I use a lot of these types of devices, and 90% of the time I need a device that is easily configurable from the SERIAL side. Instead, most of the companies tout how good their GUI is - which you use to configure the device from the LAN side. That doesn't help me.

It is also very convenient to have the devices send you status through hardware pins, not just messages embedded in the bitstream (things like "cable connected" or "telnet session in progress" or "I'm now in command mode" for example)