[c-nsp] data center/mpls/vpls

[Aaron]

Thanks Andrew....

Q1 - Why do you want MPLS on the top of rack switch?
A1 - L2VPN's...L3VPN's...  Yes, 10 feet away is my Cisco ASR9006 MPLS PE
edge box, so yes I could simply do 802.1q from tor switch to that 9k and
then jump into mpls LxVPN's there.....perhaps this would be a way for me to
keep the cost down on the TOR switch.

Q2 - Do you need 1G, or 10G interfaces, and how many of them?  Why do you
need 5? Would something like a pair of 5Ks and FEXs not do what you are
after?
A2 - 10G and about 5 of them per switch.  (2) Data Centers, with (2)
cabinets each.  So (4) TOR switches....and we spare one of everything we
have for quick disaster recovery incase of outage.... so 5

Q3 - IIRC, the HP 5900s only support 16K routes - which could be a problem
on an MPLS network.  
A3 - My MPLS network is just that, mine.  I am a small ISP.  I own the whole
mpls network....currently 209 routes....it will grow, but not to thousands.
And if I do ospf area's and route summarization at area boundaries down the
road, I could probably still keep route table small.

3600#sh ip route summ | in Route|Total
Route Source    Networks    Subnets     Replicates  Overhead    Memory
(bytes)
Total           4           209         0           12900       47784

Q3.1 - Can't you just trunk the various VLANs back to a PE/ pair of PEs?
A3.1 - yes, I could.... should I?  Would you/you all prefer mpls to the ToR
edge to jump into and out of mpls LxVPN's right there?  Or is it not worth
paying for?  Seems reminiscent of ATM....and the powers realized by getting
atm closer and closer to the edge...but then always wondering, perhaps I
could simply just vlan into the atm lane elan/pvc/pvp and be done with it.
Hmmmm

Q4 - I think the QFX will be too expensive for your budget. IIRC, the
EX4500s also have the not enough routes supported issue....
A4 - 209 routes currently.  I see EX4550 does mpls.  Don't know how much it
costs though...gonna talk to Juniper this morning in webex.  Is ex4550 a
good box?

Aaron 


-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Miehs [mailto:andrew at 2sheds.de] 
Sent: Monday, April 15, 2013 1:08 AM
To: Aaron
Cc: cisco-nsp at puck.nether.net
Subject: Re: [c-nsp] data center/mpls/vpls

On 13/04/2013, at 12:57 AM, Aaron <aaron1 at gvtc.com> wrote:

> I would like mpls capability in it.  Does anyone say that 
> mpls/vpls/l3vpn/l2vpn is good to top of rack data center level?  Seems 
> like more flexibility and strength to me with using all those nice mpls
features.

Why do you want MPLS on the top of rack switch?

> I would like a pair of top-of-rack devices that can mirror one another 
> if possible too, like cisco's 6509-vss thing.or at least like nexus 
> vpc (multichassis link aggregation/bundling)
> 

The Nexus 5Ks are pretty cheap and good if you only need L2.

> What vendor has something that can do all that?  Oh, I'm trying to 
> stay around $75K for 5 of them.

Do you need 1G, or 10G interfaces, and how many of them?
Why do you need 5? Would something like a pair of 5Ks and FEXs not do what
you are after?


> HP tells me their 5900/5920 can do most of this and mpls is on roadmap 
> for end of year.l3vpn, maybe l2vpn beyond that.

IIRC, the HP 5900s only support 16K routes - which could be a problem on an
MPLS network.
Can't you just trunk the various VLANs back to a PE/ pair of PEs?

> Juniper ?  don't know.but I see on their web site something about 
> QFX3500, EX4500, EX4550 but haven't look at them yet.

I think the QFX will be too expensive for your budget. IIRC, the EX4500s
also have the not enough routes supported issue....




Regards

Andrew