It depends on what you're looking for. ESW is designed and optimized for a solution deployment, where a mixture of UC500, SA500, AP541, etc products are being deployed. In this context they all work better together allowing for discovery, management, and simplified deployment of these products as a unit. The switch supports CDP and Smartports and integrates into the CCA network management tools.One other piece - ESW comes with next business day replacement (in select markets) as part of the warranty. Some customers value this as a "step up".
The SFE/SGE switches by contrast do not have this solution "glue", but instead has support for other advanced capabilities not present in ESW. For example, it delivers support for Stacking, IPv6, MVR, Static L3, etc. It is also lower in price.Some customers may value this as a "step up".
Cisco has the broadest portfolio to address the needs of very diverse customer base.
We will take your suggestion of adding 48 Gig POE into the ESW product line as a potential product enhancement and discuss internally, so I appreciate your feedback.
