[c-nsp] Best practice - Core vs Access Router

[Jon Lewis]

On Tue, 9 Feb 2010, Andy B. wrote:

> I am running one 6509 as a core router:
>
> IOS: SXF15a
> 1x WS-SUP720-3BXL
> 1x WS-X6748-GE-TX
> 2x WS-X6704-10GE
>
> On this core I am doing BGP with 2 upstreams (full BGP table IN) and
> 10 downstreams (full BGP table OUT).
> I am also doing OSPF with 4 other core routers in this AS.
>
> On top of that there is one VLAN on this core that serves as a default
> gateway for approximatively 5000 servers, producing around 30 GBps
> outbound traffic and 10 GBps inbound.

If all of that traffic is transiting between the 6748 and 6704s, is it 
possible you're filling (perhaps overfilling) the 40Gbps fabric the 6748 
has to the rest of the chassis during short traffic spikes?

With that much going on, I'm surprised you're using a single 6509 vs 
having things split between a pair or more of them.  Put some transit and 
some customers on each...that way if one has an issue, needs a software 
upgrade, etc., you can do a reload without the network going completely 
offline.  Or are you already doing that, and the troubled 6509 is just one 
of multiple?

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