Switches, Cisco Linksys Ethernet Switches, Ubiquiti UniFi Switches, Cisco Ethernet Switches and Aruba Instant On Switches. See our Fortinet FortiSwitch - Secure Access vs. NETGEAR Switches report.
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