Call me a Cisco Fan Boy

Yes, call me a Cisco fan boy.

I admit it, but every once in a while I get intrigued by other organizations' choices for VoIP, Wireless LANs, switching/routing, etc.

Today I had the opportunity to visit a neighboring school district and I noticed that they were deploying Extreme wireless access points. My first thought when I see something other than Cisco is that the equipment is either a) cheaper or b) sold to the IT department based upon some misleading information about functionality (e.g. Aruba Wireless representatives told me that Cisco could not centrally control access points) or c) really does something Cisco doesn't (e.g. Xirrus wireless has an interesting wireless array available). I admit it - I am not that familiar with Extreme products, so I started checking them out tonight and had a realization: they are not cheaper than Cisco! I am not sure where that leaves Extreme, but with a 0% failure rate over a 6 year period on our network switches (we have 50+ switches deployed) and wireless LAN (we have ~30 access points), I'm not likely to start looking for a replacement for Cisco anytime soon.

I noticed that they chose 3Com for a VoIP system. Again, not a system I am entirely familiar with, but ever since a vendor tried to sell me a NEC VoIP phone system that relied on a card system (just like any old phone system from the 1970's) I have been a little skittish about VoIP anyways. Cisco makes VoIP almost too easy. The data switches act as your phone cards and the call manager handles all the call routing. No need for any additional equipment (except I do use routers to act as the voice gateway - but they also provide a secondary call manager in case something happens to the main one).

So yes, I am a certified Cisco fan boy....it's because their products work and the work well - and I find them flexible enough to handle an ever changing network architecture. Something my fast growing school district has to be ready to do.