Cisco has been different companies over the last 30 years, and it's not hard for me to believe their current incarnation is drastically more hospitable than their mid-aughts incarnation.
Not sure about 30 years ago, but for the last 20 Cisco has been the same. Mostly reliable hardware, but the software side sucks, the licensing and support fees are ridiculous, licensing without a direct connection to their cloud (or a satellite server) is a pain in the arse, sales doesn't even try to be realistic with product capability to product need match, and support is barely above worthless, even with a high-touch contact. Cisco is the same company today as they were back with Ciscoworks and MARS Protego.
