[nsp] Re: Newbie Cisco upgrade question, apologies in advance

Sun Jun 29 02:26:14 EDT 2003

On Sun, Jun 29, 2003 at 12:54:53AM -0400, Mary Grace wrote:
> This message was posted originally on the isp-bgp list, and I was told that 
> it should have been posted on cisco-nsp if I really wanted advice on Cisco 
> equipment for this application.  Please, forgive me if this is not 
> appropriate, but I hope that you will consider it appropriate!
> *******************************
> Thank you most graciously for the incredible knowledge that God has given 
> you, and to everyone that has responded so generously to this message that 
> we posted this past week, regarding routers for T3 circuits!
> 
> I am thankful to you all for sharing your knowledge in response to such a 
> newbie question that I was almost ashamed to ask of you.
> 
> Since the last email, Mother Superior has talked to our generous 
> contributor from the company who is a T3 circuit provider, and explained 
> this list's advice regarding how it was such a "mismatch between a T3 in 
> one port and a T1 in the other" and how BGP isn't really designed to 
> perform well in a multi-homed situation with such a large difference in 
> bandwidth between the two ports.
> 
> Thanks to your advice, and the wisdom of our MS, the provider has agreed to 
> donate to our small teaching seminary and convent TWO DS3/T3 45 Mb/s 
> point-to-point HDLC circuits, homed into two different exchange points in 
> two different major cities (NAPs).
> 
> So, is it still true that we do not need anything more powerful than a 4500 
> or 4700 to run this system?  I believe that is true if we take default 
> routes advertised by the upstream on both sides, and the two diverse-path 
> circuits ARE being advertised out of the same upstream AS, but is it still 
> true if we were nuts enough to want to take full routes anyway from this 
> same provider?  And why would we even want to take full routes?  It is true 
> that, despite the gracious gift of the two DS3 circuits, we don't have much 
> money to buy a router and so we want to find our what Cisco part numbers 
> are needed for whichever model will support two DS3/T3 and one or two 
> 100base ethernet connections into our internal IP space.
> 
> 
> Thanks again, and may God bless you all in many rich ways :-)
> 
> Your most thankful and humble servant before God,
> 
> Mary Grace

The main reason you would want full routes in such a situation would be in
the event that one of your upstream vendor routers was isolated from the rest
of the Internet but still able to announce a default route to you.

The likelyhood of such an occurance is small, and if the decision to be made
on the router chosen is based on BGP table size, I would recommend going with
default routes. Frankly, what is likely going to be the deciding factor for
you is what router model can handle 2 T3's and 2 100Mb Fast Ethernet
connections. Assuming that you won't need to really saturate those connections,
a 3600 should suffice. I am not completely familiar with the network module
options of a 4500/4700, but they should do fine if they support the network
interfaces that you have laid out. If you are expecting significant growth
and/or the actual need of being able to utilize the full capabilities of
two T3's and one or two Fast Ethernet connections, I would recommend a
7200. The 3600s and 7200s can be fairly cheaply upgraded to 256Mb of RAM.
If you decide to go with full Internet routes, I would not recommend doing
it on a platform that supports only 128Mb of RAM.

> 
> At 03:45 PM 6/24/03 -0700, Mike wrote:
> >Yeah, but 3600's are at least 3-4x more expensive than a 4500 or 4700.
> >
> >Mike
> >
> >On Wed, 18 Jun 2003, Brian Thoman wrote:
> >
> >:| Date: Wed, 18 Jun 2003 10:48:26 -0400
> >:| From: Brian Thoman <flyfisher at bambooflyrods.com>
> >:| Reply-To: isp-bgp at isp-bgp.com
> >:| To: isp-bgp at isp-bgp.com
> >:| Subject: [isp-bgp] Re: Newbie Cisco upgrade question,
> >:|      apologies in advance:-)
> >:|
> >:| Wouldn't a 3640 or 3660 off of eBay do the same trick?  We ran two 
> >DS3's off a 3640 for a while with maxed out RAM.  It worked for us.
> >:|
> >:| ---------- Original Message ----------------------------------
> >:| From: Mike <mike at motherone.com>
> >:| Reply-To: isp-bgp at isp-bgp.com
> >:| Date:  Tue, 17 Jun 2003 00:18:40 -0700 (PDT)
> >:|
> >:| >If you're looking for really inexpensive, and don't need full routes, get
> >:| >a 4500/4700 and put a HSSI card in it. With an external CSU, and cable,
> >:| >you could probably get the whole package for $600-750 on ebay.
> >:| >
> >:| >Otherwise, I would suggest looking at a 7100 series (7120 or 7140) with a
> >:| >built in DS-3 port (or two). Those can be had for dirt cheap on ebay. They
> >:| >have all the processing power of a comparable 7200, but they're a
> >:| >smaller form factor and don't have as many port adapter slots (which it
> >:| >doesn't sound like you need, anyhow).
> >:| >
> >:| >Mike
> >:| >
> >:| >
> >:| >On Mon, 16 Jun 2003, E.B. Dreger wrote:
> >:| >
> >:| >:| Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2003 21:54:12 +0000 (GMT)
> >:| >:| From: E.B. Dreger <eddy+public+spam at noc.everquick.net>
> >:| >:| Reply-To: isp-bgp at isp-bgp.com
> >:| >:| To: isp-bgp at isp-bgp.com
> >:| >:| Subject: [isp-bgp] Re: Newbie Cisco upgrade question,
> >:| >:|      apologies in advance :-)
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| MG> Date: Sat, 14 Jun 2003 20:43:03 -0400
> >:| >:| MG> From: Mary Grace
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| MG> Our tiny little non-profit religious network has been using a 
> >pair of T1
> >:| >:| MG> lines running BGP4 for  multihoming to two diverse-path 
> >upstream ASNs for
> >:| >:| MG> many years now.  We have our own portable IP address space and 
> >ASN (of
> >:| >:| MG> course), and have just decided to install our first DS3, 
> >because a new
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| I think that's the first "tiny little non-profit religious
> >:| >:| network" I've ever heard of that had/needed that kind of
> >:| >:| bandwidth.  You could run a moderate ISP using that...
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| MG> upstream is offerring us $30 per month per meg port for a full
> >:| >:| MG> HDLC-encapsulated point-to-point DS3 (yippee!).
> >:| >:| MG>
> >:| >:| MG> Our quandary is where to go to ask people with lots of clue on 
> >BGP4/eBGP to
> >:| >:| MG> tell us what the least expensive Cisco router we must buy to 
> >replace the
> >:| >:| MG> tired little 2600 series we currently have.  The router, which 
> >need not be
> >:| >:| MG> as race-car fast as a 7206VXR NPE400, should be able to take 
> >full routes,
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| Do you really need full tables?  For what you're doing, I doubt
> >:| >:| it.  If there is some weird reason why you do, how many full
> >:| >:| views will you take?
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| MG> so I am told it must have at least 128 meg memory, and it must 
> >be able to
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| Maybe.
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| MG> take a coax DS3 feed in to one card or module from the new 
> >provider, and a
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| Yes.  PA-T3 or PA-2T3.
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| MG> lowly DS1 serial port now from an AdTran TSU on the other side 
> >for one of
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| Keep the 2610 in service.
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| MG> the old DS1 providers, but be upgradeable someday to take a 
> >second DS3
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| No problem.
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| MG> card.  OF course, with a DS3 on one side, it has to have a 100base
> >:| >:| MG> ethernet, unlike our blessed little sturdy cheapie 2610 :-)
> >:| >:| MG>
> >:| >:| MG> Again, please forgive this perhaps off-topic question, but who 
> >knows better
> >:| >:| MG> which router can hit the double scores of least expensive and 
> >able to take
> >:| >:| MG> full BGP4 routes for a DS3 but you learned and knowledgeable folks?
> >:| >:| MG>
> >:| >:| MG> Thanks in advance, and any charitable response that you may be 
> >willing to
> >:| >:| MG> offer us will have our most humble thanks!
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| 7200 series would be best.  No need for VXR.
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:|
> >:| >:| Eddy
> >:| >:| --
> >:| >:| Brotsman & Dreger, Inc. - EverQuick Internet Division
> >:| >:| Bandwidth, consulting, e-commerce, hosting, and network building
> >:| >:| Phone: +1 (785) 865-5885 Lawrence and [inter]national
> >:| >:| Phone: +1 (316) 794-8922 Wichita
> >:| >:| _________________________________________________________________
> >:| >:|           DO NOT send mail to the following addresses :
> >:| >:|   blacklist at brics.com -or- alfra at intc.net -or- curbjmp at intc.net
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> 
> 
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