[c-nsp] BGP Router Considerations

[Gert Doering]

Hi,

On Wed, Mar 26, 2008 at 12:02:15PM -0400, Paul Stewart wrote:
> What I'm considering is removing the 12012 because of the space it consumes
> (does all BGP today) and replacing it with a pair of 7606's Sup720-3BXL etc
> 
> For BGP edge that's feeding 3 full BGP transit feeds and a couple hundred
> peering sessions will the Sup720-3BXL cope ok from a memory perspective.

The Sup720 is not very fast, regarding CPU wise (= BGP update handling)
but it will handle 3 full feeds just fine.

If you want a faster CPU, you might want to check the RSP720, but beware
(see below).

> The traffic is not a lot (500Mb/s or so) on this network . 

Traffic-wise, the Sup720 *is* fast :-)

> Thanks for any feedback.. We have lots of 6500's but everyone keeps telling
> me lately to go 7600 series instead??

Basically it's the same thing.  And with IOS 12.2SX*, there was no 
difference, except chassis colour.

Then came the 7600 business unit (BU) inside Cisco and decided "we're going
to sell Real Routers, can't have this switch chassis crap around!" and
forked a software train (12.2SRA/SRB/SRC) that nowadays doesn't run on 
chassis that are labeled "6500" anymore.  Just because they do an EEPROM
check.  Otherwise there is still no difference.

There is some new hardware - the RSP720, the ES20 line cards, and the 7600-S
chassis - that are *only* supported by SR* software.  OTOH, there are 
"LAN style" line cards, notably the 6708 8x10GE card, that only just
recently have been supported in SRC, and as far as I have heard, SRC is
not very mature yet.  Politely said.

OTOH, there is the 6500 business unit, that targets "enterprises" - their
IOS fork is 12.2SXH these days.  They build nice things that ISPs might
want to have as well, like "modular IOS with restartable processes in 
case BGP leaks memory" (and, in theory, upgrades-without-reboot, and such),
the Sup720-10G supervisor engine, and thus.

Until recently, buying a 7600+Sup720 and running SXF/SXH was what we 
considered "future proof" - you have a chassis that supports all the 
software that's out there, and are saved from the internal politics
bullshit.  Unfortunately, that's not completely true anymore - the 7600-S
chassis are NOT supported by SXH IOS, and as far as we have been told, 
there are no plans to do so.


So - what's the summary?  Cisco internal politics is hurting customers.
Whatever you decide upon, you'll be f***ed in a year or so.

Get a Juniper M7i.  For your traffic needs, it's definitely fast enough
- and the CPU to handle the BGP updates is much faster.

gert

-- 
USENET is *not* the non-clickable part of WWW!
                                                           //www.muc.de/~gert/
Gert Doering - Munich, Germany                             gert at greenie.muc.de
fax: +49-89-35655025                        gert at net.informatik.tu-muenchen.de
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