Likelihood to Recommend Definitely well-suited for a backup for a retail environment. We have had to use it as a primary internet connection when our fiber wasn't brought in in time and we had no issues with it running. It was able to withstand the temporary load on it until we were able to get the circuit provided.
Read full review Fortinet FortiExtender is well suited to delivering fast 5G and LTE service. The cloud-based system is great so that our agency can manage the cloud from anywhere which is great during remote work. The Fortinet FortiExtender was easy to deploy and the system has been easy to manage. The Fortinet FortiExtender is less appropriate when it comes to the cost to implement and the customer support could be improved.
Read full review Pros Seamless changeover to LTE (Cellulor network) in times of failure of ethernet connectivity in your company. Continuous backup for ethernet. No Downtime experienced. It provides you with ability to manage all devices in your network. Next generation Firewall, Traffic Shaper and Internet Gateway that is centrally managed on web. Read full review Failover protection by supporting multiple bands. Cloud based management helping to manage the system from anywhere. Integration with the Fortinet firewall. Read full review Cons A DHCP configuration would be fine, but a fixed IP configuration seems to require a twist in the configuration. If possible, it's just a subscription. With no initials and just a subscription, I think it's a "feature product" that may convince the superior even if the price is a bit high. I am happy with wireless and all in one, but I feel that the management screen is old, so I think it is better to renew it a bit more. Read full review It is good when any problem occurred in our fiber cables but when it gets problematic then there isn’t any way out for us and its graphic interface is not helpful. Its support team is useless and didn’t help in any regard. The price is not in our favor. Read full review Likelihood to Renew It does what it is supposed to, with minimal issue!
Read full review Alternatives Considered We checked many vendors. ALU was a primary contender. However, their acccess points are not primarily designed for cellular use case. Cellular is just an additional feature on their fully loaded APs. The fact that MEraki MG is suited for this particular use case was a major factor.
Read full review By looking at the market of similar devices, we quickly recognized that Fortinet FortiExtenders are very reasonably priced; however, they provide top-level functionality that even some of the competitors don't have.
Read full review Scalability In terms of scalability, The MG Meraki is unvanquished! As it works on cellular signals, as long as you have the required signal strength, you are connected. Removes the dependency on cables to connect to our ISP. So geographical locations do not affect the scalability of MG. Which is the whole point of having a Cellular to Wired Ethernet Device. And it can also be managed with the web centrally.
Read full review Return on Investment The ROI is excellent, over time we have been able to avoid outages even though our WAN provider may have had issues, the switch to LTE via Cisco Meraki MGwas smooth in locations where traditional lan links were not feasible, like mobile locations, this has been a saver they can be placed where mobile phone reception is best without LAN Read full review Backup connectivity is helping us in many ways especially at times when connections run out and we have to perform any action that is essential to be done at times. It provides a secure network. With direct management, we can monitor and add and remove unwanted devices. Read full review ScreenShots