Full Solution Firewall and Switches

[Nasser-ps]

Hey everyone,

I was asked to prepare a full solution for a small enterprise. The solution should provide firewall and switch, with least price and minimum capabilities.

I'm thinking of suggesting a Meraki firewall with CBS 250 switch. 

My concerns are:

1. Can we have a solution like that (Meraki firewall with Cisco switch)? 
2. Regarding Meraki Firewall license, which features I lost if a license expired?

Please advise and provide useful material if there.

THANKS

[Brash · Accepted solution]

Going to put it straight out there... If all the business requirements are minimum cost and minimum features, Meraki isn't for you.

You can easily get cheaper firewalls with less features (heck, even running opensense on a raspberry pi would do that job), but will have tradeoffs in other areas.

With that said, if you're looking for a security appliance which is easy to use and manage and provides some decent base features, and are willing to pay a little more, Meraki is a good fit.

To answer your questions:

1. Yes, a Meraki MX security appliance is compatible with other vendor switches (including Cisco small business).

2. If you don't renew your license subscription on your Meraki devices, you have a 30 day grace period before your devices stop functioning completely.

[Nasser-ps]

Your help is appreciated. 

THANKS

[GreenMan]

I would try to understand your customer's approach to IT and internal skill and available time levels too.  The cheapest things to buy that will tick the required boxes will probably not be Meraki, but they are unlikely to be fully supported and easy to manage for the duration of their lifetime.   The total cost of ownership of Meraki solutions, for people who have little time and/or expertise to put into managing their network gear, tends to make it extremely attractive, once more.