Cisco Ethernet Switches Scalability

Yusuf Kucuk - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Manager at EMU

I rate Cisco switches 10 out of 10 for scalability. We design our networks to be scalable. Scaling is only a matter of procuring new devices. 

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JW
Network Manager at Telio Management GmbH

I do not like the way the stack feature is done on Cisco. I mostly prefer Fortinet or ESL from Brocade. It's way more flexible and straightforward, and you just need to understand the logic. With Cisco, it's a black box. It's hard to understand. 

It is possible to scale. However, you do reach a limitation with eight switches placed together. We have four switches in the data center, so we've never hit a scalability threshold. 

We have five admins on the solution, and across the company, we have 30 people that have access to the solution. 

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Jose-Rivera - PeerSpot reviewer
Account Manager at Telefónica

The solution is scalable so I rate scalability an eight out of ten. 

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Buyer's Guide
Cisco Ethernet Switches
April 2024
Learn what your peers think about Cisco Ethernet Switches. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: April 2024.
768,740 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Amir Sanayeayan - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Security Specialist at NIGC

For enterprise-sized companies, Cisco is the number one product in the market. The solution is scalable and offers good resilience.

In my environment, we have 2,500 of our clients using the product. We need two to five administrators for the configuration part.

I don't know if my company plans to increase the solution's usage in the future.

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Syed Basheer - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Network Engineer (Level-3) at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

The solution is scalable and depends on the desired model. You can create multiple contexts and extend your network by adding Nexus 5000 or 2000 for connections. 

I am currently working on a big project with thousands of routers and 70% of them are Cisco switches. Scalability is not dependent on the number of users but is instead about providing access to the network. 

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PS
Senior Manager - SBR Technical Services at Reliance Industries Ltd

I can scale Cisco Ethernet Switches when required. For example, when I'm running out of port, I need a new switch, but that only happens sometimes.

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IT
Group CIO at a construction company with 10,001+ employees

Regarding the product's scalability, the scalability option will be available as long as the product or the hardware does not reach the end of life or support.

All the people working in my company use the solution, which comes to more than 8000 people.

My company plans to increase the number of users who use the solution.

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Dinesh Upadhyay - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr.Manager-IT at IMI Kolkata

This is a scalable product. It expands well. 

We have about 50 users on the solution right now. 

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DS
Senior Project Manager / Systems Engineer at a consultancy with 11-50 employees

This solution covers it all. I've done everything from simple 12-port switches for a small facility to a wide area network with core switches and multiple redundant communication lines and there haven't been any scalability issues. There's no one-size-fits-all in terms of maintenance required, it depends on the size of the organization. 

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SH
Manager (Customer Service) at Raya Integration

The platform is highly scalable. I rate the scalability a ten out of ten.

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RN
Engineer -'SF' at NRSC

Our department is quite big. About 50 engineers are accessing different nodes.

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Sven Gotovac - PeerSpot reviewer
Professor at FESB - Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture

It is a scalable solution.

There are around 3,000 to 4,000 users of the solution, considering that all the students in our university use it.

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KV
IT Manager at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees

Around 3,000 users use the solution in our organization.

I rate Cisco Ethernet Switches a nine out of ten for scalability.

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SR
Senior Technical Director at National Informatics Center

I would rate the scalability of the product as an eight out of ten. About 3,000 users are currently using Cisco Ethernet Switches, and there are plans to increase usage as the hospital expands.

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Vivek Makhijani - PeerSpot reviewer
Director at JEDI SERVICES PRIVATE LIMITED

Since Cisco Ethernet Switches can be integrated with different modules, we can have one switch to scale up to 10, 15, or 20 switches. The solution is enterprise scalable and telecom scalable. I've got about 12 to 14 customers using Cisco products.

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Olajide Olusegun - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Team Lead at Atlas Security

The solution is highly scalable.

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John Bayangos - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead Infrastructure Engineer at a educational organization with 1,001-5,000 employees

I rate Cisco Ethernet switches seven out of 10 for scalability. Unless the switch is submodular, you can remove those modules and plug in better ones. Scalability is harder if it's fixed hardware, but it's easier to scale a virtualized network appliance.

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DD
Network Engineer at Dukat d.d.

Around 50,000 users are using Cisco Ethernet Switches in our organization.

I rate the solution’s scalability ten out of ten.

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RI
Technical Project Manager at a consultancy with 51-200 employees

Ethernet does not scale very well because you've got distance limitations. Ethernet can only run for about one hundred meters or less, so you have to use Couplers. This distance limitation is why we use Fibre. Fibre optics is actually a better technology than Ethernet, but it's more expensive. Everything about it, the equipment, the nature of the way the Fibre cables are prepared, is a lot more expensive compared to Ethernet.

Ideally, everybody would like to run Fiber switches because it's a better technology that carries more bandwidth. The high price is due in part to the components. All the components that make Fibre work are expensive to produce. It can be relatively cheap for what we use it for but overall, it's way more expensive than Ethernet. If it wasn't for that then Fibre would have been the best solution. Ethernet, as it is right now, the cost price point for Ethernet is very good, so it won't be going anywhere fast soon. In terms of scalability, don't have limits. If you want to scale, you need to use Fiber to scale.

In terms of users, the organization right now has more than a thousand, and the previous one had approximately five thousand.

With respect to user roles, some are call center personnel, some platform systems guys, some are software developers, some project managers, some are marketing managers, some are sales managers, and some are professional services. Department-wise you have your legal, HR, and your finance department.

To my knowledge, our business is focused on doing work for clients so I expect that our usage of Ethernet Switches will be expanding.

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Abubakar Bello - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Administrator at NDIC

We may switch to another solution, although this will depend on the cost. The dollar has multiplied five times over the past ten years, which means that certain things are not affordable in dollars at the moment. I am not saying that the best product would be be cost prohibitive for us. This said, one's budget and the cost of materials must be weighed. 

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DR
Sr. Information Officer at Merino Industries Ltd (Merino Group)

I give Cisco Ethernet switches 10 out of 10 for scalability.

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KR
Tata Medical Center logo Senior IT Infrastructure Supervisor at Tata Medical Center

We have around 3000 users. The tool is used daily.

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Richard Hermogeno - PeerSpot reviewer
Channels Management Head at Philippine National Bank

I am the only one using this solution.

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DM
Network Tech Leader at a aerospace/defense firm with 201-500 employees

Cisco Ethernet Switches are scalable.

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HI
Network Team Lead at ElSewedy Education

The solution is quite scalable. However, the pricing is a concern. If I need to add switches, I tend to look at cheaper options like Juniper or HP.

In my organization, there were about 150 switches or more. That covered about 4,000 users and covered both wireless and LAN, wired and wireless.

We may not continue to use it, as it is expensive and there are alternatives.

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PinchasAlbalya - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Engineer at Ben Gurion University

At this level, the edge, we are not concerned with scalability. We will be able to update the edge using the new uplink port module if we need to.

The core switches are scalable. You can add another slot of forty-eight ports with 10-gigabit each. 

On the university campus, we have approximately thirty thousand users. These are not concurrent connections. We have more than twenty thousand students, about six thousand employees, and there are guests. I can say that more than twenty thousand connections may be active at one time.

We have about one thousand switches, and we have four people in charge of maintenance. They do the installation, repairs, and all of the other tasks in the data center. Three are technicians and one is a manager.

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Daniyal Khalid - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Solutions Specialist at Google

The scalability of the solution depends on the models. I rate the scalability a nine out of ten.

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YF
sTAM at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees

The product scales quite well. It works for any size organization. A company can also expand it out if they need to.

We have around 2,500 customers and half of them use Cisco.

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RK
Account Manager at a computer software company with 11-50 employees

They've got many solutions for small companies, which we work with, and some of our biggest customers, and even multinationals can use Cisco probably better than anybody else. That's why the fact that international community likes it so much. They can use it anywhere in the world in companies of any size. It scales very well.

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IP
Cyber Security Consultant at Ukroboronprom

Cisco Switches are scalable.

We have 300 users using it and 5 guys from the IT department that support our network.

They are basically all engineers and some programmers.

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TC
Office Ohrid at AGENCY FOR REAL ESTATE CADASTRE

I give the scalability a nine out of ten.

We currently have around 5,000 people using the solution. The amount of people is determined by the license we have. To scale up we need to increase our license.

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AS
Deputy IT Manager at ICAPP (Americana Group)

Cisco Ethernet Switches are scalable.

We have approximately 250 people using the Cisco Ethernet Switches.

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KS
Manager Infrastructure & Projects at Kinetic Pride

We usually over-spec, and there is no problem with scalability. They're able to handle everything very well. In all the fields where we are using them, we haven't encountered a situation that they are not able to handle. They work fine.

In our company, they are being used at different levels. They're basically serving everyone, and there are about 500 people in our company. They serve right up to the data center.

In terms of our plans to increase its usage, a lot of discussions are going on about moving to the cloud, SD-WAN, and things like that. With the ongoing situation of the pandemic, there have been discussions about scaling down the local network and moving towards service provision for remote workers, as opposed to on-prem. We might scale down the local network and move things to the cloud and other remote access technologies.

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HW
Sr. Security Network Engineer at Children's Cancer Hospital - Egypt 57357

The solution becomes more scalable as more switches are connected to the ACI fabric. We currently have 2,000 users and this is increasing all the time. We just increase our switches as our users increase. 

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DK
Information Technology Security Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

The scalability is medium, that is, it's neither hard nor easy to scale.

Specifically, it is easy to scale up to a certain network size, but it becomes difficult beyond that.

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RS
Network Engineer at a educational organization with 1,001-5,000 employees

They're doing the job fine. We have upgraded them when we needed to. We can scale as necessary.

I can't speak to how many users are currently on our switches.

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MA
Technical & Pre-Sales Manager at GateLock

This solution is scalable. If I want to add switches to the existing one, I can easily do it. 

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ERICK KAGWEZA - PeerSpot reviewer
Network and Collaboration Engineer at SoftNet Technologies Limited

The solution is scalable. We have 1,000 people using the solution.

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MN
Network Analyst at a manufacturing company with 11-50 employees

It's a scalable product. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so. It's no problem. 

We've used it in a large company and had no issues. 

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BR
Responsable Infrastructures, Réseaux & Télécoms at a university with 201-500 employees

The scalability of the product is great, If a company needs to expand, it can. There is a lot of stacking and cascading that can happen.

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CE
Senior Presale Manager at a tech services company with self employed

In terms of scalability, normally you have a 24 port switch or a 48 port switch, which are fixed to scalability. So you can't really go beyond what has been provided. If it's a 24 switch, it's 24 users, if it's 48 it's 48, except if you're using the switch as an extender for a wireless device. That is a different conversation, but if you're using it in a LAN environment and for a connected, wired connection, then you can't scale.

But you can connect multiple switches to themselves and stack them and make it one switch depending on your design.

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Imtiyaj Jamadar - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Technology Executive at Akums Drugs & Pharmaceuticals Ltd.

The solution is scalable.

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AA
Student at a educational organization with 201-500 employees

The solution is scalable and we have the ability to upgrade our appliances without impacting our services.

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LM
Enterprise and Security Manager at University of Fort Hare

This is a very scalable solution. When we started, we didn't have enough switches and other equipment. One of the beauties is that when we add new technologies or buy new switches, it scales.

We are in a university setting and there are new students every year, so we always have to connect more people to our network. It is definitely scalable and we plan to increase our usage in the future.

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JM
IT Manager at a construction company with 10,001+ employees

Cisco switches are scalable. I manage two large sites and at the first site, we have about 200 people. The second site has about 300 people. We do not have any plan to expand, per se. I do have plans to upgrade the switches and probably redesign the environment for better efficiency. 

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PP
Supervisor of IT Infrastructure & Cybersecurity at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees

Cisco Ethernet Switches are extremely scalable and have the broadest line of solutions in the market.

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SG
First Assistant Vice President at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees

Cisco Ethernet switches are scalable. We have approximately 1,500 people using them in the company. We have a plan to increase our usage of Cisco by implementing an SD-WAN.

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JD
CGO at TMS Consulting Inc

The solution has been absolutely fine so far and I have yet to run into any scalability issues just yet. A company should be able to expand if they need to.

We have about 100 people using the product at any given time.

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TM
Telecommunication Team Leader at BIK

It is scalable. I don't have any problem with its scalability.

We have 500 people in my company. They don't directly work on these devices. I configure these devices, and they connect through these devices.

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EK
Partner / Owner at Bimel Elektronik Mamuller Paz. Ltd.

This solution is scalable.

It depends on the customer, regarding the number of users. Recently we were awarded a contract for the Turkish military, and there will be several thousand people who will be using it.

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NA
Network & System Security Consultant at Zakat House

In terms of scalability, it is scalable. With Cisco we have built-in stacks and stackable switches. And it has a stackable fiber from the main office to the Catalyst and the Nexus switch.

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WK
CIO with 501-1,000 employees
DB
Consultant - Smart Buildings at a tech services company with 201-500 employees

Scalability in the sense varies with switching. Some switches are fixed, which we cannot expand with the design, but some switches are those you can expand. It's basically the design. So scalability is good.

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Paul Ojil - PeerSpot reviewer
Director at Blue Neuron Limited

I think Cisco Ethernet Switches are quite scalable, with lots of options. It's not an issue at all for anyone to expand. 

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DC
ICT Manager/Systems Administrator at a university with 201-500 employees

The solution scales well. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so with ease.

We have about 1,300 users on the product currently.

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DB
Pre Sales Engineer at a non-tech company with 201-500 employees

In my experience, Cisco Ethernet Switches are scalable.

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DR
Network Engineer at Transportation

Well, need more pro-active option to add PoE modules to Industrial switches.

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LW
Senior Director of IT and Data Analytics at a performing arts with 201-500 employees

The scalability is pretty good, all you need to do is add more racks. We have approximately 70 people that rely on this solution from my organization.

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SA
Senior Information Technology Manager at FAP Marine Terminals Ltd

There are no limitations to scalability. It depends on what you choose. Once you choose the product you want then collaborate with getting that box which is important.

You need to know what your plan is two years in advance, and how you want to upgrade it. You will need to select the box as it is.

If you make your own selection, there may be an issue. Cisco provides many scalable options.

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it_user1180785 - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Operations Engineer at Infosysta

Once you understand how the product works, it is easy to configure. I do not see any significant limitation on the scalability of the product so long as you have chosen the right product for use in your environment.

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it_user98859 - PeerSpot reviewer
Consulting Engineer EMEA at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
On the specific cases I used, never. Adding new switches to the networks is painless (but please be careful with the VTP configuration though, as if it’s not configured you do have the possibility of a new switch giving you trouble with the VLAN configuration). View full review »
MD
Network Engineer at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees

It is very scalable. We have about 8,000 users.

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it_user146331 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Network Operations Specialist at a government with 1,001-5,000 employees
The Chassis can run out of slots as the environment expand further along. View full review »
SC
Head Of Information & Communication Technology at a transportation company with 51-200 employees

Sometimes we have issues with certain switches hanging.

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CC
Network and Service Development Manager at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees

Some versions of the solution can scale with a stacking option. So far, we've been satisfied with the level of scalability we can achieve. We know what we can do using the right point in the network.

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Kalyan  Chowdhury - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder at Computech infosysetm

It is a scalable solution, and we have more than 35 customers who use it.

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JEGAN N - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder at SYSTA NETWORKS

Cisco Ethernet Switches are scalable, much more than Jupiter. 

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SV
Technical Manager at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

This solution is very scalable.

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IM
Network Delivery Lead at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

It is very scalable.

In this company we have a single usage. I first started with Cisco routers in 1997, now we install Cisco routers all the time.

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US
Owner with self employed

We have not had to scale yet, we are normally working with a fixed size. We haven't had to worry about upsizing or downsizing.

For our purposes, we are not using this, but on the client-side, we have anywhere from two to eight users, they are made up of technicians, support staff, and engineers.

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MN
Owner at it logic

Our customers have between 2,000 and 2,500 users.

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MS
Project Manager at a real estate/law firm with 10,001+ employees

Cisco Ethernet Switches is scalable.

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DP
IT Support Executive at a healthcare company with 51-200 employees

While the solution can scale, it's a costly endeavor. Scaling definitely will cost an organization more money.

We have about 60 or 70 users of the product within our organization.

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PB
Data Center Admin at Sysnet Global Technologies

We are using the Cisco 4503-E and these switches are very scalable. There are some models that have plenty of ports.

Users do not connect directly to this switch. Rather, only servers are connected and we have perhaps 20 of them.

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GS
Solutions Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

The scalability of this solution is fine.

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SC
ICT Manager at a aerospace/defense firm

It's very scalable, as you just need to buy new modules, and slot them in as and when required.

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TM
Network Security Expert at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees

I have some clients with approximately 1,600 users using the solution.

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AR
VP of IT at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

The solution is scalable. We have deployed more than 1000 switches to customers.

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CR
IT Manager at a renewables & environment company with 1,001-5,000 employees

This system can accommodate expansion without hampering the existing workflow and ensure an increase in output or efficiency.

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it_user1162803 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Engineer at a tech services company with 201-500 employees

The scalability of the solution, from what I understand, is good. We haven't actually tested the solution for scalability ourselves, however.

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LD
IT support network at a government with 1,001-5,000 employees

It is not easy to scale. We have between 1,000 to 2,000 users.

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AK
RF Planning Manager at Sabafon

We have found it to be scalable. We have approximately three million subscribers.

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JH
Senior Network Security Advisor at a computer software company with 11-50 employees

Cisco Ethernet Switches can be scaled up.

We are not using this solution extensively, it is not our main solution.

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it_user1011525 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Administrator at a engineering company with 201-500 employees

I think this product is extremely scalable. I am fairly sure everyone in the world who's working with a computer is using it. Even you — whomever you are, and whether you know it or not.

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GC
Science Technician at a government with 201-500 employees

The scalability of the solution is good. 

I am the only one in my organization using the solution.

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NW
Head of Technical at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

It's a scalable solution. Our end users are our customers. We have thousands of people using these switches that we have implemented.

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ME
Solution Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

The solution is quite scalable. They support our stacking feature, which means we can stack up to eight switches together to have scalable port numbers in terms of port numbers and also throughput. 

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it_user1199781 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Engineer at a tech services company with 1-10 employees

Scaling and upgrading the solution is easy. Our group has about 500 employees and all of them use Cisco and its switches.

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it_user133842 - PeerSpot reviewer
Infrastructure Connectivity Engineer at Reputable Service Company
AD
Junior Network Engineer at Easy Systems

It is scalable.

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AS
Solution Engineer at a tech services company

We have around 500 switches deployed in one network. 

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it_user116220 - PeerSpot reviewer
Works at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
it_user92235 - PeerSpot reviewer
Security System Engineer at a wholesaler/distributor
SD
Solutions Architect at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees

Scalability varies from model to model. We have a particular model that was sized according to our use case and requirements. In general, they are very scalable.

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TW
Member of Technical Staff at a tech services company with 201-500 employees

I am not sure how well this product scales. Everybody in our company uses it.

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TJ
Director at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees

I have found the solution to have good scalability. Cisco is the pioneers on switching technology, they are very good. There are approximately 2,500 users using the solution.

View full review »
SC
CTO at a tech vendor with 11-50 employees

We don't have much of a demand to significantly increase the workload on network switch so we don't experience any scalability issues. 

View full review »
Buyer's Guide
Cisco Ethernet Switches
April 2024
Learn what your peers think about Cisco Ethernet Switches. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: April 2024.
768,740 professionals have used our research since 2012.