Cisco

The work you do will most likely have a real effect within the company.

Hours are pretty relaxed; the time you work isn't supervised, so if you get your work done quickly, you can easily work less than 40 hours a week and still get paid for all 40.

Interns have the opportunity to present their work to higher-ups in the company at the end of the internship, which helps to get a returning offer.

Employees are welcoming and enjoy helping interns learn the ropes. I was able to go out for food and beer with my team.

Hackathons for interns exist.

The way they assign jobs to interns is completely arbitrary. I worked in network operating systems even though I had no experience in networks or routers.

Many interns have complained that their work is often slow and that having to deal with old code and legacy systems is excruciating.

The engineer culture is the old-fashioned, sit-in-a-cube and do what you're assigned type. You have to go out of your way and get approval to be remotely innovative.

A lot of coding internships around the Bay Area will pay significantly more and also provide housing and food. Cisco does neither, but will give a sign-on bonus. You also can't get paid for overtime.