Is it paradoxical to wonder what low-cost full table (or close to it) 400G options there are? An earlier thread looks like the Arista 7280QR-C36 is "almost" there for 100G at a reasonable $3k, but a quick look at 400G-capable goes up, well, 4x in price, though one does get fully into DFZ capable devices then. It seems like anything with more than low 6 digit route capability goes into full-scale multi-million capability, which is great technically, but not so great financially. ----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com
Juniper PTX 10001-36MR. I have no idea what these cost “on the street” now, but Juniper had great deals Dec 2024 on these. Or if you are purchasing in 2026, the Juniper MX301. This is probably the best “minimally viable 400G” router, as it pushes a bit farther than the FIB scale of the Arista stuff, but at the cost of relatively low 400G density. Tom
On Dec 14, 2025, at 11:02 PM, Mike Hammett via NANOG <nanog@lists.nanog.org> wrote:
Is it paradoxical to wonder what low-cost full table (or close to it) 400G options there are? An earlier thread looks like the Arista 7280QR-C36 is "almost" there for 100G at a reasonable $3k, but a quick look at 400G-capable goes up, well, 4x in price, though one does get fully into DFZ capable devices then.
It seems like anything with more than low 6 digit route capability goes into full-scale multi-million capability, which is great technically, but not so great financially.
----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com
Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com
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On 15/12/2025 09:13, Tom Samplonius via NANOG wrote:
Juniper PTX 10001-36MR. I have no idea what these cost “on the street” now, but Juniper had great deals Dec 2024 on these.
Or if you are purchasing in 2026, the Juniper MX301. This is probably the best “minimally viable 400G” router, as it pushes a bit farther than the FIB scale of the Arista stuff, but at the cost of relatively low 400G density.
If you don't mind not having Trio, the ACX7300 will give you 4x 400Gbps ports, each of which can also break out into lower speed ports. There is also the ACX7100, which will also do 4x (32C) and 6x (48L) 400Gbps ports. But these are 1U, non-modular chassis. The MX301 looks pretty sexy, but one will pay through the nose for that Trio chipset. I'm not sure how mature EdgeCore are now, but their AGR560 has 12x 400Gbps ports: https://www.edge-core.com/product/agr560/ Not a lot of 400Gbps options on the market at the moment that won't have you sacrificing something big. Mark.
- Lots of ports - Lots of FIB - Cheap Pick 2 On Mon, Dec 15, 2025 at 2:03 AM Mike Hammett via NANOG < nanog@lists.nanog.org> wrote:
Is it paradoxical to wonder what low-cost full table (or close to it) 400G options there are? An earlier thread looks like the Arista 7280QR-C36 is "almost" there for 100G at a reasonable $3k, but a quick look at 400G-capable goes up, well, 4x in price, though one does get fully into DFZ capable devices then.
It seems like anything with more than low 6 digit route capability goes into full-scale multi-million capability, which is great technically, but not so great financially.
----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com
Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com
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On 15/12/2025 14:52, Tom Beecher via NANOG wrote:
- Lots of ports - Lots of FIB - Cheap
Pick 2
It is really interesting that pluggables technology is outpacing "not a lack of" forwarding capacity, but accessibility. 25.6T (400G) and 51.2T (800G) chips are around in all shapes, sizes and prices, but getting a package of ports and a mature NOS in one chassis is proving to be quite the challenge when typical network operators need to grow beyond 100G, without having to mortgage the cows. 1.6T pluggables should make commercial landfall by Q3'26. I'm not sure router/switch vendors will have a compelling offer for operators outside of the cloud & content space by then, or even two years out following that. Mark.
*nods* Usually, I don't need lots of ports. Usually, just a few will do. That's the annoying thing: they usually come with (and I'm exaggerating to avoid getting caught up in minutiae) two high-speed ports or 50, but rarely six, eight, or ten. ----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tom Beecher" <beecher@beecher.cc> To: "North American Network Operators Group" <nanog@lists.nanog.org> Cc: "Mike Hammett" <nanog@ics-il.net> Sent: Monday, December 15, 2025 6:52:56 AM Subject: Re: Low Cost 400G?? * Lots of ports * Lots of FIB * Cheap Pick 2 On Mon, Dec 15, 2025 at 2:03 AM Mike Hammett via NANOG < nanog@lists.nanog.org > wrote: Is it paradoxical to wonder what low-cost full table (or close to it) 400G options there are? An earlier thread looks like the Arista 7280QR-C36 is "almost" there for 100G at a reasonable $3k, but a quick look at 400G-capable goes up, well, 4x in price, though one does get fully into DFZ capable devices then. It seems like anything with more than low 6 digit route capability goes into full-scale multi-million capability, which is great technically, but not so great financially. ----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com _______________________________________________ NANOG mailing list https://lists.nanog.org/archives/list/nanog@lists.nanog.org/message/XZVYJ7UT...
On 15/12/2025 15:43, Mike Hammett via NANOG wrote:
*nods* Usually, I don't need lots of ports. Usually, just a few will do.
That's the annoying thing: they usually come with (and I'm exaggerating to avoid getting caught up in minutiae) two high-speed ports or 50, but rarely six, eight, or ten.
The reduced density is because they know most customers need tons of 10G and 100G, compared to tons of 400G. So the 400G real estate is optimized for 100G (and lower) breakout in a small(er) form factor, rather than native 400G scale. For that, they'll be pushing you to a chassis with a gazillion line cards they can sell beautiful licenses on. Mark.
The Arista 7280 series has models with moderate amounts of high speed ports to go along with a larger number of lower speed ports, for example 7280CR3A-24D12 has 24x 100G and 12x 400G 7280CR3A-48D6 has 48x 100G and 6x 400G /Jesper On Mon, 15 Dec 2025 at 15:44, Mike Hammett via NANOG <nanog@lists.nanog.org> wrote:
*nods* Usually, I don't need lots of ports. Usually, just a few will do.
That's the annoying thing: they usually come with (and I'm exaggerating to avoid getting caught up in minutiae) two high-speed ports or 50, but rarely six, eight, or ten.
----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com
Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com
----- Original Message ----- From: "Tom Beecher" <beecher@beecher.cc> To: "North American Network Operators Group" <nanog@lists.nanog.org> Cc: "Mike Hammett" <nanog@ics-il.net> Sent: Monday, December 15, 2025 6:52:56 AM Subject: Re: Low Cost 400G??
* Lots of ports * Lots of FIB * Cheap
Pick 2
On Mon, Dec 15, 2025 at 2:03 AM Mike Hammett via NANOG < nanog@lists.nanog.org > wrote:
Is it paradoxical to wonder what low-cost full table (or close to it) 400G options there are? An earlier thread looks like the Arista 7280QR-C36 is "almost" there for 100G at a reasonable $3k, but a quick look at 400G-capable goes up, well, 4x in price, though one does get fully into DFZ capable devices then.
It seems like anything with more than low 6 digit route capability goes into full-scale multi-million capability, which is great technically, but not so great financially.
----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com
Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com
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*wave* Long time no chat! I hope all is well with you and yours. -Darrel
On Dec 15, 2025, at 5:59 AM, Jesper Skriver via NANOG <nanog@lists.nanog.org> wrote:
The Arista 7280 series has models with moderate amounts of high speed ports to go along with a larger number of lower speed ports, for example 7280CR3A-24D12 has 24x 100G and 12x 400G 7280CR3A-48D6 has 48x 100G and 6x 400G
/Jesper
On Mon, 15 Dec 2025 at 15:44, Mike Hammett via NANOG <nanog@lists.nanog.org> wrote:
*nods* Usually, I don't need lots of ports. Usually, just a few will do.
That's the annoying thing: they usually come with (and I'm exaggerating to avoid getting caught up in minutiae) two high-speed ports or 50, but rarely six, eight, or ten.
----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com
Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com
----- Original Message ----- From: "Tom Beecher" <beecher@beecher.cc> To: "North American Network Operators Group" <nanog@lists.nanog.org> Cc: "Mike Hammett" <nanog@ics-il.net> Sent: Monday, December 15, 2025 6:52:56 AM Subject: Re: Low Cost 400G??
* Lots of ports * Lots of FIB * Cheap
Pick 2
On Mon, Dec 15, 2025 at 2:03 AM Mike Hammett via NANOG < nanog@lists.nanog.org > wrote:
Is it paradoxical to wonder what low-cost full table (or close to it) 400G options there are? An earlier thread looks like the Arista 7280QR-C36 is "almost" there for 100G at a reasonable $3k, but a quick look at 400G-capable goes up, well, 4x in price, though one does get fully into DFZ capable devices then.
It seems like anything with more than low 6 digit route capability goes into full-scale multi-million capability, which is great technically, but not so great financially.
----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com
Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com
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participants (6)
-
Darrel Lewis -
Jesper Skriver -
Mark Tinka -
Mike Hammett -
Tom Beecher -
Tom Samplonius