[c-nsp] 3550 as a BGP Router

[Jon Lewis]

On Thu, 13 Sep 2007, Adrian Chadd wrote:

>> The ISP's would BGP peer and announce their own routes into it (<100) and
>> basically just take each others routes for a neutral peering situation.
>>
>> Would the 3550 handle that?  Number of routes here isn't an issue. but the
>> number of BGP sessions. what wise advice would people offer regarding that?
>
> You could always try. That said, for like $200 could you pick up a 2610
> or something similar off ebay as the route server and bypass the problem
> entirely.

How would you propose he connect a dozen ISPs to a 2610?

I suspect the 3550 would work (EMI software required) as long as the 
number of BGP routes is kept low (he mentioned <100 routes...if that's the 
total for all peers combined, I don't see a problem).  The switch has the 
advantage of plenty of ports (which can be configured as layer 3 ports) 
capable of wire-rate...unlike the 2600 series.

I've done iBGP and eBGP on a 3550, though this was only 2-3 peers and a 
handful of routes.  IIRC, the BGP command set on the 3550 is somewhat 
stripped down...but I can't remember exactly which features I think were 
missing.  I know from looking at the config, peer-groups, prefix-lists, 
and route-maps are supported.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
  Jon Lewis                   |  I route
  Senior Network Engineer     |  therefore you are
  Atlantic Net                |
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