[f-nsp] Is there much to recommend an MLX?

[Aaron Wendel]

I think "cheap" is a relative term.  When you say "not cheap" do you mean
compared to a Cisco or Juniper equivalent?  That's a rhetorical question by
the way. :)

Recently I did a LOT of comparisons on different solutions for BGP speakers
from Extreme, Cisco, Foundry, Juniper, etc etc etc....

I found the Foundry XMR to be the best bang for the buck and since
installing a few in our network I would definitely recommend them.

Aaron


-----Original Message-----
From: foundry-nsp-bounces at puck.nether.net
[mailto:foundry-nsp-bounces at puck.nether.net] On Behalf Of Clint Chapman
Sent: Wednesday, December 03, 2008 2:21 PM
To: Ryan Harden
Cc: foundry-nsp at puck.nether.net; Dan Pinkard
Subject: Re: [f-nsp] Is there much to recommend an MLX?

Dan,

I am just going to toss out a quick vote for the XMR line. We have them
at our edge/backbone in 6 major cities here in the US and couldn't be
happier.

With that being said, they aren't cheap, but year end I am sure you can
close out a good deal :)

Thanks!
Clint


P.S. Good to see another foundry guy here in the mid-west (our office is in
Bloomington, IL)

On Wed, 2008-12-03 at 14:14 -0600, Ryan Harden wrote:
> We use the Foundry MLX platform in our Layer3/MPLS only statewide
> network. These boxes hold two full copies of the global BGP table as
> well as several other sessions with 10-100k prefixes each. There are 10
> routers total, all 'no route-only', all interconnected at 10G, and a mix
> of AC/DC power.
> 
> We are very happy with the MLX platform. We intend to turn IPv6 in the
> near future (a few weeks). We are using MPLS sparingly but VLL transport
> is solid. BGP runs on top of MPLS and is handled nicely.
> 
> The MLX/XMR is the first Foundry "backbone class" platform that I'm
> comfortable saying is an all around excellent product. Previous and
> lesser products are not as happy when doing both Layer2 and Layer3. Some
> are excellent Layer2 switches, some are excellent Layer3 switches, but
> not both at the same time. This is sometimes due to CAM
> sizing/partitioning, sometimes due to features not being supported. Some
> products have features like "These two features are supported, but not
> at the same time" which make them less desirable when used in a
> layer2/layer3 application. The MLX/XMR has a few of these as well, but
> nothing absolutely shocking. Well, maybe one or two....
> 
> We picked the MLX due to price as well as our rather large Foundry
> install base here at the Urbana campus. If I had to go back and respec,
> I would probably go with the XMR over the MLX due to the 2x CAM size. We
> are very familiar with the Foundry platform which also influenced our
> decision. Other options were explored but were either too expensive or
> were way over-sized for our needs. That being said, we are a state
> institution and are also bound to a RFP/Bid system that weighs cost
> almost as high as technical ability of a device.
> 
> /Ryan
> 
> Dan Pinkard wrote:
> > Time and time again I've gotten anecdotal recommendations that Foundry
should only be used for layer 2. I would like to open that up to a wider
audience with a perhaps more directed question:
> > 
> > What is there about the MLX platform that helps it compare to the
available offerings from Juniper/Cisco/etc? Why did you end up with that
gear other than just price? With the same options available, would you buy
it again?
> > 
> > (Please avoid the flamable aspects of that conversation)
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