RE: [WIRELESS-LAN] Aruba vs. Cisco - Bake Off!

[Dave Molta]

Title: WIRELESS-LAN Digest - 17 Jan 2006 to 19 Jan 2006 (#2006-10)

We're about to do a bake-off here at Syracuse for an upcoming issue of Network Computing Magazine. We're still finalizing our test-plan, but from a performance standpoint, we plan to look at QoS, roaming, load-balancing, failover, security, and scalability, at least to the degree that our test tools will allow for this. I think basic AP performance has commoditized, so I don't think we'll look at basic rate-versus-range performance, but we might look at performance in multi-mode client environments, with a mix of a, b, and g clients.   If you haven't read it, you may want to check out Frank Bulk's review from February of last year. Frank is a former college network administrator and he spent a couple years here at Syracuse completing is MS degree so he has a pretty good feel for what's important. A lot has changed since then but it will at least give you a feel for some of the evaluation criteria we thought were worth considering:   http://www.networkcomputing.com/showitem.jhtml?docid=1603f2    As for the decision between Aruba and Cisco, I think you will find that they both have solid offerings and would likely be suitable for a large campus environment. It's likely that the most important decision-points won't be performance-related. As you may know, Aruba won the deal for Microsoft's network and while it's quite possible that Microsoft was looking for a reason NOT to purchase Cisco, it's unlikely they would have gone with Aruba if they didn't think their stuff would scale.   There are some interesting feature-differentiators that you may want to consider. Cisco offers some interesting advanced capabilities with CCX-compatible clients. I realize many of you don't favor proprietary enhancements, but the reality is that all of the major clients out there now support CCX, so it is pretty much a free add-on if you use Cisco infrastructure. Also, Cisco now offers a mesh AP, which may be important to some campuses and it is unlikely you will see that from Aruba anytime soon. On the other hand, Aruba offers some interesting twists of their own, including a unique security model that handles crypto functions on the controllers rather than AP's and also provides a per-user firewall capability that provides for more granular authorization, prioritization, etc. I also like Aruba's branch-office controllers and personal AP's, though those features are likely to be of more appeal to a distributed enterprise than to a University.   Another important factor relates to whether you want to do business with a multi-billion dollar company like Cisco or a $100 million company like Aruba. There is certain amount of security in dealing with Cisco, especially if they are already a business partner. On the other hand, Aruba might be characterized as a little hungrier, which sometimes translates into a willingness to bend over backwards to please every customer.   dm --------------------------------------------------- Dave Molta Assistant Professor Assistant Dean for Technology Director, Center for Emerging Network Technologies Syracuse University School of Information Studies 206 Hinds Hall Syracuse, NY 13244 315-443-4549 --------------------------------------------------- From: Phil Raymond [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, January 20, 2006 10:26 AM To: WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU Subject: Re: [WIRELESS-LAN] Aruba vs. Cisco - Bake Off! I think you understand the importance of this based on your question but it bears repeating – if you let Cisco and Aruba come in and perform their own rehearsed dog and pony show, they will focus on their strengths and deflect from their weaknesses.   So how do you answer your question? It is quite complex. Hopefully some other institutions have performed a similar bakeoff and can offer insight on this forum. I would also suggest that you find some WLAN RFP’s that were written by knowledgeable folks. I have a couple that I could probably cut and paste some stuff from if you don’t get enough assistance elsewhere. They are probably too technical though and it is better that you listen to others in your situation.   Another thing to understand is what applications are you running on the WLAN? VoIP? Video? Will you require high mobility? Security capabilities?   If you are using for example Spectralink handsets, get a couple and perform some roaming and range testing. Make sure that Cisco/’Aruba show up with a setup that will enable 2 or more AP’s to simulate roaming.   Have a lot of clients on hand to stress out the AP’s with load balancing, etc. VoIP clients are good at this since they load up an AP fast (you might expect to get 10-12 handset conversations on an AP with no other data clients).   Typical tests are roaming/handoffs, load balancing, security, range. It really depends on the applications you will be putting on the WLAN. Just make sure you have those applications available during testing.   I think both vendors are high grade and will perform comparably. Many times it comes down to the uniqueness of your application requirements and who is tailored best to meet them, and price…   From: Landry, Michael [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, January 20, 2006 7:33 AM To: WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU Subject: [WIRELESS-LAN] Aruba vs. Cisco - Bake Off!   We’re coming up on a lightweight AP competition between Aruba and Cisco. Both vendors are providing hardware, an engineer to set it up, and some sort of “test steps” for us to use in our evaluation. I’m looking for guidance from this list if anyone has done the side-by-side real-world eval, what types of criteria you evaluated, speedbumps to watch out for, and what your decision was and why.   OK, so that’s a bit broad, but any info you’re willing to share is appreciated. I’m sure we all have a lot of free time on our hands… :P   Thanks! Michael Landry Quinnipiac University ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/.