Cisco Catalyst 8000V SD-WAN & Router - PAYG - DNA Advantage

The main use cases for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN are in the retail sector and enterprise. The product is used for Cisco routing, specifically for configuring traffic engineering with protocol BGP.

With Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, I have centralized orchestration and management. The transport independence of MPLS or connectivity and internet connectivity is another excellent feature. End-to-end segmentation is also provided.

I use the application-aware routing feature. Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN supports dynamic police-based routing decisions based on application type or different performance metrics such as jitter or latency.

The benefit of that feature is that it improves user experience. The principal benefit of application-aware routing is that critical applications are prioritized or routed over the best performing paths to reduce outages and service degradation. There is full visibility of applications.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN has integrated security features which include base firewall, URL filtering, IPS, and secure segmentation, and it supports integration with other Cisco products such as Umbrella or Snort. This feature is beneficial for the client because the information is secure.

It is important that Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN supports cloud, on-premises, and hybrid environments for my organization because it allows for scalability and faster deployment in the cloud. It reduces operational needs because I don't need to manage physical controller hardware, and updates and maintenance can be centralized and automated.

The zero-touch provisioning feature is very important for the speed of deploying new branch locations. I can deliver the device to the branch, and it is important because simplified deployment makes the implementation start more easily since devices are auto-configured and authenticate without manual intervention.

Cisco can improve Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN by simplifying licensing and platform integration with other Cisco products such as Catalyst Center or solutions with Meraki.

A license needs to be permanent for me. The client feels that it is very expensive.

I have used Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN for two years.

I have experience with the Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance, but I haven't configured it. I am currently working in pre-sales.

I would rate Cisco's support, their customer service, and technical support as excellent. The support of Cisco is very good, and the attention is immediate.

Positive

I have sixteen years of work experience in enterprise architecture with Cisco, including networking, switching, routing, and solution SD-Access.

AWS is the main cloud provider in my use cases.

My company, Sonda, is a Gold partner of Cisco.

I am a solution architect at Sonda.

I rate this solution 10 out of 10.

The main use cases for Juniper vSRX  would be primarily for a data center scenario device, and there's a significant focus on the other core elements.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN 's main use cases for us will be data center deployment for enterprise level.

The most useful feature for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN  is the single pane of glass management because we also use Meraki onsite. It's a standard Cisco solution, and because Cisco is who they are and what they can provide, we use Cisco for compute and network, and we use NetApp  for storage, so that's what we generally do.

I have absolutely seen scenarios where the decentralized management capability improved operations and workflows.

There's nothing I could put my finger on right away for improvements in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN. There is definitely nothing that Juniper does that Cisco doesn't do. Cisco will do everything Juniper does and then some. The negative, or the downside of Cisco is the knowledge base; you need to be a little bit more tech-savvy and network-savvy to work with Cisco, while Juniper is a lot more user-friendly from what I can see, especially in terms of configuration and any kind of roll back. But in terms of market leaders, Cisco is capable of doing anything you want it to do, as far as I can see.

I have just recently been working with Juniper.

I have contacted Cisco support for one-on-one support for a very unique or bespoke configuration where there are a lot of rules and policies going on in the background, maybe some interconnecting or conflicting with one another, but in terms of the actual product or problems with the product, nothing I'm aware of.

I would consider Cisco support a 10 out of 10.

Positive

In my experience, customers are realizing the return on investment with Cisco in 12 months. Within the year, I've done work with customers in the last couple of years that we've upgraded from Avaya six to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN in a Cisco network environment, and they are now back to do that with the remainder of their company, so they've realized the value in 12 months and are willing to invest in the remainder of their organization.

I am working on the Juniper vSRX  solution.

I work with switches, routers, firewalls, and any IT consultant tasks, and I work at the core. I have a CCNA, and I'm actually doing a Juniper certification exam in 3 hours, so I continually work on upskilling, as part of what I do.

If it's enterprise level, you'll deploy your Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN in a couple of hours. You can draw it down there if you've already got a Catalyst  or an existing environment. If you are starting up from scratch, it's hard to put a timeframe on it because it depends on criteria, but if you're replacing something with a Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN and you know what you're doing along with using the CLI and your backups, a couple of hours would be plenty of time, a half a day or maybe a little bit more wouldn't hurt.

There are AI features, and I'm not 100% privy to them because I just haven't been involved in that element, but they do exist.

I would rate Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN an eight.

My title is Information Technology Consultant at a company named Island  Networks.

Positive

Positive

The primary use case for Cisco SD-WAN  is the standard configuration across all sites, facilitated by templates. This solution helps in the ease of management and compliance configuration, which is deployed everywhere. 

It also simplifies troubleshooting and provides full mesh topology for branch connectivity to data centers. All branch locations, along with central locations, are on SD-WAN and gathered in the data center. Many customers combine it with local Internet breakout for SaaS applications.

The valuable features of Cisco SD-WAN  include its security policies and zone-based firewall that are applied to every site, as well as application-aware routing. Security is standard compliant, eliminating config drift that was prevalent before manual configurations. Application-aware routing offers flexibility in using different lines for traffic, depending on the policy implemented.

The main area for improvement in Cisco SD-WAN is the lack of documentation, which often lags behind the software releases. This is especially notable since Cisco acquired the solution and is still integrating it into its overall environment.

I have been using Cisco SD-WAN for the last three years.

I would rate Cisco SD-WAN an eight out of ten for stability. While some software-related issues and bugs were encountered, they did not cause the whole environment to crash. Sites were able to continue functioning, although there were limitations in making changes at those times.

The ease of configuration and features like zero-touch provisioning enhance the scalability of Cisco SD-WAN, especially in disaster recovery situations. I would rate scalability a nine out of ten. The initial implementation faced some issues, but it has improved with newer software versions.

The customer service and support for Cisco SD-WAN are satisfactory, rated as eight out of ten. 

However, Cisco's ongoing reorganizations have affected the quality of technical support, which varies depending on the engineer handling cases.

Positive

Before Cisco SD-WAN, I used traditional MPLS or eVPN, IPVPN networks. The switch was made for easier management and standard compliance, which is enforced by the SD-WAN product itself.

The initial setup involves getting the underlay and controllers in place to migrate from the old to the new network. I deployed in parallel, allowing both networks to coexist, and then migrated sites to the new central control plane.

For a complete project, we had two central administrators and designers, along with three or four teams managing the remote locations. The process took approximately one year to migrate about 280 sites.

The pricing for Cisco SD-WAN is rated eight out of ten, with some variability depending on the reseller discounts and the size of the enterprise. It is also relatively cost-effective for smaller businesses when using the Meraki version.

We evaluated other solutions but chose Cisco SD-WAN due to its flexibility, support for our requirements, and the preference of many of our customers who were already using Cisco-based solutions.

I would recommend working out detailed use cases and requirements before implementation. Cisco SD-WAN is quite flexible, however, without a solid foundational design, users might struggle with too many options, leading to a poor rollout design. 

Overall, I rate Cisco SD-WAN as nine out of ten.